Musicals dead? Not when there is still so much to discover. A long-overdue look beyond the top 25.
A dynamite genre whose hyperexpression (heightened movement and vocals symbolizing heightened emotions, usually love) compresses an entire film’s worth of narrative into segments just a few minutes long, musicals are uniquely powerful. But despite a few dominant decades and then a few false starts, the genre is now only just barely of interest.
Precipitated by the most recent false start/surprise success of Damian Chazelle’s passion project, La La Land (2016), Richard Barrios put “shop endorsement” on the most significant musicals of all time in TCM’s fun, but predictable Must-See Musicals: 50 Show-Stopping Movies We Can't Forget. It’s a solid text—if it gets one person to see Love Me Tonight (Rouben Mamoulian, 1932), it's worth its publication.
Regrettably, there's nothing too surprising here; where is Down with Love (Peyton Reed, 2003), Hedwig and the Angry Inch (John Cameron Mitchell, 2001), the original Hairspray (John Waters, 1988), Across the Universe (Julie Taymor, 2007), or The Point (Fred Wolf, 1971)? All “must-see” from a more creative perspective. Dull.
On the other hand, Jeanine Bassinger put out a terrific book last year, the aptly-titled The Movie Musical! One of the most interesting things about this well-organized and enthusiastically scholarly text is the chapter on B-Musicals (watch Trocadero!).1
Basinger also discusses Eleanor Powell. Often referred to as among the greatest dancers ever captured on celluloid, Powell should be studied by anyone with even a passing interest in classic film musicals.2 She effortlessly combines the grace of Astaire and the athleticism of Kelly but was often the best thing about the films she was in. She never commanded A-list vehicles nor became a star of the first magnitude because her singing was dubbed, but her sparky personality, confidence, Rita Hayworth smile, and middle-of-the-road relatability mixed with jaw-dropping dancing are still a wonder to behold.
I Dood It (Vincente Minelli, 1943)
is the kind of oddity that puts the “love” in lovers of the classic film. The ostensible Red Skelton vehicle begins with Jimmy Dorsey’s orchestra, features legends Lena Horne, Hazel Scott, and Skelton in an unusually funny, innocent, and charming turn while Sid Herzif and Fred Saidy’s screenplay is just as funny and punchy as it is delightfully corny and improbable.3
Throughout the film, Skelton’s Joseph Rivington Reynolds hams his way through an infatuation with Eleanor Powell’s magnificent star of stage Constance Shaw. He’ll eventually deal with Nazis, but the plot is really beside the point. In yet another film where she displays intellectual superiority to the material, Powell works her way through a series of misunderstandings and liaisons dangerous.
An early genuinely amusing scene betrays Joseph’s infatuation with Constance, as he lip-syncs her theatrical dialogue from the front rows in Minelli’s typically revealing close-up.4 In this sloppy lark, joy simply oozes out of every one of this film’s care-wrought cracks.
To wit: at the USO Bazaar, Bob Eberly sings "So Long Sarah Jane" as Eleanor Powell executes the most astonishing dancing this side of the Rio Grande…or The Nicholas Brothers. As Eberly unspools the Hillbilly-cum-Hollywood corn, Powell humors and patronizes the big goof. Her expressions are really priceless; sending up the implausibility. Eberly lassos her, she taps away and tosses the lasso back on him. She dances within the lariat, tosses it aside, catches another, dodges others, does a flip to casually display athleticism, and shrugs.
A gaggle of gorgeously adorned cowgirls appear with their own lariats, she borrows each, in turn, to attach to the hitching post that they encircle stage center. The camera which had formerly floated, dodged, and dared us to follow along as Powell worked, briefly cants, stunned by this new development. Powell answers our cinematographic astonishment by tap dancing over the series of jump ropes the cowgirls spin, in a seeming effort to flummox this marvel. Truly astonishing.
Then, Powell spins wickedly fast side to side through a single lariat. Dizzy with the utter heights of the human endeavor, we spin, she spins and spins to a medium close-up, tapping all the way into an eventual full approach of the viewer: a triumphal performance in one of the most charming little trifles in existence. A perfect no-stress prescription for any blues.
Stay tuned for Part Two of this series to discover more obscure musicals!
Notes:
1. (William Nigh, 1944) this curiosity heralding the history of the famed nitery features wonderful black singer Ida James, the underrated Rosemary Lane, Dave “Betty Boop” Fleischer animation, and streams free.
2. See also The Broadway Melody of 1936, Born to Dance (1936), The Broadway Melody of 1938, and The Broadway Melody of 1940, where Astaire refused to work with her again since she was so hard to top, maybe even hard to keep up with. Ann Miller cited Powell as the best and her main inspiration. Powell’s hula is so astonishingly/esthetically sensual in Honolulu (1939) that it’s reused here full stock when Red Skelton’s Joseph unsuccessfully tries to kill himself, drifting away to stock-footage dreamland. Powell makes Nelson Eddy’s first starring role without Jeanette MacDonald, Rosalie (Woody Van Dyke, 1937) bearable with its jingoistic West Pointdrill team musical sequence. Delightful nonsense.
3. And for those tired of explaining historical advantagism to your friends and family, Butterfly McQueen’s servant is refreshing and certainly isn’t so bad as compared to other roles blacks had to play at the time. McQueen gets to sit on a bench, having a conversation with Joseph like a normal self-respecting human being, showing wisdom and grit beyond her station.
4. Minelli would soar to greater heights (1944’s Meet Me in St Louis, e.g.), but his third directorial effort is a hell of a lot more fun than 1955’s The Cobweb.