Behold, below, two clips from one of the most extraordinary gatherings of filmmakers ever assembled on one prime-time talk show–scratch that, assembled anywhere. On a 1971 Dick Cavett show (when he was still on network), Cavett had Peter Bogdanovich, Robert Altman and Mel Brooks–all representing “young Hollywood” (though Brooks and
When Marx Brothers movies are discussed, they are generally broken into two main categories–Paramount (the first five features up through “Duck Soup”) and MGM (“A Night At the Opera” and the next–and increasingly less impressive–four movies). (The two worthless coda items, “A Night In Casablanca” and “Love Happy” rarely rate
Here’s a fascinating three minute clip from Mervyn LeRoy’s 1930 talkie “Showgirl In Hollywood” starring the always strange Alice White. (Shamefully, I’ve yet to see this film–though it’s happily extant and reputed to be quite good). It shows the making of an early musical number–complete with views of the cameras in booths, reverse shots
According to a post on the imdb page for “It’s Always Fair Weather”, Gene Kelly had been offered the lead in “Guys And Dolls” (presumably Sky Masterson) but MGM nixed it, refusing to loan him out to Samuel Goldwyn. As a result, they had an unhappy star to placate and
The lucky Mr. Cyd Charisse, vocalist and entertainer Tony Martin, was a major pop singer in the forties with a number of hit records to his credit, most memorably “To Each His Own”, “There’s No Tomorrow” and “I Get Ideas”. He also appeared in a number of movies starting in the
Once Arthur Freed’s musical unit closed up shop at MGM, the studio itself went more or less in the tank. Indeed the finish of the Freed era in the late 1950’s more or less conincided with the “end of history” for MGM–not that the studio went out of business (though
I mentioned the other day, while discussing Susan Hayward, Hollywood’s brief foray into a sub-genre that I think of as “musical melodramas.” These films are all post-war items–the era brought with it a frankness about human frailty, compulsions and violence that wasn’t earlier considered appropriate for mass entertainment–and used period
Thoughts of Julie London the other day naturally stirred the ghost of her first husband, the deeply misanthropic maverick television auteur, Jack Webb. In fact, his ghost practically kicked me in the ass this morning and told me the pussycats could wait another day–as he still hasn’t gotten his due, twenty-five years
Fred Astaire thought their “Jumpin Jive” climax in “Stormy Weather” (see 10/9 post) the greatest tap dance number ever filmed. Balanchine and Barishnikov also claimed them as among their top picks as greatest dancers ever. Gregory Hines said that if they ever made a biopic about them they’d have to
And now, after a decade of keeping it locked in a dark vault as if it were the mutant child of a royal family, Showtime is bringing back my first feature, “Cafe Society”. It will air this Sunday evening at ten pm. Is that time Eastern or Pacific? I don’t