Harry Warren was an eminent composer of literally dozens of hit tunes written for movies from the early 1930s through the late 1950s. His last big song was the haunting theme from ‘An Affair To Remember’ and his earliest works include depression-era ditties like ‘Jeepers Creepers’, ‘Lullaby Of Broadway’, ‘Would You Like To Take A Walk?’, ‘September In The Rain’ and the remarkably sturdy ‘I Only Have Eyes For You’–that last has had hit records over three separate decades. Then there was his 1940s catalogue, featuring songs such as ‘The More I See You’, ‘Chattanooga Choo-Choo’, ‘Atchison Topeka and the Santa Fe…’ I could go on. But fame somehow eluded him and he never became the household name that Irving Berlin, Cole Porter or George Gershwin were. (He had a particular abhorrence of Berlin for some reason; he infamously once remarked ‘In World War 2 they bombed the wrong Berlin’).I actually knew Harry in the last years of his life and he was filled with contradictions; a warm, welcoming man who was openly vituperative and bitter about his lack of recognition; a Brooklyn boy who retained the modesty (and accent) of his origins while living a life of unapologetic lavishness on his estate in Beverly Hills; a private and retiring man who professed to miss the fame that others of his ilk (and many not quite up to his extraordinary talent) seemed to receive. He had a small studio building on the grounds of his home that was his private office/sanctuary and on a number of fondly remembered Friday afternoons my father and I would pay a visit and I’d play jazz versions of his songs on the spinet piano he kept in the corner of the room. (I also once unexpectedly met Gene Kelly there–he kicked me and a friend off the tennis court that he occasionally borrowed from Harry…but that’s another story for another time). The above short film features Harry in 1933 playing his own songs (and singing a little), accompanied by some terrific talent of the era. The film is something of a promotional reel I think–it may have screened in theaters but I suspect it was also used for the exhibitor conventions the studio threw a couple of times a year to advertise and hype their product and talent to the theater owners. The art deco set is superb and the direction by Ray (Leo’s brother) McCarey and photography by E.B. DuPar is sleek and inventive. It’s rather astonishing how many hits he’d already written this early in his career–he was not yet forty when this was filmed–and how long he had in front of him. Did I mention he wrote ’42nd Street’? You’ll find that out at the end of the short when we break out of the set and see some footage from the movie, providing this reel with a truly bang-up ending.