Oklahoma!

Straight from Broadway, Fred Zinneman's (perhaps the oddest choice to direct a deliriously corny and gleeful musical ever) 1955 production of "Oklahoma!" began the successful collaboration between the dynamic music/lyricist team of Rogers and Hammerstein and 20th Century Fox. While the duo and the studio had made 1945's "State Fair" ten years prior, that would prove to be the only book and score the two ever did solely for the screen. Their far more illustrious and lucrative creations began unspooling in cinemas in 1955, starting with "Oklahoma!" and continuing the next year with "Carousel" and "The King and I", followed by "South Pacific" in 1958 and their blockbuster "The Sound of Music" in 1965. While "The Sound of Music" is arguably their finest acheivement, few people remember that that property was derived from its stage incarnation; the movie is so fondly remembered today. The other four stage-to-screen productions were all Broadway smashes, and are still revived to this day based on their success, not the latter success of the film versions. However, I find three of these films worthy of the praise bestowed upon their original Broadway productions (only "South Pacific", which fell victim to an over-enthusiastic cinematographer who experimented with a few too many filters, fails to entertain to this day), and of them, "Oklahoma!" is the best.

The story is almost rudimentary: happy-go-lucky cowboy Curly is in love with the innocent but stubborn Laurie. She spurns him and decides to go to the box social with surly ranch hand Jud Fry. That is essentially it. The movie takes place almost completely over the span of a few hours, from the moment Curly strolls on screen, singing "Oh What a Beautiful Morning", to later that day at the evening's box social. In between Curly and Laurie squabble, Will Parker returns from Kansas City to find his sweetheart, Ado Annie, involved with a scheming "peddler man", and Aunt Eller keeps a firm rule over all proceedings. The film's actual dramatic undertone is the menacing presence of Jud Fry. Betraying its otherwise harmless and happy exterior, Jud is an intriguing character to the story, one whose motives are at first thought to be sympathetic and pitiful (he desperately loves the beautiful Laurie, and is heartbroken when she regrets accepting his invitation as opposed to Curly's and leaves him humiliated and alone on the dusty highway). However he quickly loses the audience's sympathy when he turns his despair into violent revenge, attempting at first to skewer Curly with a deadly toy the peddler man unknowingly bestows upon him, and then attempts to burn Curly and Laurie alive, setting a haystack they are on ablaze. This all sounds serious and rather grim, and while it remains consistent with all of Rogers and Hammerstein's musicals, which are renowned for their family friendly scores and plots, in reality, they all possess darker subplots, such as Jud's violent revenge, the Nazi threat in "The Sound of Music", Billy Bigelow's abuse and death in "Carousel" and the plight of the young lovers in "The King and I".

Not to portray "Oklahoma!" as something its not, however, the show is still overwhelmingly light and fun. Curly and Laurie's flirting and fussing is entirely harmless and charming, the couple's love for each other obvious from the very beginning. Curly teases her with the number "The Surrey With the Fringe On Top", and "Laurie cautions him about "people talking" with her number "People Will Say We're In Love". In the slightly sillier subplot, Will Parker, having just returned from Kansas City with the $50 he needs to convince Ado Annie's father that he's "worth something", almost loses her to the peddler man, Ali Hakim, who ultimately shows his good nature by outbidding Will for Ado Annie's picnic basket, enabling Will to keep his money, but insuring himself of a "three day bellyache". Both couples united by the film's end, the entire cast breaks out into the film's titular anthem, "Oklahoma!", which lacks some of the knockout punch it delivers seeing it live on stage. However, the film has some things going for it that no stage production ever could. The technicolor is gorgeous, the locations (oddly enough, the small frontier town of Nogales, Arizona, still more convincing than the Fox backlot) are a welcome alternative, and the cast is exceptional. Fox apparently thought so too of their star duo that they brought them back the next year for their adaptation of "Carousel" (only after Frank Sinatra dropped out, but who wants to argue?). While the stage experience is usually superior, a film as special as "Oklahoma!" is one to seek out, at greater convienance and less expense.