A Stranger in My Arms (1959)

Film: A Stranger in My Arms (1959)

Stars: June Allyson, Jeff Chandler, Sandra Dee, Charles Coburn, Mary Astor, Peter Graves

Director: Helmut Kautner

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on June Allyson: click here to learn more about Ms. Allyson (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

By the late-1950's, June Allyson's once unimpeachable box office record was more miss than hit.  She appeared in a Douglas Sirk film called Interlude (which I am dying to see as I am fascinated by what Sirk would do with Allyson's girl scout persona) and a remake of My Man Godfrey with David Niven, both of which bombed.  Her last leading role in a movie was in 1959's A Stranger in My Arms from Universal Pictures.  At the time, Allyson was 42, an age at which most actresses, especially those who bear the title of "America's Sweetheart" tend to fade from the public.  But Allyson would live for almost 50 more years after A Stranger in My Arms, and have an unusual second chapter in her career that, while perhaps lucrative, would become an unorthodox part of her legacy as an actress.

(Spoilers Ahead) Before we get into that, though, let's talk about A Stranger in My Arms, which is our movie today.  The film is about Major Pike Yarnell (Chandler), who is tortured by memories of his time on a raft during the Korean War with Donald Beasley (Graves), his fellow soldier.  Beasley's widow Christina (Allyson) comes to find him, and wants to hear more about her husband's final days, as does his family, specifically his mother Virginie (Astor).  As we find out, Donald is not a hero, and was not as enamored with his wife & mother as they were with him, as he bad-mouthed them, saying he hated his mother and never truly loved his wife.  Virginie, though, is pressuring Major Yarnell to help get Donald the Medal of Honor, but he refuses, even as he begins to fall in love with Christina, as we soon learn that Donald killed himself on the raft, and Major Yarnell had lied and said he'd fallen off the raft in a storm.  The film ends with Christina, finally breaking free of her in-laws and the memory of a man who never truly loved her, leaving with Major Yarnell, hopefully for a happier second chapter to her life.

The film walks the line between delicious campy melodrama and over-serious bore, and man do I wish it'd had the gaul to go with the former.  This is one of only two films that Helmut Kautner (who made films in Germany during World War II, but largely avoided some of the propaganda films that would plague other Germans who made films during the reign of Adolf Hitler) made in the United States, and came just three years after his picture The Captain from Kopenick was nominated for an Oscar.  The movie needed to have more indulgence, either leaning in on Mary Astor's gorgon mother or Sandra Dee's salacious debutante.  These are the best parts, as Allyson & Chandler are a snooze in the lead-he's too dour to be a romantic lead, and she's too old to be this naive.  It's the sort of film that in 1952 would've starred Joan Crawford, Kirk Douglas, & Gloria Grahame and been much more interesting.

As I said, Allyson never was the lead in a major studio film again after this movie-after two decades in the spotlight, this was probably more than she could've asked for.  She quickly did an eponymous TV series that she (and critics) hated, and would work on-and-off in theater, television, and film in the years that followed.  She also did a series of commercials throughout the 1980's for Depend undergarments, which are essentially a well-known brand of adult diapers in the United States for people with incontinence issues.  This was actually pretty brave for Allyson to link herself to-before this, no celebrity had talked about issues like this, which is a common issue, particularly for women.  But it made her something of a punchline.  My first encounter to Allyson was not in one of her movies, but through a joke made about her by Dixie Carter on Designing Women, where in one episode she says to an older woman she's annoyed with "I don't appreciate you leaving your big old box of June Allyson bladder pads on my nightstand!"  Like Lauren Bacall over enunciating about High Point Coffee or Ann Miller tap-dancing for Heinz, this is further proof that, no matter how many movies you make or how long you reign as a leading lady, nothing lasts quite as long as a TV commercial.

Next month, we're going to fully move into the 1950's, and we're going to talk about the only woman this season who wore the crown of America's Sweetheart...even though she was not born in America.

OVP: The Glenn Miller Story (1954)

Film: The Glenn Miller Story (1954)

Stars: James Stewart, June Allyson, Harry Morgan, Charles Drake, George Tobias

Director: Anthony Mann

Oscar History: 3 nominations/1 win (Best Original Screenplay, Sound*, Scoring)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on June Allyson: click here to learn more about Ms. Allyson (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

In 1953, coming off of Remains to Be Seen, a crime musical that flopped badly at the box office, June Allyson was dropped from her contract with MGM.  This wasn't the end of June's career, though.  Allyson smartly made her first post-contract movie with her costar in the MGM hit The Stratton Story Jimmy Stewart in The Glenn Miller Story, which was a critical & commercial success (and our film today).  Allyson would reteam successfully with Stewart the following year in Strategic Air Command, and Alan Ladd in The McConnell Story (another war picture) the same year.  She'd even return to MGM for one last musical at the studio in The Opposite Sex (a musical remake of The Women that also has Joan Collins & Ann Sheridan) in 1956, but that would bomb badly, and by 1957 she'd be ready for a new chapter, which we'll get into next week.  But first, let's talk about one of the films that helped keep Allyson a leading woman throughout her late thirties, The Glenn Miller Story.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film is a (somewhat) accurate depiction of the life of Glenn Miller.  Miller might not be super well-known to the general public today, but in 1954 if you asked "who is Glenn Miller?" they would've looked like you in the same way  people would look at you today if you asked "who is Rihanna?"  Miller was a wildly successful big band leader in the 1930 & 40's, and we see that in this film as Jimmy Stewart plays him from his unsuccessful beginnings, including his unusual courtship of his wife Helen (Allyson), to eventual success, recording such standards as "Moonlight Serenade" and "Chattanooga Choo Choo" which would become the first-ever certified gold record.  The film ends where Glenn Miller's life did, with his plane going down during World War II into the English Channel, his final resting place still unknown to this day.

The movie is a part of my least-favorite subgenre, the musician biopic, one that has been pounded into the ground in recent years thanks to the success of the film Bohemian Rhapsody (we've got an upcoming one about Amy Winehouse while a Bob Marley biopic is still playing in most theaters).  So color me as surprised that I loved this movie.  It helps that Glenn Miller is one of my favorite recording artists.  My friend Drew, after I told him I was cooking while listening to Glenn Miller the other day said "how old are you???" but there's something about Miller's orchestrations that feed my soul.  Every moment of actual music in this picture is heaven.

But it's honestly the film itself that makes it work (I didn't like Respect with Aretha Franklin and I love Aretha's music).  I think it's primarily because of the way the film is constructed.  We don't need Miller to struggle with fame or a drug addiction-his story feels refreshing, particularly since it's unique (how many music superstars have died for their country?), and because Stewart & Allyson have a lot of fun with it.  Their courtship is silly & delightful, even if they're both too old for these parts, and as the film progresses, they do a really good job of showing us how bittersweet this love story's ending is going to be, knowing that it will end too soon, but that Miller's music will live on with countless lovers in the decades that follow.  Stewart is excellent (I love the way he conducts, showing that he loves Helen in a way that's different than being in love with music, but when they connect, it fills his heart), but Allyson is strong too.  Allyson didn't get enough credit as an actress during her career, but she's very good here, and the last few minutes, when she goes on a facial journey listening to her husband's arrangements, a special song just for her (for the last time), is beautiful.  Really well done on her part.

The film won three Oscar nominations, and two of them are impossible to argue with; I wasn't as enamored with the screenplay just because it was sometimes confusing at the beginning as to what Helen exactly saw in Glenn, but that's only a quibble because there's an Oscar at stake as it's otherwise solid.  But the scoring is divine-all of the Glenn Miller musical choices, particularly "Moonlight Serenade" and the way they show its evolution, are spectacular.  And the sound...I honestly was surprised how well this went.  I'm not one of those "it's a musical-it must have good sound!" people primarily because it downplays how great it can sound when you get it right-the sound here is rich, full, and captures all of the melancholy grandeur of Miller's music.  The scene where he plays while the enemy planes are dropping bombs near a still-enraptured audience...death be damned if the music is that enchanting.  What a terrific choice for an Oscar win.

OVP: The Stratton Story (1949)

Film: The Stratton Story (1949)

Stars: James Stewart, June Allyson, Frank Morgan, Agnes Moorehead

Director: Sam Wood

Oscar History: 1 nomination/1 win (Best Motion Picture Story*)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on June Allyson: click here to learn more about Ms. Allyson (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

We don't really think about this anymore, but one of the best aspects of the Classical Hollywood era was that, while they weren't really big on sequels (they had them, mind you, but the concept of a tentpole wasn't a thing), they did tend to milk cinematic pairings until they were no longer adored by the public.  Had Barbie been as big of a hit in 1949 as it was in 2023, the studios would've basically forced Margot Robbie & Ryan Gosling into another 3-4 more movies, knowing that the public would show up to cheer them on.  This is something that happened to June Allyson a lot, and honestly I wish studios would do more of now (I like capitalizing on movie stars more than I like capitalizing on franchises).  We talked about this initially with Van Johnson in Two Girls and a Sailor, but this week (and next week) we're going to focus on maybe the most-remembered of her pairings.  Even though she would ultimately make more movies with Johnson or Peter Lawford, June Allyson's most beloved pairing to modern audiences is probably with Jimmy Stewart.  The two made a trio of movies together, all of them big hits, and in the case of The Stratton Story, Allyson's favorite picture from her whole career.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie talks about now largely-forgotten baseball player Monty Stratton (Stewart), at one point a promising pitcher for the Chicago White Sox, who would end up sidelined during his prime after a freak accident where he accidentally shot himself in the right leg, forcing it to be amputated.  The film focuses on his career from the beginning to end, including being raised by a thorny mother (Moorehead) and being recruited by a sweet baseball scout (Morgan).  Along the way, he marries the love of his life Ethel (Allyson).  The movie spends a long time on his recovery, which is less physical and more emotional, until Monty decides to take his glove back to the baseball field, and remarkably stages a (true-to-real-life) minor league comeback, even as an amputee.

The movie won an Academy Award for Best Motion Picture Story, a category that's a little hard-to-understand to modern audiences, but essentially boils down to "best idea for a movie" and in that way, it generally works.  This is a movie film, one that tells the story of a hero who overcame the odds, and it does the best thing that biopics can do-it tells you a new tale of a person you didn't know about.  But it also doesn't really work.  The first hour of the film is a snore, giving us virtually nothing but repetition and basically feels like it's explaining the concept of baseball, which (I'm sorry) in 1949 was not something America needed a lesson upon.  So I'm in the middle on that statue, even if I understand why it happened.

The film's back half is much better, and easily to invest upon.  A broken man overcoming the odds is the subject of a lot of Jimmy Stewart's best films, and he definitely nails this part.  His boy-next-door charm plays well with Allyson's girl-next-door pluck, and I get why the studio saw not just the dollar signs at the box office, but also them playing off of one another and understood this was a formula worth repeating.  I just wish that they were in a stronger movie, especially in the first half.

OVP: Little Women (1949)

Film: Little Women (1949)

Stars: June Allyson, Peter Lawford, Margaret O'Brien, Elizabeth Taylor, Janet Leigh, Rossano Brazzi, Mary Astor, Lucille Watson, C. Aubrey Smith

Director: Mervyn LeRoy

Oscar History: 2 nominations/1 win (Best Cinematography, Art Direction*)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on June Allyson: click here to learn more about Ms. Allyson (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

Last week we missed June Allyson, because I was in the office all week & it was the Oscars (which as you can imagine, is quite the event around my house), so today you're going to get a double dip of Ms. Allyson, both films from 1949.  Circa 1949, you'd be hard-pressed to find a bigger name in Hollywood than June Allyson.  Allyson's lack of an Oscar nomination relegates her to a category of actress that isn't super discussed today (we'll talk about this in a couple of weeks, but a few decisions late in her career also contributed to this decline in stature), but she was a big deal on the MGM lot, rivaling figures like Judy Garland or Joan Crawford (at a competing studio) as one of the most noteworthy actresses in Hollywood.  One of the biggest films she made at the time was the all-star rendition of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, one of four big-screen studio incarnations of the story, and arguably the one with the most buzz-worthy cast.  In a lineup that included Mary Astor, Peter Lawford, Janet Leigh, and Elizabeth Taylor, it was Allyson who got top billing & the leading role.

(Spoilers Ahead...though do you really need a spoiler alert for Little Women?) The movie is about the four March sisters: headstrong Jo (Allyson), dutiful Meg (Leigh), vain Amy (Taylor), and sweet Beth (O'Brien) who used to be rich, but now live in relative poverty (relative being the operative word here given their house is pretty swanky in this film) with their nurse mother (Astor), while their father is out away fighting for the Union in the Civil War.  The film unfolds with these four women trying to live their lives, at the center of it a love square between Jo, Amy, handsome-and-rich Laurie (Lawford), and handsome-and-studious Professor Bhaer (Brazzi).  Love, tragedy, and even death ensue (we all know that Beth dies), but it's a family drama with all of the trimmings...I could go into it more, but let's be honest, you've either seen one of the movies or read the book if you're on this blog.

I will own that I've never really gelled with this story.  Even the recent critically-acclaimed movie by Greta Gerwig I was just in the middle of (let me tell you-my 3-star review of that picture stands OUT compared to my friends on the platform).  But watching this, I get why Gerwig's film enchanted so many, as it takes a relatively formulaic story and gives it life, particularly through the performances from Timothee Chalamet & Florence Pugh.  The 1949 film has no such luck, giving us little invention, and as a result, playing all of the characters as flat.  Star power will get you a little bit (Elizabeth Taylor is delicious if nowhere near as good as Pugh, playing pretty Amy), but the rest is a struggle.  Jo March is a tricky heroine (she bucks convention, frequently makes somewhat cruel mistakes about people, and spends much of the film not knowing what she wants), and Allyson doesn't know how to land her.  The first and second halves of the film feel like separate Jo's entirely.

The movie won several Oscar nominations, and here I'm onboard.  The technicolor cinematography looks divine, with all of these beautiful actresses framed perfectly in snow-covered houses and richly-detailed libraries.  The art direction in generally is also strong-I get why this, with these houses that actually have personality, won the statue.  I'm surprised, honestly, that it didn't get in for costuming too, which is fun (particularly Elizabeth Taylor's gown in the film's final scene) and lovely.  But there's not enough life in this film to make any of these lush decorations truly sing.

OVP: Two Girls and a Sailor (1944)

Film: Two Girls and a Sailor (1944)

Stars: Van Johnson, June Allyson, Gloria DeHaven, Jimmy Durante

Director: Richard Thorpe

Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Original Screenplay)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on June Allyson: click here to learn more about Ms. Allyson (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

June Allyson's career in Hollywood started rather conventionally.  She was originally a chorus girl on Broadway, getting a spot as an understudy to Betty Hutton in Panama Hattie, and after Hutton got the measles (and Allyson got to go on), she caught the eye of a Broadway director, who put her as the lead in his next show.  From there, she went to Hollywood, where an MGM screen test put her under contract immediately.  Her first real breakthrough role was in today's film, Two Girls and a Sailor, where she was paired off with Van Johnson.  Johnson was known as the "boy next door" at MGM, and got to play these parts regularly, and Allyson was soon after referred to as "the girl next door" on the lot.  The two would make six films together in all (this is the only one I am planning we'll get to this month as Allyson made a lot of movies), most of them quite successful, including today's film, which would make Allyson a leading lady for the next thirteen years.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is about two sisters Patsy (Allyson) and Jean (DeHaven) who grew up in a show business family, sometimes performing as children opposite comedian Junior Kipp (Durante).  When they get older, they are a successful singing duo who want to open up a club, but they can't because they don't have the money.  What they do have is a crew of handsome soldiers & sailors following them around (great problem if you can get it), and one of them is John Dyckman Brown III (Johnson), an extremely wealthy man who is also in the Navy.  They don't know that John has been sending Jean flowers, and when they spend a night getting to know each other, he buys them their dream venue, not revealing that he's actually a wealthy heir to a $60 million fortune.  The problems arise when it's clear that Patsy and John are in love, but she thinks he loves her sister (and that he's penniless).  Before the film ends, Jean goes off with one of her other suitors, pushing Patsy & John (whom she now knows is rich) into each others arms.

The film's original screenplay nomination is kind of silly, even if it's a genuinely lovely little movie.  The plot makes no sense if you assume that, during the time that both sisters were smitten with Johnny, they never bothered to ask him his last name or anything about his family.  But this will be a problem for when I get to that chapter of the Oscar Viewing Project later, as otherwise Two Girls and a Sailor is lovely.  The music is really great.  This is one of many MGM musicals in the 1940's that would use big names of the era and singers under star contracts (such as Lena Horne) to add a touch of excitement & glamour to the film.  Horne is wonderful, as is Harry James (who does trumpet with Allyson to the tune "The Young Man with the Horn," which I believe is the first appearance of this song that would become a James staple), and Jimmy Durante.  The funniest number is a skit that Gracie Allen does where she just plays two notes as the star pianist to an otherwise very busy orchestra; though she'd continue to do radio & television with her husband George Burns for another two decades, this would be her final film appearance.

As for our star of the month, I'm instantly enamored.  I've seen a couple of June Allyson movies, but because she isn't an "Oscar-nominated actress" I honestly haven't seen a lot of her.  Watching her here, it's intoxicating to understand why this role, in particular, made her such a big name in Hollywood.  Every scene she owns, and she does it effortlessly, like the camera is drawn to her.  After watching the most recent Hunger Games picture, my friend Cody said of Rachel Zegler (and I agreed), "this (star power) is the kind of special effect that money can't buy"...that's what Allyson is doing here.  There's something in her singing, her husky voice, her warm expression...you want to see it again-and-again.  Allyson oftentimes disparaged her abilities (she once said of herself "My voice is funny, I don't sing like Judy Garland and I don't dance like Cyd Charisse"), but it's easy to see why America disagreed with her.

Saturdays with the Stars: June Allyson

Each month of 2024 we are taking a look at an actress who bore the title "America's Sweetheart" during the peak of her film fame, and what she did with the title (including when it was passed on to the next Hollywood princess).  Last month, we discussed Shirley Temple, whose stardom as a young girl kept a studio afloat during the depression, but who couldn't translate into adult success in the film industry...so instead she went into politics.  This month, we're going to focus on one of the few women of the 1940's who would qualify for the title of "America's Sweetheart" when strong, independent women like Barbara Stanwyck & Bette Davis were more in fashion in film (thanks to the war effort).  Our star this month was a noted singer, who specialized in musicals, and would enjoy a surprisingly long career, ending in one of the most unusual places imaginable for a former screen legend.  This month's star is June Allyson.

Little is known about Allyson's early life, or at least most of it is the stuff of studio-enhanced myth & rumor, but what we do know is that she did not have an easy childhood, with both of her parents largely abandoning her with her grandparents, and an accident when she eight-years-old left her stuck in a wheelchair, with doctors initially saying she wouldn't be able to walk again.  Her one escape was the cinema, and she was especially in love with the films of Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers.  When she did, in fact, learn how to not only walk again but also to dance, she got a job in the chorus at the Copacabana, and then on Broadway.  A chance case of measles for lead actress Betty Hutton when Allyson was her understudy in Panama Hattie got her her big break, first as a Broadway lead, and then a studio contract with MGM.  Two years later, she was one of the biggest stars on the lot.

June Allyson's career is really interesting, and is going to mirror a few of the women we're going to see throughout our year of America's Sweethearts in that it isn't necessarily "taken seriously" by film historians because Allyson was never nominated for an Academy Award and appeared in largely musicals or comedies.  Despite starring opposite critically-acclaimed actors of the day like Humphrey Bogart, Jimmy Stewart, William Holden, & Gene Kelly, she was never deemed an "important actor" even by some of her peers (you can see Joan Crawford mocking her in a What's My Line? appearance).  Part of that may have been because of Allyson's most lasting pop culture moment, a late-in-her-career series of commercials for Depends Undergarments (for those reading outside of the US, these are adult diapers), which led to less stigma about bladder control, but also opened her up for a lot of mockery.  This month, we're going to take a look at Allyson's career in total, not just the atypical ending of it, but also why America fell in love with her in the first place and if, perhaps, she should be a more seriously considered actress of her era.

Words and Music (1948)

Picture: Words and Music (1948)

Stars: June Allyson, Perry Como, Judy Garland, Lena Horne, Gene Kelly, Mickey Rooney, Ann Sothern, Tom Drake, Cyd Charisse, Betty Garrett, Janet Leigh, Marshall Thompson, Mel Torme, Vera-Ellen

Director: Norman Taurog

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2022 Saturdays with the Stars series, we highlight a different Classical Hollywood star who made their name in the early days of television.  This month, our focus is on Ann Sothern: click here to learn more about Ms. Sothern (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

By the late 1940's, about the time that Ann Sothern would be soon entering her forties (she was born in 1909), her career had hit a decided slump.  The Maisie pictures ended in 1947, and while she had consistently made movies throughout the decade, other than Maisie the movies hadn't really caught on in the same way-she wasn't an established star like Judy Garland or Gene Tierney, not the kind who could demand respect & acclaim & Oscar nominations, and as a result her contract was in peril with MGM.  In 1948, she tried to jump-start her career with two musicals, April Showers, which was a poorly-reviewed musical for Warner Brothers, and then Words and Music. Words and Music was a weird film for Sothern because by most standards, it was a hit, wildly popular both domestically & abroad...but due to exorbitant costs (including giving Judy Garland a fortune for what amounts to little more than a cameo), the film couldn't break even, and as a result, Sothern's star continued to diminish.  Today we'll look at Words and Music which, despite an all-star lineup of MGM talent, is listless & forgettable.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is a semi-autobiographical look at the creative partnership between Richard Rodgers (Drake) and Lorenz Hart (Rooney), two of the bigger names of the early 20th Century for musical theater.  Most modern audiences know Rodgers for his partnership with Oscar Hammerstein, which produced classics like Oklahoma, The Sound of Music, and South Pacific, but his time with Hart was very successful.  American songbook classics like "The Lady is a Tramp," "Manhattan," and "Blue Moon" came out of their partnership.  Throughout the film, we see how Rodgers wooed his eventual wife (played by Janet Leigh here) while Hart's stature causes him to suffer with women, and tumble into a deep depression.  This is interspersed with "cameos" from much of the biggest names in the cast doing musical number versions of classic Rodgers & Hart numbers.

The film's biggest problem is that, even for an MGM musical, the plot is pretty thin.  Rodgers' life seems idyllic & pretty much an overnight success (in a fourth-wall break in the opening scenes of the movie, he basically admits as such), which might make for fine domesticity in real life, but isn't great for a movie.  Hart's life was much more complicated, but it was his homosexuality (and the homophobic culture of the 1940's) that caused his alcoholism, self-hatred, and eventual friction with Rodgers that led the partnership to break up.  No one in the film can pull off him simply being upset about being short work (since him being gay in an MGM movie would've been unthinkable), particularly Mickey Rooney.  Forget for a fact that Rooney is about as good of an example as you can come up with for a short guy whose success led to romantic touchdowns (the man married Ava Gardner, for crying out loud); Rooney is simply not a good enough actor to play a part this subtle, and his histrionics totally derail the movie.

The film's best part are the musical cameos, though our star Sothern hardly stands out in this regard.  Admittedly, Sothern is a fine singer but her skill-set is best used in comedy & dialogue.  When you put her next to Lena Horne, Gene Kelly, Judy Garland, & June Allyson, all four troupers whose biggest talent was as musical-comedy stars...you just can't compete.  Garland had $100,000 worth of medical bills at the time & used her cameo here to get them all paid off, but honestly the real highlight of the movie is Lena Horne, singing the hell out of "The Lady is a Tramp" in what is the most-remembered sequence in Words and Music.  Alas, Horne was too much of a financial risk in Southern theaters at the time, and so we don't get enough of her...and the rest of the movie can't compare.

Till the Clouds Roll By (1946)

Film: Till the Clouds Roll By (1946)
Stars: June Allyson, Lucille Bremer, Judy Garland, Kathryn Grayson, Van Heflin, Lena Horne, Dorothy Patrick, Van Johnson, Tony Martin, Dinah Shore, Frank Sinatra, Robert Walker, Cyd Charisse, Angela Lansbury
Director: Richard Whorf (Vincente Minnelli, Busby Berkeley, Henry Koster, & George Sidney all also directed scenes in what sounds like a rough shoot, but none were credited)
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2020 Saturdays with the Stars series, we highlight a different actress known as an iconic "film sex symbol."  This month, our focus is on Lena Horne-click here to learn more about Ms. Horne (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

For the past two weeks we have focused on the two major highlights of Lena Horne's film career during Classical Hollywood.  Stormy Weather and Cabin in the Sky were big deals, major motion pictures that starred African-American casts and were distributed by major studios.  However, these were anomalies.  For much of Horne's career in the 1940's and 50's, her film career was that of mere cameos.  Frequently she'd appear in films like Thousands Cheer, Swing Fever, and Ziegfield Follies as nothing more than someone that could belt out a classic tune, and then move on with the plot, oftentimes playing herself or simply a "famous singer."  This was because, since Horne was not playing stereotypical roles like maids or servants, she couldn't be seen in movies of the era in the South, and the studio couldn't afford to put her in major productions for risk that the lack of a southern box office would mean they couldn't recoup some of their investment.  This becomes particularly bitter with a movie like Till the Clouds Roll By, a 1946 MGM extravaganza, but we'll get to why in a second.

(Spoilers Ahead) Till the Clouds Roll By is the first of a quartet of biopics produced by the studio during this era where it's loosely based on the life of a famed composer (in this case Jerome Kern, as played by Robert Walker), but mostly it's an excuse for the studio to put its biggest musical stars into the picture singing the greatest hits of those composers (worth noting that the second of these films, Words and Music, also starred Lena).  As a result, the plot here is a bit thin, even by the standards of a 1940's musical.  We have Kern, falling in love with his wife Eva (Patrick), being mentored by another composer James Hessler (Heflin), and eventually trying to find some sort of path for Hessler's daughter Sally (Bremer) when she turns out spoiled & eventually, a runaway.  All of this is told in flashback by Kern to his cab driver on the night of Show Boat's premiere, which would help him to reach a new echelon of success.

The film on its merits is, well, a mixed bag (charitably).  I actually knew very little about Kern's life, and it's worth noting that while there are countless standards here, you might not be as familiar with him as you'd think either.  With the exception of Show Boat, while his songs are still well-known from other shows, none of his musicals are really done anymore, and so he's not recalled in the same way that someone like Rodgers & Hammerstein or Lerner & Loewe might be today since their films/musicals are more frequently revived.  However, the acting in this portion is dreadful (even performers as gifted as Walker or Heflin can't sell this dreck), and you spend the entire movie wishing they'd get back to the singing.

That's because the musical numbers in Till the Clouds Roll By are sublime.  Angela Lansbury sings for the first time onscreen in the cheeky "How'd You Like to Spoon Me" and Judy Garland (very pregnant with Liza Minnelli during the shoot) is at her "awe shucks" best with "Look for the Silver Lining."  Some of the numbers are cut short (at 135 minutes, this is a particularly long film) to make way for the unnecessary plot, such as Dinah Shore's "The Last Time I Saw Paris" and, most regrettably, a ballet between Cyd Charisse & Gower Champion to "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes," but you'll leave being enchanted by these numbers.

And no songs are more enchanting than Lena Horne's two numbers, for my money the best in the production (and look at that cast list-this is hardly an ensemble filled with backbenchers).  Her "Why Was I Born?" is regal & glorious.  Horne once opined in an interview (with Judy Garland, oddly enough) that she always struggled to "sing pretty," but I don't know that anyone has ever looked so glamorous while singing in Classical Hollywood-if they have, I can't recall it.  Watching this scene, you'll either cry because you're moved, or because you are so angry that MGM couldn't have given Horne some proper classic musicals during this era.

Because, as the other song showed, Horne never really got a chance after Stormy Weather & Cabin in the Sky.  Here she sings "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man" from Show Boat, one of the biggest numbers for Julie Laverne.  Horne desperately wanted the part when MGM decided to make the actual film, and in fact her costar here Kathryn Grayson (who plays Magnolia Hawks in Clouds' production of Show Boat) ended up playing the part she plays in this 1946 film when the big-screen Show Boat was made in 1951.  However, thanks to the Hays Code banning interracial romance onscreen, Horne's part was given to her friend Ava Gardner, a white woman despite the part being written for a biracial woman.  As a result, a role that Horne was born to play (and does so beautifully here) went to a woman who didn't even end up singing onscreen.  Combined with her regret over not getting the title role in Pinky (which won Jeanne Crain, another white woman playing a biracial performer, an Oscar nomination), Horne essentially left Hollywood for Vegas and the nightclub circuit.  Next week we will conclude our look at Horne with one last film role, far removed from the oppression Classic Hollywood put on her acting career.

OVP: Executive Suite (1954)

Film: Executive Suite (1954)
Stars: William Holden, June Allyson, Barbara Stanwyck, Fredric March, Walter Pidgeon, Paul Douglas, Shelley Winters, Louis Calhern, Dean Jagger, Nina Foch
Director: Robert Wise
Oscar History: 4 nominations (Best Supporting Actress-Nina Foch, Cinematography, Art Direction, Costume Design)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

There is no genre harder to gage in how it will age than straight-dramas.  For any classic film fan, there's really few joys greater than investigating a classic movie for the first time, but I have to say that dramas always have their own risks.  Westerns, whether comedy or drama, you know what you're getting into; same with action-adventures, love stories, horrors, noir, but straight dramas run multiple different pitfalls.  The issues that are being discussed (because almost every drama has an issue at its core) may no longer be applicable, or applicable in the same way.  What might have seemed important at the time could, in fact, be unimportant now, and societal norms may shift to make the film much more dated than you'd hope.  As a result, I headed into Executive Suite (as part of Operation Clean My DVR), not knowing what I was in store for, and actually ended up pleasantly surprised.  The film, with an inexplicably gigantic cast of stars, works despite on-paper seeming like something that might not.

(Spoilers Ahead) Executive Suite uses the ticking clock aspect of storytelling well-while the film isn't quite in real time, it's only the course of about a 24-hour period, where an unseen man, a wealthy and controlling titan of industry, has died, leaving a gaping hole over who will be his successor at a successful furniture manufacturing company.  In the 24-hour period, we see multiple different men jostling with each other and other members of the board trying to figure out who will end up being the CEO, though the chief protagonists in that regard are Don (Holden), the young upstart with a lot of big ideals for the company, and Shaw (March), a practical man who lives mostly by the adoration of the shareholders.

I'll give you one guess over who wins (let's not forget this was made in 1954), but the film actually rises above its predictable nature in that regard.  We're well aware that Holden is the one in command here, and will eventually become the successor, but the film is still pretty riveting nonetheless.  It helps that Robert Wise hired a slate full of movie stars to fill up his picture; it was reported years later that they made this film, similar to the Grand Hotel-style all-star casts of the early 1930's, to compete with television, and while not all of the acting is on the same level, everyone is very watchable and knows how to command a scene when they're expected to do so.  I particularly liked Shelley Winters as a secretary having an affair with her boss, and Fredric March is commendable at making his mustache-twisting villain into a real human being (March is such a fine actor-the fact that he largely made pictures like these without any sort of genre hooks is the only explanation why he isn't still just as famous with casual moviegoers).  Nina Foch won the film's sole acting citation, and she's good, but it's the sort of good you only notice when someone else points it out to you-her character is mysterious, and rises above what could have been completely stock work (think of that scene where she's opposite of March and telling him off as carefully as she can, knowing he's likely to be her next boss), but I'll admit that I wouldn't have paid her much heed had I not been looking for the OVP.

The film's other three nominations are about on the same page-they're all good, though one wonders if they were listed simply because the movie is actually quite good and these were easy categories.  Art Direction is solid-I loved the C-Suite hallway stairs (it's such a nice, elegant touch, the sort that would happen dozens of stories above the earth), though the rest of the film (especially the homes and the other offices), don't have this level of inventive detail.  The costumes are all very appropriately tailored to this level of importance (one wonders if the Mad Men costume designers looked at a film like this for inspiration), and again there's the great touch of Nina Foch's pencil necklace, but overall I was less impressed with other parts, such as the men's suits which felt completely interchangeable.  And finally, the cinematography has a gimmick (never properly seeing the face of the dead CEO, and a first-person camera early on in the picture), which was catnip at the time to that particular AMPAS branch, but again (aside from those great C-Suite hallway shots), there's not a lot to recommend this nomination.

Stil, even if it didn't quite deserve all of its Oscar accolades, I can't help but be fascinated by this movie.  It's wildly watchable, particularly Winters and March, and the sort of film that's less about the acting or visual elements and more about the sum of its parts.  Think of something like Argo where nothing specifically is singled out as "the best" but it's damn fine entertainment.  At least those were my thoughts-how about yours?  Have any of you seen Executive Suite, and if so, what are your thoughts?  If not, share some favorite straight dramas that have stood the test of time in the comments!

OVP: Good News (1947)

Film: Good News (1947)
Stars: June Allyson, Peter Lawford, Patricia Marshall, Joan McCracken, Mel Torme
Director: Charles Walters
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Original Song-"Pass That Peace Pipe")
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

Okay, I will admit first hand that going into Good News, a film I saw mostly because I was maxed out and figured that a musical was the best way to cure my insomnia/work-stress, was one of those films I figured I would just "cross-off the OVP list," not expecting very much in terms of actual quality in the picture.  Thankfully for me, Turner Classic Movies (and in this case, Comden & Green) were not about to let my frown resist some upside down action, as Good News was a delight from start-to-finish, one of those musicals that you can't help but want to go on forever and features a game performance from Peter Lawford of all people.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film's plot is about as easy to predict as you could possibly imagine.  You have studly Tommy Marlowe (Lawford), the quarterback with a gorgeous mug who can get any girl he wants, pursuing a snobby gold-digger named Pat McClellan (Marshall) who won't give him the time of day because he's not rich.  Marlowe tries to impress her by learning French from a Plain Jane named Connie Lane (Allyson) who turns out to be quite beautiful once he gives her half a notice.  The film falls into typical love triangle mode, with Tommy realizing that Connie is the girl for him just in time for him to win the big game and end up in her arms.

The trick here is that the score to the film is ridiculously good fun.  Thirty years before Grease was the word, we got something similar in Good News, though the numbers here are more classic musical theater than pop-radio friendly.  The film was originally on Broadway, but several songs were added in the big-screen version, including "The French Lesson" (which is impossibly witty fun and you should see it right now) and "Pass the Peace Pipe," which won an Academy Award nomination.  It seems inexplicable to me, quite frankly, that what is almost certainly the worst song in the film (with all due respect to Joan McCracken, who nails pretty much everything else in this role and is, along with Lawford, the highlight of the movie), managed the nomination, as "Pass the Peace Pipe" really only has a solid bass-line going for it.  The rest of the song is forgettable, and instead you'll spend most of the film wanting to recreate "The French Lesson" with your personal crush.

The film's actors were all pretty new in their careers, including singer Mel Torme who manages a bit part in the film and gets his own musical number.  Allyson and Lawford were new stars, coming off of hits in Two Girls and a Sailor and The Picture of Dorian Gray, and were major draws with the teenybopper set.  Both actors have called this amongst their favorite pictures, but the film itself was a bit of a flop when it first came out which may be why it has been forgotten in the MGM canon, but don't let that fool you-it's a frothy delight.  The film captures what would later be missing in musical revivals and is completely gone from the genre today-the firm lightness that made MGM and the musical genre itself so wonderful.  The songs are wry and the dancing effervescent, but it's that lightness of touch, and the quick focus on not only the main characters but properly setting up side characters that makes it particularly well-focused.  No one would accuse this movie of being a masterpiece, but it's a damn fine way to spend two hours.

Those are my thoughts on this little-remembered (had you even heard of it, because I hadn't?) picture.  Share your thoughts on the film, Allyson, Lawford, and the musical genre in general in the comments!

The Opposite Sex (1956)

Film: The Opposite Sex (1956)
Stars: June Allyson, Joan Collins, Dolores Gray, Jeff Richards, Ann Sheridan, Ann Miller, Leslie Nielsen, Agnes Moorehead, Joan Blondell, Carolyn Jones
Director: David Miller
Oscar History: None to speak of, but you just know they were close, considering the film received a Best Comedy/Musical Picture nomination from the Golden Globes and 10-time Oscar nominee Helen Rose did the costumes
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

Do you ever have that moment when you're flipping through the channels, waiting for something to speak to you, and suddenly, there it is, a Turner Classic Movies commercial break?  My stomach lifts, and I don't dare hit the "Guide" button on the television, as I am so excited to see what film is about to grace my living room.  Maybe I'll watch it, maybe I won't, but I suddenly have the opportunity to watch a movie from start-to-finish as it airs live on television.  I found myself there this morning, and before I knew it, I had watched all of The Opposite Sex.

I am a little embarrassed to say how long it took me to realize that this was a musical-version of The Women, the classic 1939 tale of comedic bitchiness that you simply must investigate (it stars a Many Rantings favorite, Joan Crawford with one of her arch-rivals, Norma Shearer).  Let's just say it took until they went to Reno before it started to sink in, which is at least half of the movie.  This film doesn't boast quite that iconic talent, but it isn't missing star power when you have a cast list that features June Allyson and Joan Collins in the lead roles.  Unlike the 1939 original, Sex does in-fact have men featured onscreen, though they're more props (the hunktastic Richards) or dopes (the "I'll-go-where-you're-leading-me" Nielsen) than anything else.

For those not familiar with the original or the awful Meg Ryan-remake, the story is about a gaggle of women who gossip about their friends, and in particular, Allyson's Kay, whose husband (Nielsen) has cheated with Collins' Crystal.  Allyson is told of this news by her frenemy Sylvia (well-played by the glamorous Dolores Gray), and bitchy madness ensues as the women exchange men and barbs with a frenetic speed.  For any actressexual, it's a necessary viewing and you'l find yourself falling all over one character or another.  The ones that spoke most to me were Gray, the eternally pregnant Blondell, and in an extremely bit role Carolyn Jones (who, like she did in The Bachelor Party, makes the most of a small part).

I can't say that I loved either of the two leads, both ladies having names I'm more familiar with than their filmographies.  June Allyson is a star whose face I could have attributed to any number of other actors prior to this, and whose husky voice and onscreen demeanor are both traits to admire and pursue in other films, even if I thought her mousy character was a bit too wimpy for the lioness's den of women that she's dealing with; additionally, Collins, who has curves like the Indy Speedway, is fun to watch vamp it up, but also seems a bit out-of-her-element when she is trying to act sweet-it's hard to believe anyone couldn't see right through her.  And though this is a musical, it doesn't boast a lot of music-the only numbers come from Allyson (who is dubbed in one of her numbers despite her wheelhouse including an excellent singing voice) and two bizarre musical numbers from "guest stars" to the movie.  This is particularly upsetting when you consider that Ann Miller of all people is in this cast and never once taps, shakes, or croons, and that the musical is made from the greatest studio to ever churn out the song-and-dance routine, MGM.

There's more I could delve into (how much do you love Agnes Moorehead and how weird does Leslie Nielsen look before his prematurely grey/white hair set in?), but I want to hear from you.  What did you think of The Opposite Sex, and where does it rank in your personal rankings of the multiple Women films?  Did you have a best in show?  And with Allyson and Collins-what would you recommend I look into first to get the best showcase of their talents?