Rosalie

MGM, 1937
Directed by W.S Van Dyke
Starring Nelson Eddy, Eleanor Powell, Frank Morgan, and Ray Bolger
Music and Lyrics by Cole Porter

The Story: Dick Thorpe (Eddy) is the Army's biggest football star. He's not as popular with Vassar College student Rosalie (Powell), who finds him to be conceited. She changes her mind when he starts courting her and singing at her window, with the help of his bench warmer buddy Bill Delroy (Bolger). They've barely started dating when Rosalie is called back to her home country of Romanza for its big festival. Turns out that Rosalie is actually the princess of Romanza, and is engaged to marry Prince Paul (Tom Rutherford). No one is happy with the arrangement but the dour Queen (Edna May Oliver). Paul is more interested in the Queen's lady-in-waiting Brenda (Illona Massey), and the King prefers working on his ventriloquist act to ruling a country. Dick takes off when he learns of Rosalie's engagement, but Bill knows he's unhappy. It'll take a revolution - and Rosalie and the King learning to speak for themselves - to finally reunite these lovers back at West Point.

The Song and Dance: Let's get things out of the way first - this movie is BIG. MGM was trying to outdo Warners' Busby Berkley musicals and it's own earlier spectacles, and they succeeded at that. Almost every musical number seems to be accompanied by hundreds of extras and sets that could probably dwarf four of the football field Eddy and Bolger played on early in the film. Only the biggest, most popular movie factory in Hollywood could have put together something like this at the height of the Great Depression.

Eddy's notorious for being rather stiff, but he actually comes off well enough as the dashing quarterback. Bolger's less believable as a football player, but he does get a good solo later in the film and a couple of nice scenes with Eddy and Powell. Morgan and Oliver are really fun as the flustered ruler who would rather be performing, and the haughty queen who just wants him to pay attention to his country.

Trivia: Cole Porter reportedly wrote the title song as a joke when MGM studio head Louis B. Mayer asked him to write a song with a girl's title. Porter came up with the drippiest song he could imagine...then saw Mayer have the last laugh when it became a hit.

Rosalie was originally a Broadway musical in 1928, with music by George Gershwin and Sigmund Romberg and lyrics by Ira Gershwin. While most of the original plot (and Frank Morgan) were retained, the songs were dropped.

According to Richard Barrios in his book A Song In the Dark, this was actually MGM's second try at filming Rosalie. The first was in 1929, with Marion Davies as the title character. William Randolph Hearst finally decided it wasn't working out and pulled the plug, and the studio shelved the script for nearly a decade.

Favorite Number: The second version of the title song is amazing, with literally thousands of extras watching Powell's incredible tap dance on giant drums. It must be seen to be believed. No wonder Eddy looked so amazed. Speaking of Eddy, his "In the Still of the Night" was so darn hot, I'm surprised Powell wasn't a puddle on the soundstage when he finished. His "It's All Over but the Shouting" is also nice, as is another big dance routine for Powell and the chorus late in the film when she's posing as a cadet at West Point.

What I Don't Like: Down-to-Earth Powell is too American to be anyone's idea of a Balkan princess. The story is a rather awkward mix of standard 20's operetta and standard 20's musical comedy, with a fairy-tale kingdom and Eddy's operetta ballads stuffed alongside a college musical with military overtones and Powell's huge tap routines. The movie can be too big at times, to the point of completely overwhelming its fairy-tale story. Critics then and now carped about the lightweight plot collapsing under the sheer size of it all.

The Big Finale: Worth seeing for the "Rosalie" drums number and "In the Still of the Night." Look for it at the Warner Archives and on TCM if you're a fan of the cast or Porter's music and can get around the overblown production.

Closing Credits: DVD