Strike Me Pink

Goldwyn/United Artists, 1936

Starring Eddie Cantor, Ethel Merman, Sailly Eilers, and Harry Einstein (Parkyakarkus) 

Directed by Norman Taurog

Music by Harold Arlen; Lyrics by Lew Brown

By the mid-30's, the Goldwyn/Cantor extravaganzas weren't the only game in town for merriment. Berkeley had moved to Warners, while the Production Code ensured that the Goldwyn Girls could no longer show skin and Cantor's blackface numbers couldn't be quite so suggestive. Musicals had come back into fashion, and now every studio was creating lavish spectaculars featuing big numbers with lots of pretty girls. How does Cantor's last movie for Goldwyn reflect these changes? Let's begin, not with Cantor, but with college student Butch Carson (Gordon Jones) as he defends a smaller student from bullies, and find out...

The Story: Butch is a sweet guy, but he's not very bright. He turns to his friend Eddie Pink (Cantor), the owner of the tailor shop where he studies, to help him ace his final exams. He was supposed to take over managing his mother Hattie Carson's (Helene Lowell) amusement park, but joins the Navy instead. Eddie, who has read a book on how to be more assertive, gallantly agrees to take the job.

He instantly regrets it when he realizes that a group of gangsters led by Mr. Couple (William Frawley) have been pushing to have their illegal slot machines in the amusement park and have killed all of Eddie's predecessors. He manages to avoid their bullets and hypnotize one of their men, though he doesn't have much luck dodging his meddling bodyguard Parkyakarkus (Einstein). His crush on nightclub singer Joyce Lennox (Merman) may be what does him in when she convinces him that she killed a man. He'll do anything to help her, but even he thinks there's something going on when gangsters phony ghosts who can burp and play cards start chasing him and Parkyakarkus all over the amusement park!

The Song and Dance: Cantor dominates this from start to finish. He does get some good routines, especially when he's hypnotizing gangsters or convincing them he's impervious to their bullets. (I also appreciate that this is one of two Goldwyn movies where he doesn't end up in blackface, not even to avoid the mob.) Eliers gets a few good lines as his disbelieving secretary, and Frawley's a decent menacing gangster. Goldwyn's usual lavishness gives us gorgeous gowns for the ladies and location shooting at the long-gone The Pike amusement pier in Long Beach, California. 

Favorite Number: Taurog begins Merman's nightclub number "First You Have Me High" with a striking shot of her in black, with just her white face surrounded by a dark background. This eventually becomes dozens of dancing Goldwyn Girls who are joined by handsome partners as they swirl around her. Cantor admires comely Dona Drake and the Goldwyn Girls as they swirl across the stage, singing about how "The Lady Dances." Merman and Cantor sing on the Ferris wheel about how he'll be smoking a "Calabash Pipe" when they grow old together, despite her having no real interest in him. Merman gets to solo on the peppier "Shake It Off With Rhythm," this time joined by Sunnie O'Dea and the Goldwyn Girls tapping to their mirrored reflections.

Trivia: Look for a young Brian Donlevy among the thugs threatening Eddie. 

What I Don't Like: No one besides Cantor and the gangsters really have all that much to do. Merman is top-billed with Cantor, but other than her numbers and luring Eddie with her phony murder story during the middle of the movie, she's barely there. You think Jones will be a prominent character, from what a big deal they make over Eddie helping Butch out in the opening, but he vanishes after ten minutes and is neither seen, nor heard from again. Harold Arlen and Lew Brown's songs are lovely, but not that memorable.

The Big Finale: Fine for major fans of Cantor or Merman. Casual viewers will want to start with one of his earlier, better-received vehicles like The Kid from Spain or Roman Scandals. 

Home Media: Once again, easily found on streaming and DVD, the latter from the Warner Archives.

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Amazon Prime

The Kid from Spain

Samuel Goldywn/United Artists, 1932

Starring Eddie Cantor, Lyda Roberti, Robert Young, and Ruth Hall

Directed by Leo McCarey

Music by Bert Kalmar; Lyrics by Harry Ruby

This week, we're returning to the wild world of comedian Eddie Cantor with two more of his vehicles for producer Samuel Goldwyn. Cantor's wacky movies were the height of escapist entertainment during the worst years of the Great Depression. Between his stage appearances, his annual movie in November or December, and his radio show, Cantor was one of the biggest stars in the world at this point. Does he live up to that legacy here, or should this movie be chased off by a bull? Let's begin very far from Spain in an oversized college room ala Goldwyn and find out...

The Story: Eddie Williams (Cantor) and his friend Ricardo (Young) are expelled from college after Ricardo gets his friend drunk and leaves him in the women's dormitory. As they figure out what to do next, Eddie accidentally finds himself mixed up in a bank robbery and forced to drive the criminals to Mexico. To Eddie's horror, he learns there's a detective (Robert Emmett O'Connor) who's hot on his trail. 

He reunites with Ricardo in Mexico and poses as Don Sebastian II, a great bullfighter, to avoid being caught. This has its own problems. Eddie tries to help Ricardo win sweet Anita Gomez (Hall), but she's promised to Pancho (John Miljan). Meanwhile, her sister Rosalie (Roberti) falls for Eddie, but she's already involved with the bandit Pedro (J. Carrol Naish). Eddie's going to have to fight that bull whether he likes it or not in order to avoid the authorities and prove to everyone that he has what it takes to be a real fighter. 

The Song and Dance: This wild bit of Hollywood fantasy benefits from Cantor's nutty brand of humor, Goldwyn's typical largess, and delightful directorial touches from both McCarey and Busby Berkeley. Berkeley's signature style is all over this movie, from the sexy (and extraneous) opening number in the pool to the big "What a Perfect Combination" number at the night club. Roberti more than matches Cantor with her odd accent and equally manic energy, while J. Carrol Naish has fun as the menacing bandit who doesn't like Eddie messing around with his girl.

Favorite Number: And we open in that girls' dormitory with their big number, "But We Must Rise (The College Song," as they begin their morning routine. Somehow their morning routine includes doing formations for an overhead camera in a huge pool and descending down a slide to their dorm room. After Eddie gets to Mexico, he sings about all the naughty things that happen "In the Moonlight" as he passes couples. 

"Look What You've Done" Eddie fusses to the delighted Rosalie as she tells him she's in love and he admits he's got a lot more on his mind than romance. Dancer Grace Poggi does a brief flamenco to an instrumental song before Eddie turns up in blackface for his big routine. "What a Perfect Combination" he claims as Goldwyn Girls in black and white lace Mexican-style outfits dance and make formations around him. 

Trivia: Real-life American matador Sidney Franklin is seen showing off his actual skills in the ring right before Eddie comes out.

What I Don't Like: This is pure Hollywood fantasy, even for Goldwyn. None of the Mexicans are played by anyone who looks or sounds remotely Mexican, including Young and Hall. Hall is so dull she fades into the woodwork. Young's having a little more fun as Eddie's more dashing friend. The songs aren't bad, but they're far from Kalmar and Ruby's best. There's also all the skin shown during that (completely extraneous) opening number, and Cantor turning up in his signature blackface for no reason to sing "What a Perfect Combination." 

The Big Finale: If you can get past the goofy stereotypes, this is one of Cantor's better vehicles and his recommended for fans of him or Berkeley's other musicals of the 30's and 40's.

Home Media: Easily found on streaming and DVD, the latter from the Warner Archives.

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Kid Millions

Samuel Goldwyn Productions/United Artists, 1934

Starring Eddie Cantor, Ethel Merman, Ann Southern, and Warren Hymer

Directed by Roy Del Ruth

Music and Lyrics by various

Cantor's vehicles became an annual event for moviegoers in the early 30's. Every year in November or December, they could count on seeing Cantor clowning and dodging the advances of a crusty comedienne,  doing a blackface routine or two while Busby Berkeley created incredible chorus routines around half-naked Goldwyn Girls. Berkeley moved to Warners after the success of 42nd Street in 1933. The Production Code went into effect earlier in 1934, and among the things it forbid was scanty costumes. 

Goldwyn had to find other diversions to pair with Cantor. He came up with a new Broadway comedienne who had just made a splash two years before and an improved three-strip Technicolor process. How does all this reflect on the story of a young man who is literally chased to Egypt and back to get a fortune? Let's begin as singer Dot Clark (Merman) learns about the death of her ex-boyfriend Professor Edward Wilson (Cantor) at the shop where she works and find out...

The Story: Professor Wilson wanted his son Eddie (Cantor) to inherit the 77 million dollar fortune he found in the pyramids of Egypt. Eddie lives with his abusive adoptive father (Jack Kennedy) and stepbrothers on a leaky barge in Brooklyn, watching over the children who also live there. He only agrees to go so he can marry his girl Toots (Nora Davenport). 

Turns out, he's not the only one who thinks he deserves a cut of that cash. Dot and her current boyfriend Louie (Warren Hymer) claim to be Eddie's mother and uncle and try to kill him. Colonel Harrison Larrabee (Berton Churchill) says his company financed Wilson's explorations and should get a cut, too. Wilson's assistant Jerry Lane (George Murphy) just wants to marry Larrabee's niece Joan (Sothern), but she's angry when he tells her the money belongs to Eddie. And then after Eddie inadvertently rescues the daughter (Eve Sully) of a shiek (Paul Harvey), it turns out the money really belongs to his ancestors, and he intends to kill the son of the man who stole it!

The Song and Dance: Cantor gets a better supporting cast and a terrific production backing him this time. He and Merman are hilarious together, especially on the ship when she plays leapfrog and tickles him in order to get him to sign over the money. Sothern and Murphy have slightly more to do than usual for the young lovers in Cantor's films. Hymer's hilarious as the gangster who just wants to bump Eddie off and get the dough, and Harvey is a riot as the shiek whose sense of humor overrides the fact that he actually thinks Eddie is a nice guy. The finale in the ice cream factory of Eddie's dream is gorgeous Technicolor in shades of sherbet and candy straight out of banana splits. 

Favorite Number: We open right with Merman performing "An Earful of Music" at a song sheet store, backed by a chorus of Goldwyn Girls. Cantor sings "When My Ship Comes In" for the kids on the barge, promising them a better life with free ice cream and no spinach. The Nicholas Brothers and Goldwyn Girls give us a huge minstrel show on the barge, singing "I Want to Be a Minstrel Man." Blackface-clad Eddie gets Irving Berlin's hit "Mandy," while Murphy woos Sothern in massive hoop skirts with "Your Head On My Shoulder." 

The Goldwyn Girls amuse Cantor, Harvey, and the sheik's audience with "The Harem Dance." Cantor sings "Ok, Toots" to explain why he's devoted to his girl. The movie ends in blazing Technicolor with "The Ice Cream Fantasy," as the Girls mix the flavors in Eddie's massive streamline factory and the kids wait impatiently to get in.

Trivia: The music for "I Want to Be a Minstrel Man" would be reused as "You're All the World to Me" in the 1951 MGM film Royal Wedding. 

Look for Lucille Ball among the Minstrel Show Goldwyn Girls. 

Cantor originally introduced "Mandy" in The Ziegfeld Follies of 1919. 

What I Don't Like: This may be the strangest Cantor movie yet. Nothing makes the tiniest bit of sense, including the Egyptian setting. The second half is awash in the goofiest Middle Eastern stereotypes I've ever seen, and there's Eddie's blackface during the "Mandy" minstrel number, too. The lavish ice cream number is nifty to look at to this day, but the choreography misses Berkeley's creative and outrageous touch. 

The Big Finale: Strange as the plot is, Cantor's antics and the nice supporting cast makes this one of his better vehicles. Highly recommended if you're a fan of him or the wacky comic musicals of the 30's and 40's. 

Home Media: Easily found on DVD from the Warner Archives and on streaming. Like many Goldwyn offerings, it's currently free with commercials at Tubi. 

DVD

Tubi

Palmy Days

Samuel Goldwyn/United Artists, 1931

Starring Eddie Cantor, Charlotte Greenwood, Barbara Weeks, and Charles Middleton

Directed by A. Edward Sutherland

Music and Lyrics by various

Eddie Cantor was on top of the world after the film version of his Broadway vehicle Whoopee! ended up as the biggest hit of 1930. Producer Samuel Goldwyn immediately put him and director Busby Berkeley into more of the same. Gigantic Art Deco sets replace the Technicolor, but the Goldwyn Girls are still being put through their overhead paces, and Cantor has another hard-nose comedienne to play off of, down-to-earth Charlotte Greenwood. How does his first original starring role on film look today? Let's start, not with Cantor, but with the Goldwyn Girls making cakes and donuts at that massive streamline bakery and find out...

The Story: Eddie Simpson (Cantor) is the assistant for phony psychic Yolondo (Middleton), until he realizes Yolondo is tricking people like gym coach Helen Martin (Greenwood) out of their life savings. He turns on Yolondo and flees, passing himself off as an efficiency expert at the bakery. He tells the owner Mr. Clark that he needs more entertainment to lure in customers, and that he wants his pretty daughter Joan (Weeks) as his secretary. He thinks he's fallen for Joan, but she's in love with Steve (Paul Page). When Yolondo and his men try to make off with the bakery's payroll, it's up to Eddie and Helen to stop them and save the day!

The Song and Dance: Cantor and Greenwood may seem to be a strange fit on paper, but they make a rather charming couple. Her crusty demeanor contrasts nicely with his motor mouth and nervous tics. Goldwyn, as usual, spared no expense on this one. We have the biggest Art Deco bakery in Hollywood, gorgeous gowns for the ladies, and cinematographer Gregg Toland helping out Berkeley with some terrific overhead shots in his numbers. Berkeley continues to show what made him a legend with his two surreal numbers here. Middleton, best known for playing Ming the Merciless in the Flash Gordon serials, makes a great exotic heavy, too. 

Favorite Number: The first number takes the Goldwyn Girls from the bakery to the gym as Charlotte Greenwood encourages them to "Bend Down Sister." They certainly do that as Greenwood leads them through calisthenics. Berkeley takes over after the switch to using sticks, slowing them down as their hands wave, filming them overhead and in an S formation. Cantor prances to "There's Nothing Too Good for My Baby" in blackface at the bakery show. 

The big hit here was "My Baby Said Yes, Yes." Surprisingly for one of Cantor's movies, it starts off as a plot number, with Cantor excitedly admitting to Joan that he loves her. The Goldwyn Girls take over mid-way through the song, holding up circle boxes as they make box formations. 

Trivia: Look for George Raft in one of his earliest films as Yolondo's goon Joe. 

What I Don't Like: Cantor's brand of manic comedy is an acquired taste for many audiences today. I think he still has his moments, but others find him to be too annoying or fussy. The songs besides "Yes Yes" aren't that memorable, no matter how many overhead shorts Berkeley gives them. The story is even goofier than Whoopee! and makes even less sense. (Though at least this avoids the stereotypes that mar that film.) Weeks is charming enough as sensible Joan, but Page is so colorless as the guy she really loves, he's barely in the movie. 

The Big Finale: If you like Cantor or Greenwood or want to see some of Berkeley's early work, say "yes, yes" to this wild comedy. 

Home Media: Easy to find on DVD and streaming; the former is from the Warner Archives. 

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Cult Flops - Glorifying the American Girl

Paramount, 1929

Starring Mary Eaton, Dan Healy, Edward Crandall, and Sarah Edwards

Directed by John W. Harkrider and Millard Webb

Music and Lyrics by Irving Berlin and others

Of course, operettas were far from the only - or the most popular - musical genre during the it's first flush of popularity in 1929-1930. Backstage films, which had existed even in the silent era, really exploded in 1929. Every studio rushed to make use of the new medium with tons of songs, dances, and acres of girls in plumed headgear and skimpy sequined costumes. Paramount and a cash-strapped Ziegfeld had been trying to get this one off the ground since 1928 By the time they settled on this mish-mash of cliches, it had been switched to all-talking. How does the story of a shop girl who learns how tough it can be to get "glorified" look almost a century later? Let's start with a nifty montage of women traveling across the country to New York to become the next Ziegfeld Girl and find out...

The Story: Gloria (Eaton) is a shop girl peddling sheet music in a department store who wants nothing more than to become the next big dancing star. Enter Danny Miller (Healy), half of a vaudeville dance team who just broke up with his partner. He meets Gloria at an employee picnic and, after doing a tap routine with her, convinces her to be his partner. She leaves behind her boyfriend Buddy (Crandall) and best friend Barbara (Olive Shea) to follow him to New York, only to discover that his real interest in her lays more in casting couches than her talent. Her conniving mother (Edwards) convinces her to sign a five-year-contract with him anyway. She does manage to get out of it, and even audition for the Follies...but she loses her Buddy in the process.

The Song and Dance: For all the elaborate dance routines and Two-Strip Technicolor, this is a pretty damn depressing movie, especially in the first half. It's surprisingly dark for the era, with it's small-time characters and low-down numbers contrasted with the more glamorous Ziegfeld image Gloria wanted so much to be a part of. It being filmed at Paramount's Astoria studios in Queens means there's a lot of location shooting at authentic New York landmarks, including Grand Central Station and on Broadway.

The second half is a lot more interesting. The Technicolor is a bit grainy, but it still adds a lot of spark to the Follies scenes. At the very least, it's easier to tell who everyone is in color. "The Lorelei" sequence, with dozens of actors (including Johnny Weissmuller) flitting about in various states of undress, is a lot easier to take and a bit less static in color, too. There's also Eddie Cantor's non-musical tailor skit. Other than a few Jewish stereotypes that may offend some folks, it mostly works pretty well today.

Favorite Number: The opening montage, set to "A Pretty Girl Is Like a Melody," really is nifty, with young women from all walks off life coming across a map of the US and dreaming of becoming a glamorous showgirl in feathers and ruffles. Gloria tells everyone how there's "No Foolin'" about what she wants as she sells sheet music to department store customers. One puts in a request for "Baby Face," which she gives him cheekily. Danny Miller and his partner Mooney (Kaye Renard) sing about "Spooning With the One You Love" at the company picnic, but they aren't feeling very romantic and spend the number arguing. Healy and Eaton do better with their tap routines to "Sam the Old Accordion  Man" at the picnic after Mooney stomps off and "Hot Feet" at the vaudeville house.

The film ends with those Technicolor Follies revue sequences. Eaton performs an elaborate ballet, flitting among showgirls in feathered animal costumes in a tutu. Rudy Vallee performs his signature "I'm a Vagabond Lover" with his orchestra. Helen Morgan comes off far better with her impassioned "What I Wouldn't Do for That Man!" Eaton finishes the film with the sad and bluesy "There Must Be Someone Waiting for Me In Loveland" while surrounded by showgirls in the most amazing glitter-and-feather costumes and headdresses. 

Trivia: Among the many real-life celebrities seen at the Ziegfeld Follies premiere are Noah Beery, then real-life New York mayor Jimmy Walker, Irving Berlin, producer Charles B. Dillingham, nightclub hostess Texas Guinan, and Ring Lardner. 

The most expensive movie made on the east coast at that time, it wound up being too costly to earn its money back and was a fair-sized flop for Paramount.

What I Don't Like: Edwards is the only member of the cast who makes even the least bit of an impression as Gloria's conniving, manipulative stage mother. Everyone else is either bland (Shea and Crandall) or obnoxious (Healy). Eaton tries hard, but other than showing a little spunk at her Ziegfeld audition, she mostly comes off as dull and vapid. No one is especially likable, not even Gloria, making it hard for you to root for her rise to the top the way you should. 

The plot is supreme melodrama of the most annoying and cliched type, and it contrasts badly with the glamorous Follies in the finale. Most current copies of the film don't include the color sequences or run them edited and in black and white. For the love of heaven, find those color sequences. The black and white copies look and sound terrible, tinny and blurry. The color, while not perfect, is still better than the black and white TV prints.

The Big Finale: Too dull to be for anyone but film historians or major fans of the movies made during the early talkie era. 

Home Media: If you're really interested in seeing this, look for the DVD or Blu-Ray Kino Lorber released in 2019 with the original blue tint and color sequences fully intact. The thorough bonus features alone make it worth checking out. All prints streaming online, including the one for free at Tubi, are the black-and-white TV versions.

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Blu-Ray

Tubi

Thank Your Lucky Stars

Warner Bros, 1943

Starring Dennis Morgan, Eddie Cantor, Joan Leslie, and SZ Sakall

Directed by David Butler

Music by Arthur Schwartz; Lyrics by Frank Loesseur

This was the first Warners contribution to the "all-star musical semi-revue" genre. We've already seen their second, Hollywood Canteen, but this one gets away from the servicemen to focus on the studio and its star roster. In the 30's and 40's, Warners specialized in action and adventures, thrillers, gangster films, and the occasional wise-guy comedy. Busby Berkeley moved to MGM in 1939...and his kaleidoscopic fever dreams gave way to more typical backstage shenanigans, without the major talent of musicals at other studios of the time. How did Warners get around this? By bringing in their dramatic stars as well. Let's start with Dinah Shore on the real-life Eddie Cantor radio show to see how well they did with integrating their tough guys and gals into a patriotic revue...

The Story: Theater producers Dr. Schlenna (Sakall) and Mr. Farnsworth (Edward Everett Horton) want Dinah Shore to appear in their big theater revue for the troops, but she's under contract to Eddie Cantor and he won't let her appear without him. Cantor, however, has a reputation for taking over any production he appears in...and proceeds to do just that, shutting out the producers and drilling everyone until they're ready to throttle him. 

Meanwhile, aspiring songwriter Pat Dixon (Leslie) falls in with singer Tommy Randolph (Morgan) and dramatic actor Joe Simpson (Cantor). Simpson is a dead ringer for Cantor and can't get an acting job because everyone expects comedy from him. Randolph wants to be on Cantor's show, and then in the revue, but Cantor's beefy flunky Olaf (Mike Mazurki) throws him out. Pat finally comes up with the idea to replace Cantor with Joe and allow the show to go on, with a vast array of Warners stars.

The Song and Dance: Warners keeps surprising me with their musicals of late. This one was a lot cuter and funnier than I expected.Warners has a field day making fun of Cantor's image as a hilarious and yet hard-nosed and egotistical ham. He has a great sequence in a sanitarium when they nearly remove part of his brain. Leslie and Morgan also have a lot of fun as the duo who do most of the scheming...and I appreciate that Pat comes up with most of the schemes and it's the guys following her wild ideas, rather than the other way around. 

I also like how Warners gets around most of their star roster not being musically inclined and find ways for them to stay in character and appear in the show. Errol Flynn and Bette Davis are the winners here, but Humphrey Bogart gets a great bit where Sakall manages to intimidate him. 

Favorite Number: John Garfield spoofs his image as the resident Warners young and tragic hoodlum with his attempted rendition of "Blues In the Night." Cantor tells his unimpressed staff and the producers how "We're Staying Home Tonight" with his baby due to wartime restrictions. Comic orchestra Spike Jones and His City Slickers liven up Gower Gulch with the wacky "Ridin' For a Fall." Alan Hale Sr. and Jack Carson are vaudevillians who claim "I'm Goin' North," no matter how bad the weather is. We hear "The Dreamer" twice, first with Shore as a farm girl lamenting she's missing her sweetheart, later from George Tobias with Olivia DeHaviland and Ida Lupino dressed as 40's hipsters in striped swingy dresses and a scaled-down zoot suit. Leslie and Morgan get an entire restaurant to understand why there's "No You, No Me." Hattie McDaniel and a host of chic Harlem residents encourage "Ice Cold Katie" to marry the handsome soldier courting her in another big number.

Ironically, the biggest hits came from the stars with no musical talent at all. Errol Flynn sings pretty well and sounds like he's having the time of his life telling a pack of Brits in a pub "That's What You Jolly Well Get" when you've lead a life of wild adventure like he has. The standard here is "They're Either Too Young Or Too Old," performed by, of all people, Bette Davis as a woman who is very tired of men her age having gone off to war. Davis basically talks through the number, but the song is so good and the boys and old guys she dances with are so funny, it hardly matters.

What I Don't Like: For most people nowadays, Eddie Cantor is an acquired taste at best...and there's a lot of him in this movie. If you don't like him or his style of manic slapstick, you probably won't enjoy this. Also, while the plot is less overtly patriotic and goofier than Hollywood Canteen or This Is the Army, it's still pretty thin. We never even get to hear the sentimental ballad Pat's trying so hard to push to the studios in the early part of the movie. Some folks might be more offended by the Native Americans who grab the real Cantor to get him out of the show mid-way through, but like everything else, they're played for comedy and acknowledge the stereotypes. 

The Big Finale: This is probably my favorite of the three movies on that Warners Homefront Collection DVD set. Hilarious and filled with unique performances you won't see anywhere else, this is recommended for major fans of Cantor, World War II, or 40's musicals.

Home Media: Currently disc-only; the Blu-Ray is from the Warners Archive. 

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DVD - The Warners Homefront Collection

Blu Ray

Whoopee!

United Artists, 1930

Starring Eddie Cantor, Ethel Shutta, Eleanor Hunt, and Paul Gregory

Directed by Thorton Freeland

Music by Walter Donaldson and others; Lyrics by Gus Kahn and others

Florenz Ziegfeld had been the biggest impresario on Broadway since his famous Follies began in 1907. Women came from across the country to be "glorified" and glamorized in his huge extravaganzas. Cantor worked his way from vaudeville stardom to becoming one of Ziegfeld's most popular players; Whoopee! was his biggest hit for the producer. Desperate for money after the Depression wiped him out, Ziegfeld partnered with another famous producer, Samuel Goldwyn, to bring Whoopee! to the big screen. How does this modern-set western look now? Let's start on the ranch, just as a wedding is being announced, and find out...

The Story: Pretty Sally Morgan (Hunt) is supposed to marry Sheriff Bob Wells (Jack Rutherford), but she really loves half-native, eastern-educated Wanenis (Gregory). Hoping to evade Wells and find Wanenis, she escapes out a window with hypochondriac guest Henry Williams (Cantor). He thinks he's giving her a ride out of town, but she left a note claiming they're going to elope! Bob, his deputies, Sally's father Jud (Walter Law) go after Williams to arrest him; his nurse Mary (Shutta) wants to marry him. Williams does everything from steal a car to dress in blackface to join an Indian tribe in order to avoid the entire lot of them.

The Song and Dance: Busby Berkeley's first Hollywood assignment, the gorgeous color, and a few good bits from Cantor are the selling points here. This is one of the few full two-strip Technicolor films of its era left, and it looks incredible. That rich turquoise sky pops off the screen. Shutta matches Cantor pretty well as the tough lady who likes her men meek and mild. Berkeley's style is obvious even at this early point, with several overhead shots of ladies in cowboy hats and native headdresses and choreography that plays to the camera, rather than just tapping in front of it. 

Favorite Number: The big hit that made it into the film was Cantor's knowing "Makin' Whoopee," which he sings (with different lyrics) surrounded by a bevy of pink-clad bridesmaids. An incredibly young and perky Betty Grable opens the movie with the chorus singing about how much they love "Cowboys" as they tap for the camera and Berkeley makes overhead patterns with their hats. Cantor laments to Hunt how he lost "A Girlfriend of a Boyfriend of Mine" when they're on the run from the Sheriff in the car. "The Song of the Setting Sun" brings on the Indian tribe for some big native dances, feather-trimmed overhead shots, while the charter roster of Goldwyn Girls parade their beaded costumes and fancy capes before the camera.

Trivia: The original Broadway show opened in 1928 and ran a year, not bad for the time. A revival on Broadway in 1979 lasted about three months and added a few extra songs not in the original show, including "My Baby Just Cares for Me" from the film.

What I Don't Like: Stereotypes of all varieties run amok in this one, from Cantor's blackface routine to the extraneous "My Baby Just Cares for Me" to the ridiculous Indian-loves-white-woman plot and overdone Indian tribe. That over-the-top finale in particular with what Waneris turns out to be will likely make many viewers cringe today, rather than cheer. There's also times when this being an early talkie comes to the fore, especially during non-musical sequences that have people just standing around talking. 

Most of the songs from the original show besides "Makin' Whoopee" were eliminated, and "Whoopee" had its lyrics largely re-written. I wish they'd at least found a way to sneak in the other big hit "Love Me or Leave Me" and its star Ruth Etting, even if neither she nor the song had much to do with the rest of the show. 

The Big Finale: The dated plot and heavy stereotypes make this mainly of interest to fans of Cantor, Berkeley, or the films of the early sound era. 

Home Media: Easy to find on DVD from the Warner Archives or streaming.

DVD

Amazon Prime

Roman Scandals

United Artists, 1933
Starring Eddie Cantor, Edward Arnold, Gloria Stuart, and David Manners
Directed by Frank Tuttle
Music by Harry Warren and others; Lyrics by Al Dubin and others

Eddie Cantor is another comedian who was wildly popular in the 20's and 30's, but isn't as well-regarded today. He started out as one of the most beloved comics in the Ziegfeld Follies, and after the success of the 1930 film Whoopee, switched producers to Samuel Goldwyn. This was his biggest hit under Goldwyn, an unusual fantasy with a Depression slant and big Busby Berkeley numbers filled with half-naked Goldwyn Girls. Is it as much fun today during these equally troubled times? Let's head to the town of West Rome, Oklahoma, where a temple of Roman history is about to open, and find out....

The Story: Eddie (Cantor) is a harmless little fellow who has been sleeping in the new Roman museum, to the annoyance of a local big shot. The rich man wants to demolish a park where homeless people currently live to build a jail. Eddie stands up for the people, but he's not well-regarded by most officials in the town. He tends to give food away at the grocery instead of selling it and seems to know more about ancient Rome than even the museum's founder.

After he's run out of town, Eddie wishes he was in ancient Rome, where everything is simpler. To his shock, he suddenly gets his wish, strolling right into Rome...and finds that corruption is nothing new. The Emperor Valerius (Arnold) is building huge gathering places for the rich like the Circus Maximus, then raising taxes and bribing senators to look the other way. Eddie almost ends up as a slave, but he's freed by kind and handsome Josephus (Manners). Josephus quickly falls for the lovely Princess Sylvia (Stuart) of Briton, who was captured by Valerius. Becoming the Emperor's food taster, Eddie has to figure out how to expose Valerius' plans and avoid his scheming wife Agrippa (Veree Teasdale) who wants to poison him.

The Song and Dance: This was a bit of a surprise. Cantor is genuinely funny here, with some hilarious lines after the Roman guards find him wandering into town and when he's trying to avoid tasting the Emperor's poisoned nightingales. (It helps that playwrights William Anthony McGuire and George Kaufman had a hand in the script and story.) The production is lavish for the time, with giant sets and elaborate costumes in Rome and massive Berkeley numbers that rival anything he did at Warners. Arnold and Teasdale also do well as the Imperial couple who are more interested in getting money and killing off each other than running an Empire.

The fantasy is interesting, too. It almost feels like an earlier, gender-reversed Wizard of Oz. Here, though, Eddie learns that he can stand up to a bully and make West Rome really be "no place like home."

Favorite Number: Eddie kicks things off singing to the townspeople of West Rome about how they'll "Build a Little Home" from cast off junk, even if they have to do it in the street. Things pick up considerably with "No More Love," a dramatic number in the slave market performed by Ruth Etting, showing how brutal the slavers are to their ladies. This oddly intense (and rather sexist) routine ends with one woman throwing herself off the big cake-like structure where the women are chained. The big hit from this one was "Keep Young and Beautiful," which has Eddie in blackface singing about the ladies attracting their men as the scantily-clad Goldwyn Girls bathe and "beautify" themselves to do just that.

What I Don't Like: First of all, this is a pre-Code movie. In addition to the Goldwyn Girls parading around in scanty togas and long Godiva hair, Eddie makes a few jokes that might be considered risque even today (including one birth control joke), and there's the weird and somewhat sexist "No More Love" and "Keep Young and Beautiful" numbers. Eddie is in blackface before and during "Keep Young and Beautiful" for no real reason. Stuart and Manners are stiff and dull compared to all the hams around them; they don't even get a romantic ballad.

The Big Finale: If you've ever wanted to give Cantor and his vehicles a try, the decent cast, elaborate production, and great music might make this the best place to start.

Home Media: Currently available on DVD via the Warner Archives and on Amazon Prime.

DVD
Amazon Prime