When the U.S. negotiated a military alliance with the dictatorship of Francisco Franco to put American soldiers on Spanish soil, the chief hurdle they faced, according to an account in the Saturday Evening Post, was “the Spaniard’s well-known pride.” The Americans would go on to install the longest runway in Europe at the Torrejón Air base outside Madrid, providing a launching point for bombers making reconnaissance missions to the Soviet border. But they sought to keep a low profile. A Spain overrun with “spendthrift American airmen squiring the prettiest señoritas and showing up their poorly laid, poorly accoutered Spanish confreres” would put the hard-fought alliance at risk.
In February 1959, an executive from Loews International Corporation wrote to Spain’s Director General of Cinema to request permission to shoot sections of a new film, “It Started with a Kiss,” in Spain. In the film, air force sergeant Joe Fitzpatrick (Glenn Ford), about to ship off for Torrejón, falls for a feisty showgirl he sees at a charity event. She is selling raffle tickets for a futuristic red Lincoln convertible and hoping to meet a millionaire suitor. Meanwhile, Joe pesters her to go out with him. By the next day they are married.
The trouble starts, however, when his new bride Maggie (Debbie Reynolds) arrives in Spain along with the red convertible they won from Joe’s raffle ticket. She resists the stuffy discipline at the base and draws the gaze of a famous bullfighter, while U.S. officials fear the unwanted attention the flashy car is receiving from the locals.
Most of the film had already been completed in Hollywood, but the producers wanted to add real Spanish locations. The car provided an excuse for a road trip, showcasing busy Madrid shopping streets, a gypsy wedding overlooking the Alhambra, the Roman aqueduct of Segovia, and, of course, a bullfight. Debbie Reynolds, besieged by tabloid coverage of her divorce from Eddie Fisher, who left her for Elizabeth Taylor, was grateful to leave the country for a while.
But in order to film in Spain, producers were required to submit the script for review to the state board of censors. On the first pass it was rejected outright. Like any romantic comedy, the script was filled with sexual innuendos and comedic misunderstandings, and the censors derided its “vodevilesco” tone. However, what most concerned them was the portrayal of Spanish society and the many references to Spanish poverty, through jokes about old cars, unreliable buses, and substandard hotels. The film “becomes offensive,” they warned, “and above all, it denotes total ignorance of our feelings.”
The producers returned with a revised script with the most offensive lines removed. Instead of Spanish officials complaining about the luxury car driving around Madrid (the censors found this implausible), it was a bumbling delegation of U.S. Senators, waging a campaign against misuse of government funds, who raised the alarm.
A few stereotypes, such as the womanizing matador, remained and the censors continued to disparage the script as a cheap “españolada.” But the shoot was allowed to proceed, with a few additional cuts. In one deleted scene, a Spaniard slaps Reynolds’ character on the rear end while commenting that such behavior is considered a compliment in Spain. The censors also required that the U.S. base be given a fictional name to avoid any direct reference to the real thing.
The completed film appeared in U.S. theaters in September 1959, but it never opened in Spain. A theatrical release would have entailed another censorship review of the final film and, almost certainly, would have required further cuts. Despite the previous changes made to appease the censors, the film retained suggestive lines and references to adultery that were prohibited on Spanish screens.
While the film played in the U.S., it was considered racy there too
The release of the film came at a critical time for the relationship between Spain and the U.S. The following December, President Eisenhower traveled to Madrid, the first official visit of any American president to the country. For Franco, the visit represented a powerful endorsement after years of international isolation and a turning point for economic development in Spain. While Spanish officials remained highly sensitive to how their country was portrayed to outsiders, films like “It Started with a Kiss,” for all its stereotypes, helped usher in a boom in American tourism and investment in Spain over the following decade.
