The curtain rises as the Overture fills the theatre. The audience is greeted with a swimming pool in which a dead body is floating. The body is pulled out of the pool, and carried across the stage on a stretcher. A man appears and begins to sing (I Guess it was 5 A.M.). We later discover this is Joe Gillis.
Flashback to six months ago. Joe is at Paramout Studios, full of phony, selfish people who are making dates with each other they don’t intend to keep (Let’s Have Lunch). Joe is a writer, and he’s having trouble finding work. He meets Betty Schaefer, a production assistant who read a story he wrote and wants him to develop it into a script. She wants to meet with him to discuss it. He isn’t too enthused but agrees after she helps him escape from the guys who are trying to repossess his car. Unfortunately, he doesn’t escape very well, and there is a big Car Chase scene. Joe loses the guys, but blows a tire. He pulls into the empty garage of a mansion on Sunset Boulevard and is mistaken by the butler and the inhabitant of the mansion (who we hear but don’t see) as the pet undertaker, as the pet monkey of the woman who lives there has just died. Joe is shown into the house, where a woman is waiting. She bids farewell to her monkey (Surrender) and then Joe tells her that he’s not the undertaker. She orders him out, but he recognizes her as Norma Desmond, a faded movie star. She tells him about the decline of Hollywood since the introduction of sound in pictures, and how she, as a silent film star, could say everything she needed With One Look. She discovers Joe is a writer, and tells him that she is writing a script for herslef to star in (her “return”) and she wants him to edit it. He doesn’t want to, but she offers him a lot of money, so he agrees, and moves into the mansion. The only other person living in the mansion (that we ever meet) is Norma’s butler, Max, a really creepy guy who lurks in the shadows and always appears when you least expect it. Max shows Joe to his room above the garage, and is insulted when Joe says Norma is “quite a character”. Max tells Joe that Norma is The Greatest Star of All.
The next evening, Joe goes to his meeting with Betty, which is at Schwabb’s drugstore (Every Movie’s a Circus). Joe meets up with his best friend, Artie Green, who, it turns out, is engaged to Betty. Betty and Joe have their meeting, and he’s really condescending to her. He tells her that he can’t write the script with her, but she’s welcome to go ahead and write it. (Girl Meets Boy) Artie invites Joe to his New Year’s Eve party, and we see the attraction between Joe and Betty start. Joe says he’ll come.
Back at the mansion, Joe and Norma watch one of her old movies (New Ways to Dream). Joe begins to understand Norma better, and sees what the rejection of the “public” has done to her. He feels sorry for her, so he agrees to stay after the script is finished until they hear from Paramount. For his birthday, Norma gives Joe a makeover (The Lady’s Paying) which at first he doesn’t appreciate, but he soon gets into it. Norma convinces Joe to come to her New Year’s Eve party-she’s invited lots of people and needs his support.
The evening of the party, Joe and Norma share a dance before the guests arrive (The Perfect Year). Norma tells Joe that there are no other guests, she has set the whole thing up to have a romantic evening with him. She tells him she loves him. He tries to let her down easily, she slaps him and tells him to get out. He gets mad, stomrs out and goes to Artie’s, where the party is in full swing (This Time Next Year). Joe tells Betty that he is available after all to write the script with her, and we find out that Artie is going to Tennessee to shoot a movie. Joe calls the mansion to tell them he is moving out, and Max tells him that Norma tried to kill herself, using Joe’s razor. Joe races back to the mansion, where he tells Norma that he didn’t want to hurt her (New Year’s Eve-Back at the House on Sunset). As the first act ends, Joe goes over to the sofa where Norma is lying, and kisses her. It is pretty obvious what is going to happen!
As the second act begins, Joe is sitting next to the pool, wearing a really hot suit, sunglasses and drinking some silly looking tropical drink. He sings directly to the audience (which he does a lot during the show), telling how he’s tired of doing things the hard way, and he’s willing to let Norma make things easy for him (Sunset Boulevard). Norma comes out of the house and tells him that Paramount has called and they want to meet with her. She is thrilled that they want to shoot her script, and takes Joe “upstairs”. They go to Paramount, where Norma meets up with Cecil B. DeMille. She enjoys her triumphant return to the studio (As If We Never Said Goodbye), but Joe and Max are outside learning that they don’t want to shoot her script (which is awful) but they just want to use her car in a movie. Max makes Joe promise he won’t tell Norma. Joe meets up with Betty, and they agree to meet to work on the script. Norma leaves, and DeMille has a moment remembering her glory (Surrender – Reprise).
Joe and Betty meet, and work on the script. Their attraction to each other grows, and they almost kiss.
Norma throws herself into getting ready to shoot her movie, with doctors, beauticians, astrologers, etc….(Eternal Youth is
Worth a Little Suffering). Norma has found Joe’s script with Betty’s phone number, and she confronts him. He responds that Betty is only a friend, and that he hasn’t done anything. He then leaves the mansion for his final meeting with Betty. They finish the script, then Betty tells Joe that Artie wants her to come to Tennessee to get married. Joe and Betty admit their feelings for each other (Too Much in Love to Care). They kiss pretty passionately, and run off together.
When Joe returns to the mansion, he has an extra bounce in his step. 🙂 He is met by Max, who says that he will never let Norma be destroyed. (New Ways to Dream – Reprise) We discover that Max used to be married to Norma, and he was the director who discovered her and made her a star.
Joe goes into the mansion, and finds Norma on the phone with Betty. Joe grabs the phone and tells Betty to come to the mansion so that he can tell her the truth. In The Final Scene Norma panics and runs upstairs. As Joe steels himself for the coming encounter with several drinks. Norma reappears at the top of the stairs with a gun in her hand. She hides from Joe as Betty arrives. Joe is deliberately mean to Betty, telling her that he doesn’t want to leave his cushy life with Norma, and she should go back to Artie. Betty rushes out, and Joe is overcome with the horror of what he has done. Norma comes down the stairs, thanking him. He rushes past her and returns carrying his typewriter and suitcase. He tells Norma he’s leaving her, and she says that “no one ever leaves a star.” She shoots him in the back several times. He stumbles out onto the patio, and falls into the pool and we realize that the body we saw at the beginning was Joe. We go back to the interior of the house, which is now full of police, reporters, etc. Norma appears at the top of the stairs, obviously unaware of who or where she is. She thinks she is filming her movie, and has to take a moment to thank Mr. Demille. She strides down to centre stage, and is “ready for her closeup.”