Abstract
The Hollywood film musical, as the quintessential genre of entertainment, is usually considered in European cinema studies as a model for considering how European cinema has defined itself in relation to a Hollywood product. This article traces the beginnings of this critical journey by analysing a specific European reaction, in this case, French, to two Hollywood musicals, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Hawks, 1953) and Funny Face (Donen, 1957). Both these musicals place their female heroines in Paris as American tourists. The cultural transactions involved in watching a Hollywood product in France are thus illustrated on as well as beyond the cinema screen. This allows us to consider the ways in which Hollywood constructs a specific European screen identity and how this identity offers differing pleasures to the musicals' stars and audiences.
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