Starring Betty Hutton, Arturo de Cordova, Bill Goodwin, and Barry Fitzgerald
Directed by George Marshall
Music and Lyrics by various
Our first of three Women's History Month movies is also the first of two vehicles we'll be seeing featuring energetic comedienne Betty Hutton. Of the four biographies she appeared in, this one might suit her the most. Texas Guinin lived a colorful life from the late 1900's through the early 1930's, working everything from rodeos to Broadway to films, ending up as "queen of the nightclubs" in the 20's, singing and talking to the customers in her own lavish speakeasies. How well does the film do with depicting her wild Roaring Twenties world? Let's begin with the rodeo coming to Waco, Texas, and find out...
The Story: Texas Gunian (Hutton) may be a goofy tomboy, but she's no fool. The new owner of the rodeo, Bill Romero Kilgallon (de Cordova), is so impressed when she manages to stay on a bucking bronco, he hires her on the spot...and she holds out for more money. Press agent Tim Callahan (Goodwin) is even more so after he sees her act "rescuing" a child. She's in love with Kilgallon, but he's married to an invalid. She ends up going off to become a Broadway star with Callahan, but then follows her old friend Cherokee Jim (Charlie Ruggles) to Hollywood to become a movie star.
She does well, getting back together with Bill to make their own features, but Bill runs afoul of gangsters and ends up convincing Texas to sell out and get the money. Back in New York, Texas has few prospects until she inadvertently discovers how well she can handle a nightclub crowd. Her songs and talking directly to them jazzes up speakeasy-goers and brings in the crowds. Unfortunately, they also attract gangster Joe Cadden (Albert Dekker), who takes over the club and Texas' contract. Texas is still a smash, and with Bill's wife having passed on, she's hoping to marry him...but his getting caught between warring gangsters and her realizing she has a terminal illness makes them realize how impossible that is.
The Song and Dance: When she's allowed to do the rip-roaring comedy that she does best, Hutton has way too much fun here. This may be the biographical role that suited her best. Guinan was a tough-talking tomboy who lived one of the most colorful lives of the early 20th century, not too far from Hutton herself. She really throws herself into Guinan's trademark nightclub patter and that bucking bronco in the opening. Great production, too, with gorgeous Edith Head costumes and some nice Technicolor cinematography, especially in the first half.
The Numbers: We open with Texas singing "Ragtime Cowboy Joe" with her siblings as they watch the rodeo parade. We get montage of Texas moving up from chorus line cutie to featured dancer to a star with shows based around her, including the (rather stereotypical) African spoof "Oh By Jingo" with her shaking her hips in feathers among "natives." "What Do You Want to Make Those Eyes at Me For?" is a more romantic roundelay, with Hutton in a massive lavender gown and picture hat singing to a handsome leading man.
Texas joins three acrobats throwing each other around to ad-lib and get herself kicked out of the show...but them throwing her around turns out to be so hilarious, she ends up staying in the show. She gets the energetic "Row Row Row," turning a fur coat and a table into a boat and sweetheart, while black pianist Maurice Rocco earns the contract Texas gives him with his incredible instrumental "Darktown Strutters Ball." Texas sings "It Had to Be You" on New Year's Eve, right before she and Bill are supposed to get married.
What I Don't Like: It's true that Texas Guinan did start out in wild west shows, she did make silent movies at her own production company (and two sound features, one of which is currently lost), and she was "the queen of the nightclubs" who resurrected her career singing and mingling with the crowds in the speakeasies she owned. Her life was even more colorful than that, with her clubs frequently getting raided, her telling truth-skirting interviews to the press, and her living with two men for years without marrying either. Her only known legal husband bore no resemblance to either de Cordova or Goodwin, both of whom are dull in thankless love interest roles. Only Fitzgerald as her Irish father who is even more inclined to embroider the truth comes anywhere near Hutton.
The Big Finale: Despite the heavy cliches, this is colorful enough to rate a look if you're a fan of Hutton or the big bright Technicolor musicals of the mid-late 40's.
Home Media: To my knowledge, this is currently only available on YouTube in a blurry copy taped from a TCM showing.
