Show Boat

In the history of Broadway musicals, a few productions are at the top of everyone's all time classics list: Lerner and Loewe's "My Fair Lady", Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Oklahoma!" and "Carousel", but the granddaddy of them all is Kern and Hammerstein's "Show Boat". Originally performed on Broadway in 1927, the musical was produced by legendary showman Florenz Ziegfeld and is widely regarded as a landmark production, the first to incorporate both serious thematic material into its plot and an operatic score. Before "Show Boat", Broadway musicals were all frothy confections, filled with paper thin plots, broad characterizations, and light scores that articulated the production's overall flighty nature. "Show Boat" changed all that; featuring an incredible, emotionally and artistically complex score by two titans of musical theater, Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II (who, like his other famous collaborator, Richard Rodgers, also had an illustrious career prior to their more celebrated working relationship) and a startlingly progressive plot involving a mixed race entertainer (although it should be noted, it was not until the 1983 revival of the show, after three film versions and three different Broadway mountings did an actual mixed race actress play the role), and realistically portrayed human suffering. The story revolves around the titular show boat, the Cotton Blossom, which tours up and down the Mississippi River, and the colorful cast of characters aboard. Arthur Freed, known for his lavish productions, typically spared no expense here, peppering the cast with familiar faces: Ava Gardner as the tragic Julie, Howard Keel and Kathryn Grayson (a duo Jack Cummings would subsequently utilize in another Broadway to Hollywood production, "Kiss Me Kate") as the tempestuous lovers Gaylord Ravenal and Magnolia Hawks, Joe E. Brown and Agnes Moorehead as the show boat's proprietors, Cap'n Andy Hawks and his wife Parthy, and acclaimed stage couple Gower and Marge Champion as the film's "B" couple, all under the sure handed direction of MGM's jack of all trades director George Sidney. Despite two previous film versions (the 1936 version is also justly celebrated, thanks to Paul Robeson's definitive rendition of "Ol' Man River"), neither can dim the great cast, rousing score and brilliant Technicolor of an Arthur Freed MGM production, who knew how to align stars for his films.

The film begins with an incredible vignette, as the show boat rounds the bend into Natchez, Mississippi, the entire company, positioned on every square inch of the boat's deck space, launches into the song "Cotton Blossom", alerting seemingly the entire town of their arrival. Cap'n Andy Hawks and his wife, Parthy own and operate the vessel, and Julie LaVerne is their star attraction, a great beauty and renowned singer, who also happens to be of mixed race. Once this is found out (the show takes place in the latter half of the 19th century, when such things were illegal) Cap'n Andy is forced to remove Julie from the show. What makes the show so progressive is the display of loyalty that Julie's husband, Steve, demonstrates, pricking her finger so he can drink her blood and possess African American blood as well. The show's star duo now cast adrift, Cap'n Andy reluctantly casts his daughter, Magnolia, as the star attraction, with the ship's new leading man, Gaylord Ravenal as her co-star. Played with perhaps a bit too much charm by Howard Keel (on stage Ravenal truly is a heel, who, while he loves Magnolia, is also an unapologetic gambler and carouser), Ravenal smooth talks his way onboard and immediately makes Magnolia swoon. Soon the couple secretly marry, and with the blessing of Cap'n Andy, move to Chicago where Ravenal can make a go at being a "professional gambler". Despite having immediate success, Ravenal soon finds himself riding a long bad streak, and leaves Magnolia. This action too is played differently on screen that it is on stage. The movie portrays Ravenal as a disgraced husband who has failed his wife and retreats into his own depression. The stage version portrays a restless man, frustrated with his own bad luck, who deserts his wife in the hopes of starting anew. Either way, neither version knew one thing: Magnolia is pregnant (see, progressive!). Still needing to provide for herself, Magnolia gets the chance to audition at a nightclub in Chicago, where a broken down, alcoholic Julie is performing. Julie immediately brightens upon seeing her old friend Magnolia, and encourages her to sing the song she taught her years before "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man". Magnolia is very shy at first and the club owner dismisses her, but Julie walks out on her contract (deliberately) forcing the owner to hire on Magnolia as the new attraction.

The night of her first performance, New Year's Eve, Cap'n Andy happens to be in the audience and is shocked to see his daughter on stage. Magnolia sings a beautiful song "After the Night is Over" (a song written for the film, and retained in subsequent stage productions), timidly at first, but gains more confidence when she sees her father encouraging her from the audience. Magnolia had been too heart broken to tell her father that Ravenal had left her, especially in her condition, but Cap'n Andy warmly welcomes her back, and she returns to the show boat. Shortly after, Magnolia has her baby, a girl named Kim, and while docked at some port along the Mississippi, Kim happens to meet Ravenal, who has recognized the Cotton Blossom. After talking with the girl for a few moments, Ravenal notices Magnolia on deck, and after receiving her look of forgiveness, returns to her, reuniting the family. While the stage version ends this way, Magnolia's decision is a more strained here, which makes the film's ending somewhat more satisfying. As the boat pulls away, we see Julie looking on one last time, Magnolia's guardian angel seemingly, and the rousing song "Ol' Man River", sung by the MGM chorus (a device very popular in Old Hollywood musicals, have one on screen singer, in this case William Warfield, as boat hand Joe, accompanied by an off screen chorus) swells to a finale. Despite receiving a cool reception from critics, the film was a box office success, thanks to Arthur Freed's shrewd casting, and of course, the show's enduring popularity. One odd note; the film's poster, not the one picture here however, featured Howard Keel and Ava Gardner, not uncommon to portray the film's two biggest stars, except for the fact that the two have nothing to do with one another in the film! That small inconsistency aside, "Show Boat" is a gorgeously photograped film, emblematic of MGM in the 1950's and features one of the great American scores. A true classic, on both the stage and the screen.

Kiss Me Kate

What Gene Kelly was to Arthur Freed, Howard Keel was to Jack Cummings. Cummings, the "B" level producer on the MGM lot during the reign of Freed, sometimes got the upper hand on his more successful rival, but only rarely. After all, there is a reason Arthur Freed is regarded as a genius. However, that should not discount the work Jack Cummings did, all with significantly less resources. While "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" is regarded as the pinnacle of the Cummings unit, his work with leading man Howard Keel the year before that film is also quite good. "Kiss Me Kate", based on the truly wonderful stage musical by the incomparable Cole Porter, was released in 1953, and featured quite the collection of talent. In addition to Keel, the film starred Kathryn Grayson (something of a casting coup for Cummings, he managed to secure the star duo of one of Freed's previous hits, "Showboat"), and in her largest role to date, Ann Miller. The film was also directed by George Sidney, director of such MGM hits as "Showboat" and "Scaramouche". I like to think of George Sidney as a poor man's Michael Curtiz; he successfully worked in many different genres, and his work here is exceptional, not always a given when adapting a popular Broadway show to the big screen. Of course, when your characters can break into Cole Porter songs every scene, things come a little easier, and this show has a healthy number of standards, including my personal favorites "Always True To You" and "Tom, Dick or Harry" as well as "Too Darn Hot", "Wunderbar" and "So In Love" (which, it should be noted, was used perfectly in "De-Lovely", the biopic of Cole Porter). While the movie changed elements of the extremely successful stage musical (most significantly moving "Too Darn Hot" from the opening number of Act Two, to the very beginning of the movie, where it is used as an "audition" number, with "Cole Porter" in attendance), the film still plays very well, thanks to the dynamic presence of Keel and Grayson (who plays the obnoxious, tempermental Lilli quite well, considering her roles were usually chaste and innocent), and of course, that incomparable score by Cole Porter.

As the film opens, Cole Porter has invited Fred Graham, a pompous theater hyphenate, to his apartment to hear a young chorus girl sing a song from his new musical, "Kiss Me Kate". What he has not told Fred is that he has also invited Fred's ex wife, the domineering Lilli Vanessi, as well, in the hopes of convincing the two on a collaboration. Fred and Lilli used to be a happily married couple, as well as the biggest male and female stars of the stage, until their marriage deteriorated thanks to Fred's inflated ego and Lilli's diva like behavior. What Fred has not told Lilli is that he and the chrous girl, Lois Lane (you have to love it when characetrs in old movies had names which would subsequently take on greater pop culture status) are now an item (while she has not told him of her own tempestuous relationship with gambler/dancer Bill Calhoun), and Lilli has not told Fred that she too is on the verge of remarrying, in her case, a Texas millionaire. And for good measure, Bill has not told Lois that he signed an I.O.U. in Fred's name to a couple of gangsters. All of these secrets initially converge in Cole Porter's apartment, as Lois' "Too Darn Hot" numbers wows the assembled financial backers and Fred convinces Lilli to sign on as the production's leading lady (with an unhappy Lois and Bill as the "B" couple). It is obvious from the first scene that despite Fred's big head and Lilli's bad attitude, the two still love each other. Where Cole Porter's libretto truly attains its classic status though is the way he incorporates elements of Shakespeare's "The Taming of the Shrew" into his plot. In "The Taming of the Shrew", there are two beautiful daughters, Bianca, the younger, guy crazy one, and Katherine, the older, man-hating one. Enter boastful ladies man Petruchio, who teams up with lovesick Lucentio to "tame the shrew"; by winning the hand of the monstrous Kate, Bianca is free to marry her sweetheart Lucentio. While all this is playing out on stage, "off stage" Fred finds himself taming a real shrew, Lilli. Throw in song and dance (Ann Miller and Tommy Rall as Lois and Bill might not have the voices that Howard Keel and Kathryn Grayson have, but they are twice the dancers, talents featured in their number "Why Can't You Behave?"), and some gangsters with a theatrical itch, and you have a marvelous confection.

The show's opening night finds the company with no shortage of trouble. Lilli is threatening to leave after one performance to marry her Texas millionaire fiancee and Fred has to deal with the gangsters who have moved in backstage to make sure Fred makes good on the I.O.U. Bill signed in his name. To Fred, the gangsters are the least of his problems; the show is all that matters. Early on in the evening Lilli started to warm to Fred's charm again and you see why the two were so in love with each other. They sing of their early days in the theater to the tune of the great song "Wunderbar", itself a joke of the ways Fred used to ingratiatingly play to the crowds. The good will quickly evaporates as a flower bouquet from Fred intended for Lois ends up in Lilli's dressing room, hence Lilli's threat to leave the company immediately. This latest conflict is played out brilliantly, in Lilli's woman-scorned anthem, "I Hate Men" and Fred/Petruchio's taming of the shrew on stage (a great scene when paralleled with the hysterics back stage). Meanwhile Bill is dismayed that Lois would leave him for the pompous Fred, and the romantic subplot is actually worthwhile, thanks to the splendid performances of Miller and Rall, and the fact that they get some great numbers. The aforementioned "Why Can't You Behave?" is good, but "Always True To You" is arguably the film's most infectious song and "Tom, Dick and Harry" is, in true Porter fashion, an incredible use of lyric with a catchy tune to go with it. This being "Kiss Me Kate", everyone gets their big number, even the gangsters, who steal the film (and the show, this number on stage always gets the biggest cheers) with "Brush Up Your Shakespeare", which they sing to Fred. Porter's lyrics are perhaps never more inspired than in this song, which incorporates virtually every title and character name Shakespeare ever put down on paper. Of course by the end Fred and Lilli have fallen back in love, Bill and Lois have put their differences behind them (mainly Lois is over her Fred infatuation and Bill has resolved to stop gambling), and the gangsters give up their life of crime for life in show business! It should be noted that the film was the first musical to utilize the latest technological fad of the time: 3D, a device used throughout the film, as characters constatly pitch things "at" each other (more accurately at the camera). The ending gives the format an opportunity to be worthwhile though, as confetti and streamers explode in the air to celebrate Petruchio and Katherine and Lucentio and Bianca's weddings. A rousing ending to, in my opinion, the best film to utilize the music of Cole Porter.

Carmen Jones

In the early 1950's while vixens such as Ava Gardner and Marilyn Monroe were smoldering on screen, one actress who possessed the same burning charisma and gorgeous features saw her career fizzle for the most part. Dorothy Dandridge was a beautiful woman, an accomplished singer, dancer, and actress, who dated some of the Hollywood's most eligible bachelors and was up for some of its biggest roles. Yet for the most part she toiled in obscurity, the public, both at the time and today, only getting fleeting glances at what a talent Dorothy Dandridge was. The reason, of course, is that Dorothy Dandridge was black. Despite having all of the necessary attributes to be a star, Dandridge was only able to truly shine in a few films, due to the hateful prejudices of the time, and studios being unwilling, for the most part, to do something bold. Otto Preminger is one of the few individuals who put his career on the line for Dorothy Dandridge, directing her in the two biggest films of her career, 1954's "Carmen Jones" and 1959's "Porgy and Bess". The enigmatic director not only had a love affair with the star, he played Svengali throughout her career, advising her on roles and protecting her from studio exploitation. When the duo commenced work on "Carmen Jones", it was to be a landmark production: a big budget musical from a major studio with an all black cast. Oscar Hammerstein II, the lyrical genius behind the Broadway smashes "Show Boat", "Oklahoma!" and "Carousel" adapted Georges Bizet's romantic opera "Carmen" for the 20th century, retaining Bizet's incomparable music and story, but added English lyrics to the songs, allowing it to the film to feel familiar, but at the same time creating something completely fresh and new. Joining Dorothy Dandrige in the titular role, was Harry Belafonte, a promising black actor who would go on to greater acclaim as her tormented lover Joe. Together these two stars would burn up the screen much as Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford did six years prior in "The Loves of Carmen", thanks to the confident direction of Preminger, whose love for his leading lady is evident, and the incredible job done by Hammerstein, whose work here is not nearly as celebrated as it should be. The real story though, is the leading lady. In "Carmen Jones", Dandridge delivers an absolute tour de force performance as one of history's most infamous teases.

As the film opens, Joe, a lovestruck young private, is eagerly awaiting the arrival of his hometown sweetheart Cindy Lou. While the two have lunch at the army base's cafeteria, Carmen Jones struts in. Something of a local legend, she works in the parachute factory adjoining the base and is lusted after by virtually every man in uniform. Every man except Joe. Carmen sings her first song here, (despite being an accomplished singer, Dorothy Dandridge did not do her own singing; neither did Harry Belafonte or Joe Adams, who plays the cocky boxer Husky Miller) a provocative number in which she paints herself as every bit the harlot she is known to be, and reminds every man in the room that they cannot resist her. The entire room is transfixed with the exception of Joe, who calmly eats his food, his eyes never straying from Cindy Lou's gaze and his coffee cup. Shortly after her number Carmen gets into a fight with another woman in the cafeteria, and is sent to the MP jail some miles away from the base. Sergeant Brown (played by a young Brock Peters) orders Joe to accompany Carmen, deliberately foiling Joe's plans with Cindy Lou, since he had begun his furlough that morning. Swearing he will return as soon as he can, Joe and Carmen are no more than a few moments from the base before Carmen turns on her charms and wiles. Initially Joe rebuffs her, keeping his focus on his assignment and returning to Cindy Lou. But after their car gets straded in a creek, Joe is forced to escort Carmen home, a "short cut" she claims will aid their endeavor. Of course Carmen has no intentions on going to jail, and she pours on the charm, quickly ensnaring Joe as she has many men before him. After Carmen cooks Joe dinner and sleeps with him, the two agree to meet at a local bar where they plan on running away together.

Later that night Carmen convinces Joe to give up his life in the army and run away with him. At this moment you begin to think maybe Carmen really does love Joe. She rebuffs the advances of Husky Miller, a big boxing star and heavyweight champion, who rolls into town with his entourage, immediately setting his sights on Carmen. Two members of his "management" convince two of Carmen's friends to join them in Chicago, where Husky is going for his next bout. Joe meanwhile kills Sergeant Brown, who threatens to throw Joe in jail for his role in helping Carmen escape, and tries to force himself upon her. Now a murderer, and in desperate need of money, the two confused lovers reluctantly latch on with Husky's entourage, seeking to disappear in Chicago. After a few weeks of laying low, however, Joe and Carmen grow increasingly at odds with one another. Joe cannot leave their small apartment for fear of being caught by the police, and Carmen, as is her nature, quickly grows bored with one man in her life, in this case an increasingly paranoid and jealous Joe. Carmen decides to leave Joe and join up with Husky as his girl, which enrages Joe. He follows Carmen to Husky's hotel and challenges the heavyweight to a fight, which Husky easily wins, knocking Joe senseless with one punch. It is only the interceding of Carmen that keeps Husky from killing Joe and Cindy Lou, who has followed Joe to Chicago, begging him on behalf of her and his mother, to return home. Joe brushes off Cindy Lou's warmth, completely infatuated with Carmen at this point and follows the group to the stadium where Husky's fight is. Amidst the patrolling police, Joe grabs Carmen and strangles her to death, before being overwhelmed by the police, their tempestuous love affair finally over. This film would prove to be a highpoint in Dorothy Dandridge's career, earning her a Best Actress nomination, extremely rare at the time for an African American. A few years later Dandridge would appear in another Preminger opera, George Gershwin's "Porgy and Bess", but after that she would fall into obscurity, and in 1965, at the age of 43, she succumbed to her crippling depression, killing herself with an overdose of prescription drugs. A sad, tragic end for a true talent who never glowed as brightly as she could have.