OVP: The Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935)

Film: The Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935)

Stars: Jack Benny, Eleanor Powell, Robert Taylor, Una Merkel, Sid Silvers, Buddy Ebsen, June Knight

Director: Roy Del Ruth

Oscar History: 3 nominations/1 win (Best Picture, Original Story, Dance Direction*)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2022 Saturdays with the Stars series, we highlight a different Classical Hollywood star who made their name in the early days of television.  This month, our focus is on Jack Benny click here to learn more about Mr. Benny (and why I picked him), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

We're going to start a few years into Jack Benny's career primarily because Benny's early film career, with the exception of one film, The Hollywood Revue of 1929, has nothing really of note.  He signed a contract in 1929 with Irving Thalberg to work at MGM, but after his movie Chasing Rainbows flopped, Benny was basically out of the film industry and quickly returned to Broadway, and then radio in 1932.  Radio would become the primary home of Benny's career for most of the next twenty years, as his eponymous radio show would be what he was most known for until his TV show in the early 1950's.  That being said, Benny would continue to make a number of movies, still trying his hand at a film stardom that would never happen.  One of the more important films from this portion of his acting career, when he was starting out as a big radio star was MGM's The Broadway Melody of 1936, which he gets prime billing on even though he's definitely third lead behind two figures who were about to become superstars on the MGM lot, Eleanor Powell & Robert Taylor.

(Spoilers Ahead) Like many of the musicals in the Broadway Melody series (which would spawn four films in its combined run), the movie's plot is secondary to the musical numbers, but essentially we have Broadway producer Robert Gordon (Taylor) who is being wooed by his wealthy backer Lillian Brent (Knight), but is clearly destined to pine for his childhood sweetheart Irene Foster (Powell), newly in town & looking for a gig in his show.  Gordon is being chastised by newspaper writer Bert Keeler (Benny) who is being forced to disparage Gordon, even to the point of making up an actress that Gordon can't get into his show, in order to sell newspapers.  When Irene pretends to be that actress, unbeknownst to be both Bert & Robert (she's in disguise), everything comes crashing down for them all...until of course everyone involved gets their happy endings.

The movie is cute, and was a pretty big deal for pretty much all involved.  Eleanor Powell got her first leading role here, and as the movie was a smash hit, she'd soon become one of the bigger stars on the MGM lot (she also does a terrific impersonation of Kate Hepburn that's honestly worth the price of watching alone).  Tap dancer Buddy Ebsen also got his film debut here as a wayward friend of Irene's.  The film won three Oscar nominations, including one for Best Picture, making it (at least nominally) the first sequel to ever be cited for the prize.  In retrospect this isn't a great movie, but it has some funny one-liners and unlike many musicals of the era, at least it makes sense (a plus for the Original Story category).

It's the music, though, that is the best part.  It's sometimes hard to tell with films of this era what is an original and what isn't, but it does appear (at least from what I can find on the internet, correct me if I'm wrong oh readers) to include such standards as "You Are My Lucky Star," "Broadway Rhythm," "I've Got a Feelin You're Foolin" and "Sing Before Breakfast" in their original incantation, which makes the fact that it didn't get a Best Original Song nomination a true crime.  The best numbers are probably Powell's manic tap dancing to "Broadway Rhythm" (honestly, it's a race between Powell & Ann Miller over who was the best hoofer in Classic Hollywood), and Buddy & Vilma Ebsen tripping the light fantastic while dressed like Seurat characters to "On a Sunday Afternoon."  There are a lot of great musicals in 1936 to compete for Dance Direction, so I can't say for certain whom I would've picked for the Oscar, but know that AMPAS did itself proud by giving Broadway Melody this prize.

And Mr. Benny?  He's really funny.  The persona of this character is very similar to the "Jack Benny" creation he would have on his television show, but it works.  He lands virtually all of his punchlines, frequently at his own expense, and plays the "villain" with enough charm that his about-face at the end (when he helps a forlorn Powell), feels authentic.  This isn't a great performance, but it works within the confines of the movie...I am curious as we go throughout the month to see if this is all Benny could play, or if he has more in him than just "Jack Benny" but he was very good at playing Jack Benny.

OVP: Broadway Hostess (1935)

Film: Broadway Hostess (1935)

Stars: Winifred Shaw, Genevieve Tobin, Lyle Talbot, Allen Jenkins, Phil Regan, Spring Byington

Director: Frank McDonald

Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Dance Direction)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

I am, if you couldn't tell from the countless articles on this blog, a relatively organized person.  I don't like chaos (though currently my messy kitchen would beg to differ), and I'm someone who is always armed with at least a dozen "bucket/to do/goal" lists that I'm working on.  One of the ones I've been focusing on is trying to finish a certain number of OVP films each month so that I am completely done with the project by the time I reach a specific age (that will remain between myself & my birth certificate, but let's just say it's a long way off so don't worry if you love the series).  This month, because it's a shorter one, I'm kind of cheating my way through it, and only watching the shortest films on my DVR, one of which is Broadway Hostess, a largely forgotten musical from the 1930's that was cited for Dance Direction, but who got its "play button click" on Saturday due to only being 68 minutes long.

(Spoilers Ahead) You know the plot of this movie, or at least you think you do, from pretty much the opening scene when Winnie (Shaw) works her way into a musical act for a failing nightclub & quickly becomes the show's star.  Lucky (Talbot), a Broadway hoodlum who has Park Avenue dreams, sees her & gets her to the top, but while she's madly in love with him, he has his eyes on Iris (Tobin), a beautiful society dame who won't marry a guy from such a low class.  The movie positions their love triangle alongside another love triangle, that involves, Lucky, Winnie, and Tommy (Regan), Winnie's piano player who has an eye for her, even though all she sees is Lucky.

Broadway Hostess is an underwhelming film, and not an interesting one.  Shaw can sing, but has zero chemistry with either of her leading men, and I honestly spent more of the film cheering for Tobin's Iris, even though she's meant to be the "spoiled rich girl who needs to be taken down a peg."  But the weird thing is...the script agrees with me.  Iris does end up with Lucky, though he nearly dies when her brother shoots him in a truly bizarre & unexpected final act moment, and Winnie does with Tommy, so the cardinal rule of romantic comedies (that you cheer for the leads to get married) is upended here.  That's not enough to save the movie, and neither is the best part of the film (Spring Byington's randy society lady who also marries a Broadway commoner in Allen Jenkins' Fishcake), but it is enough so that I'll remember this longer than I normally would such a film.

The movie's Oscar nomination feels something of a cheat.  In 1935 the Dance Direction category was more for the choreographer himself than just for the film, and choreographer Bobby Connolly (who would be nominated all three years the category existed) was cited both for this and for Go Into Your Dance with Al Jolson & Ruby Keeler.  Broadway Hostess has exactly one dance number, and it's not that impressive though it is bizarre.  During one of Winnie's final torch songs, we zoom in on a champagne glass that is filled with a number of beautiful women decked in veiled swimsuits, who are doing a coordinated "seduction-style" dance, though it's hardly worth of Salome.  We literally have at one point young women's heads floating out of the glass and popping like bubbles...it's not impressive, but it is trippy, and one of the weirder nominations so far I've found in the Dance Direction category.

OVP: Cain and Mabel (1936)

Film: Cain and Mabel (1936)
Stars: Marion Davies, Clark Gable, Allen Jenkins, Roscoe Karns, Walter Catlett
Director: Lloyd Bacon
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Dance Direction)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 1/5 stars

I sometimes watch movies and can't concentrate.  This is occasionally because I'm bored or because I am insisting that I am capable of doing two things at once when one of them involves a movie (spoiler alert: I can't), but there are times where I'm distracted by what's going on onscreen.  This was the case recently when I saw Cain and Mabel, a forgettable boxing musical (that wasn't a typo, it's actually a boxing musical), about a vaudeville star who falls in love with a boxer at first for the tabloids, and then for herself.  The distracting part was that it starred Marion Davies, far more famous for her off-screen romance with William Randolph Hearst, and I couldn't help but spend most of the film thinking of Citizen Kane, comparing every little dance number to her more famous fictional counterpart.

(Spoilers Ahead) This ended up being a bit unfair to Davies, as it's not really appropriate to spend a movie trying to see if the leading lady specifically is talented, and not just well-suited for this part, but honestly the movie itself is a pretty forgettable trifle.  The film follows an almost ludicrously cliched plotline (even for 1936), with Davies playing Mabel O'Dare, a down-on-her-luck aspiring dancer who catches her big break after a random diva has a tirade and the chorus girl off the street gets her spot.  She practices every single day, and eventually drives her downstairs neighbor Larry Cain (Gable) crazy by continually tapping on the ceiling all night long, but the two of them are paired up to gain publicity for their respective careers, and suddenly they start falling for each other.  The movie's climax is them headed to be married, and then whisked away to live in happiness, but their PR teams leak it to the press, having both parties assuming the other one was truly "just in it for the fame."  The film ends with Gable losing his boxing match, but winning his girl (and also, with it, a stack of cash as she in anger bet all of her fortune on his opponent).

It's a silly movie, as far as silly movies go, but there's a lot of problems because that thing I was looking for with Davies-talent-isn't as apparent as it should be; she's not very good in this movie.  Don't get me wrong here-I think that history has exaggerated her pitfalls, particularly in terms of acting ability as she has solid comedic chops even if she's no Kate Hepburn or Constance Bennett, but she's not a very good dancer.  When she becomes a headliner, it feels like when everyone was trying to say Katherine McPhee was better than Megan Hilty on Smash-she's not special just because you say "she's special."  It's worth noting that Gable isn't particularly good either, and is about as convincing as a boxer as Rue McClanahan, but Davies is more problematic both because Gable at that point had proven he was a major talent and because of the film's sole Oscar nomination.

It was only for a few years (I'm curious if anyone knows why they eliminated Dance Direction as a category-Choreography could have run as long as they had Song Score, at least), but the dancing was the only nod for this film, and it's kind of comically bad compared to pretty much everything else that was happening then.  In an age where Eleanor Powell and Fred Astaire are your competition, you have to be a supernova in order to compare, and Davies is merely adequate in terms of her timing and dancing.  Like I said, she had comedic skills, but the dancing here by a professional marker is genuinely bad-she's regularly outdone by her partners and by the chorus line, and you don't really understand why someone would be paying for her to be the headliner compared to a truly accomplished hoofer.  It's a mean focus, and admittedly I probably didn't go into this movie with a great attitude, but my impression of Davies after this film is that Orson Welles had it right.

Those are my thoughts-how about yours?  Has anyone out there already seen Cain and Mabel?  If not, what do you think of Davies in general?  And who was the best Golden Age Hollywood dancer?  Share below!

OVP: Born to Dance (1936)

Film: Born to Dance (1936)
Stars: Eleanor Powell, James Stewart, Virginia Bruce, Una Merkel, Sid Silvers, Buddy Ebsen
Director: Roy Del Ruth
Oscar History: 2 nominations (Best Dance Direction, Original Song-"I've Got You Under My Skin")
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

While the rest of America was watching the Super Bowl, I was instead trying to find a bit more room on my DVR for more of 31 Days of Oscar (side note: I know that I'm going to hear a lot of "greatest game of all time" today but I can't really watch football be played anymore without thinking about how cultural icons like Tom Brady and Russell Wilson eventually will succumb to CTE at some point in their lives, and how this sport really needs to be retired alongside of boxing, so it's not even fun for the commercials now, though Lady Gaga killed it at halftime, which I did watch).  Anyway, the movie I chose as my side note was an early hit in the MGM stable of movies, so early in fact that not only does Jimmy Stewart star in a musical here, but he does so without top billing.  The film, your standard "romance while dreaming of stardom" film, is light and spry even as it's highly predictable, and was a wonderful Sunday evening treat.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film follows Ted (Stewart) a sailor on leave from the Navy (he's just about to finish up a tour of duty), who along with two of his buddies Gunny (Silvers) and Mush (Ebsen), are going on-shore trying to find a little bit of action with some NYC women.  There they each find a bit of romance, with the film's focus primarily being on Nora (Powell), Ted's romantic partner, and then later on a Broadway star Lucy James (Bruce) who tries (in vain) to win Ted away from Nora.  In the meantime, we get a lot of musical numbers and some wise-cracking from Jenny (Merkel, because who else are you going to pick as a wise-cracking sidekick to a female lead in 1936?).  The film, while formulaic, moves along at a deeply brisk pace for 106 minutes of movie (usually movies of this era felt shorter, but this one doesn't need to be as it's so quick), and we get some wonderful movie moments.

It's hard to imagine this, but at one point Cole Porter classics were, in fact, originals, and we get that here with "Easy to Love" and "Swingin' the Jinx Away" being performed for the first time.  Best of all is "I've Got You Under My Skin," which would become a Sinatra standard late in his career, but here is sang oddly enough for the first time by Virginia Bruce.  Bruce is a brilliant vocalist and all, but I don't recall ever seeing an Oscar-nominated song sang by "the other woman" when you aren't expected to feel anything for her (this isn't really an Eponine situation-Bruce eventually tries to get our leading lady fired).  It gives a strange aura to a song you know is a classic-it makes it seem more like a naughty seduction rather than a straight-forward love song, and considering at that point in the movie you want Stewart to end up with Powell, it's just odd.  The song and the moment are still great, but it's not what you'd expect, and considering we all know this song by heart, it's fascinating to look at where it came from originally.

The movie's other Oscar nomination was in the now defunct "Dance Direction," a category that only existed for a few years in the 1930's before largely being forgotten (choreographers never again getting their due outside the random Honorary Award to Michael Kidd).  The dancing, considering both Powell and Ebsen are amongst the cast, is sublime-the final number, including some bizarre but brilliant moves from Ebsen and then a show-stopping, heart-pounding number from Powell (who makes up for a rather routine leading woman charm with moves that would make Ann Miller say "wow"-particularly her tapping through a wave of trombones), is a particular highlight.  This is in the same era as Astaire-and-Rogers, so I make no promises in terms of who ultimately wins the OVP, but know that this is in the running.

Other than that, it's a charming, delightful film and it's fun to see Stewart, who was headlining films at this point but wasn't a "headliner" (if that makes sense) being forced into some positions we aren't used to seeing him (dancing, singing, and occasionally being a slight horndog).  All-in-all, I'd highly recommend it, and pronounce both of its Oscar nominations more than well-earned.