Betty Grable is back, after her hit musical of the previous year "Springtime in the Rockies", to star in this very well received 'period' musical comedy, set in the Gay '90s Coney Island and Manhattan. Charismatic handsome Cesar Romero is also back, as the perennial loser in the usual back and forth romantic triangles with the leading lady in Fox's musical romances of the early '40s. Carmen Miranda and Charlotte Greenwood are absent in this one, and Betty's leading men don't sing or dance. Hence, Betty has to carry the lead in all the musicals by herself, and she does a great job in a variety of productions. My only complaint is that a few of the songs were repeated once too often. In place of John Payne: Betty's frequent leading man during this period, we have gorgeous personable George Montgomery, who served as the non-musical leading man in several of Fox's musicals. Thus, all through the film, it's seemingly a battle of these reluctant buddy matinée idol titans for the hand of Betty(as lead show girl Kate Farley). But, in the home stretch, we are chagrined to discover that, in Kate's mind, Romero(as Joe) wasn't really in the race at all, which he discovers after having wrecked the imminent marriage of Eddie(Montgomery) and Kate with a phony bank messenger who reopens a previous prime disagreement between the two with the implication that Eddie is going to make her quit her Broadway starring role, and star in his forthcoming establishment in Coney Island. Joe later admits his complicity in this fraud, after Kate doesn't believe Eddie's denial, thus opening the way for a reconciliation between everyone. Betty then sings her heart out in a reprise of "Take It From There", partly to the audience and partly to Eddie, as her surprise piano player, in the last part of the long finale production number.
As was commonly the case in Fox's many 'period' musicals, a mix of old standards and new songs are featured. The standards include "Cuddle Up a Little Closer", "When Irish Eyes are Smiling", "Winter" and "Pretty Baby". As they had for Betty's previous musicals: "Moon Over Miami" and "Footlight Serenade", as well as Rita Hayworth's hit Fox musical of the previous year: "My Gal Sal", the team of Ralph Rainger and Leo Robin provided the new songs. Unfortunately, this was a post-humous release for Rainger, who died in a plane collision the previous year.
Famous Hermes Pan was choreographer and dance director, and appears as Betty's dance partner in part of the finale production. Pan was the choreographer for many of Fox's '40s musicals, and occasionally appeared unaccredited as the leading lady's dance partner, as Fox never provided her with a leading man with advanced dancing skills, until some of their late '40s musicals. Of course, prior to this, Pan was Fred Astaire's primary dance instructor all through his RKO '30s years.
The love/hate relationships between Eddie and Kate , and between Eddie and Joe, provide much of the comedy. Unfortunately, Romero, who had good comedic skills, isn't allowed to be funny, except through his rather cruel payback tricks on Eddie. Secondary characters, played by Phil Silvers and Charles Winninger, were included to add humor. Silvers always added fun to the musicals he was included in. He was teamed with Gene Kelly in "Cover Girl" and again in "Summer Stock". He and Carmen Miranda made a great comedy team in "Something for the Boys", but were less effective in "If I'm Lucky". He had a small role in "My Gal Sal", as Victor Mature's accomplice in trying to win back Rita. Here, he teams up with Eddie, initially to reformulate Silver's little unpopular Coney Island attraction into a huge attraction, later to help Eddie in his further schemes. The also charismatic Charles Winninger, a frequent secondary character in musicals of this era, plays the stereotypical old Irish drunk Finnigan: another accomplice of Eddie's.
There are a couple of blackface elements in this film, the primary one being the stage production in which Betty dons a black wig and is made up as a mulatto, with a blackface chorus, to sing and dance to "Miss Lulu, from Louisville", where she plays a woman, by her dress and behavior, clearly on the make. Some viewers object even to this mild blackface entertainment, but I find nothing racially offensive about it. June Haver would later be similarly made up for a number in "I Wonder Who's Kissing Her Now"
In the film, Kate's Eddie-inspired ambition is to move up from Coney Island establishments to star in productions at Willie Hammerstein's Broadway Victoria Theater. The real Willie, father of the incomparable lyricist Oscar II, did sometimes manage the Victoria theater his father, Oscar I, had built, along with various other Manhattan theaters.
Betty reluctantly starred in the '50 remake of this film: "Wabash Avenue", which was a modest success with audiences. It had different songs, was set in '90s Chicago, and was not as good, in my opinion, for several reasons. Also, Universal would release a B&W musical with a very similar theme the following year, in "Bowery to Broadway".
Thankfully, this film is now available on a print-on-demand DVD basis. The print quality is excellent.
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