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Irma La Douce was released on this day in 1963

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IRMA (ER-muh)

1. Irma la Douce: 1963 film starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine

2. Irma Rombauer: Author of “The Joy of Cooking”

Common clues: ____ la Douce; Role for Shirley; Shirley MacLaine role; Early Shirley role; “The Joy of Cooking” author Rombauer; Cookbook author Rombauer

Crossword puzzle frequency: 5 times a year

Frequency in English language: 49709 / 86800

Video: Dancing on the pool table


Irma La Douce: A painter once lived here. Poor guy, he was starving. Tried everything, even cut his ear off.

Nestor Patou: Van Gogh?

Irma La Douce: No, I think his name was Schwartz.


Irma la Douce is a 1956 French stage musical whose book and lyrics were written by Alexandre Breffort with music by Marguerite Monnot.



The musical tells the story of an impoverished law student, Nestor le Fripé, who falls in love with a prostitute, Irma la Douce, and becomes her protector and dependent. Through jealousy of her clients he disguises himself as a rich older man who visits and pays Irma for conversation and becomes her only client. Nestor becomes exhausted with working hard enough to make enough money for Irma to support him and decides that the only way out of his mess is to destroy his alter ego. When the older man disappears, Nestor is convicted of murder and sent to Devil's Island but he escapes and returns to Irma when he hears that she is pregnant. He manages to prove his innocence of murder by briefly assuming his disguise once more and all ends well.


It was adapted by Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond into a 1963 comedy film directed by Wilder and featuring Jack Lemmon as Nestor, Shirley MacLaine as Irma, Lou Jacobi and Grace Lee Whitney. The story was altered to make Nestor a naive policeman who unwittingly becomes a pimp only after being fired from his job when he raids a house of prostitution and finds his superior there.


Though the film is not a musical, it won André Previn an Academy Award for Original Music Score. There is also a scene in the film in which Shirley MacLaine exclaims "Dis-donc!" whilst dancing on a table and which appears to be a deliberate tribute to the musical from which the film is derived.


The film was nominated for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Shirley MacLaine) and Best Cinematography, Color.





Irma Starkloff Rombauer (30 October 1877 - 14 October 1962) was the author of The Joy of Cooking. It is one of the world's most-published cookbooks, having been in print continuously since 1936. She graduated from the all-girls preparatory school Mary Institute in 1901 and later attended Washington University in St. Louis. Rombauer privately published the The Joy of Cooking in 1931 in St. Louis, Missouri. It was illustrated by her daughter Marion Rombauer Becker, also a graduate of Mary Institute (1931) and at the time an art teacher at local private school John Burroughs School. The Rombauers self-published early editions of the book; it was picked up by a commercial printing house, the Bobbs-Merrill Company, in 1936.


In 1998, Irma Rombauer was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame.





This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Irma la Douce"  and “Irma Rombauer”.


IRMA (337) 74 Tu >1 09 "___ la Douce"

29 We- >1 09 "___ La Douce"

20 We >1 09 "The Joy of Cooking" author Rombauer

15 We- >1 04 Cookbook author Rombauer

14 >1 99 "My Friend ___"

9 Th >1 05 Role for Shirley

8 We- >1 08 Cookbook writer Rombauer

7 Th >1 07 1963 role for Shirley

7 Th >1 05 Cookery's Rombauer

6 We+ >1 08 Rombauer of cookbook fame

3 Fr >1 05 "Garfield" waitress

3 We- >1 04 "My Friend" of old radio

04 "The Joy Of Cooking" author Rombauer

3 We- >1 08 "The Mystery of ___ Vep" (Charles Ludlam play)

3 Tu NYT 09 "___ la Douce" (1963 film)

3 Tu NYT 08 "___ la Douce," 1963 film

3 Tu+ >1 96 "___la Douce"

3 We+ >1 06 '___ la Douce'

09 Cookbook compiler Rombauer

3 Th- >1 07 Early Shirley role

3 Th+ >1 04 Hogwarts librarian Pince

3 We CSy 09 La Douce in a movie

3 Th- >1 03 La Douce of film

3 Th NYT 93 Marie Wilson role

3 Th NYT 98 Soprano in "Louise"