Powerful

A Major Disappointment

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

Splashy overproduced Fox 50's musical. Merman, O'Connor and Gaynor are under utilized. MM good in 'Heat Wave' number, but languidly irritating in her other two numbers, "Lazy" and "After You Get What You Want". Skip this one!

Producer: Solomon C. Siegel. Executive producer: Darryl F. Zanuck. "Heat Wave" staged and choreographed by Jack Cole. All other dances and musical numbers choreographed and staged by Robert Alton. Vocal supervision: Ken Darby. Copyright 1954 by 20th Century-Fox Film Corp. New York opening at the Roxy: 16 December 1954. U.S. release: December 1954. U.K. release: 21 March 1955. Australian release: 24 March 1955. Sydney opening at the Regent. 10,535 feet. 117 minutes.SYNOPSIS: Molly and Terry Donahue (Ethel Merman and Dan Dailey) bring up their three children in show business, the family forming an act billed as The Five Donahues. The three young Donahues are Tim (Donald O'Connor), Katy (Mitzi Gaynor) and Steve (Johnnie Ray). Steve quits the act to study for the priesthood. Tim meets Vicky (Marilyn Monroe) at a night club where she is a hat-check girl and sees her do a song when her agent brings a producer to meet her. The Four Donahues get a booking in a Florida hotel, where Tim discovers that Vicky is also on the bill. He talks his family into doing something else so that Vicky can do their "Heat Wave" number, which sets Molly against Vicky.NOTES: Nominated for awards for Best Motion Picture Story (would you believe?), Lamar Trotti, won by Philip Yordan for "Broken Lance"; Scoring of a Musical Picture, the Newman Brothers, won by Deutsch and Chaplin for "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers"; Color Costume Design, LeMaire, Travilla, White, won by Sanzo Wada for "Gate of Hell".Domestic rentals gross was probably not much less than $4 million — the movie didn't achieve this sort of standing in other markets. First of only two movie appearances of Johnnie Ray, an exceptionally popular "crying" crooner at the time.COMMENT: The rationale behind "There's No Business Like Show Business" was the same M-G-M used for "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers". Fill the CinemaScope screen with people! So not two or three Donahues, but five Donahues plus Marilyn Monroe. Unfortunately, the script which ties the many Berlin tunes together is no world-beater. True, it starts with plenty of zest, but soon drowns its gaudy spirits in an impossibly maudlin story by Lamar Trotti, of all people. (Trotti was actually writing the screenplay from his story outline when he suffered a fatal heart attack). My advice is just forget all about the dopey, ridiculous plot that pairs MM with Donald O'Connor yet, and requires her to deliver some really absurd lines about how much she loves the little bean-brain. Instead concentrate on MM and all the Berlin songs. Although making a late entrance, MM is certainly the best thing about the movie, easily upstaging the rest of the cast with her flamboyant costumes and breathless delivery. Her "Lazy" and "Heat Wave" numbers are highlights. (At the time of the film's release, Johnnie Ray in his first and only appearance in a big-budget feature film, garnered a fair share of publicity; but he's certainly no actor. His odd mannerisms and smirking delivery cheapen what was already a cheap part). As for the songs themselves, what an Irving Berlin feast! And how brilliantly handled, sung, danced and staged they are, and all treated with such justice by all the boys behind that full 20th Century-Fox sound recording!Lang has directed in his usual mousy style, allowing bumptious players like O'Connor, Merman and Dailey to hijack the movie on too many occasions. Photography suffers from the typical early CinemaScope fault of over-graininess.I am afraid I do not share some of my colleagues' enthusiasm for Lamar Trotti — as a writer that is. Trotti was a wonderful man. He was shy and extremely sensitive and had a great affection for people. Perhaps this very sympathy was his undoing (it killed him in the end of course, but I am speaking now of his work as a writer). With the possible exception of "The Ox-Bow Incident", all Trotti's writings (and when I say writings I mean screenplays, because Trotti never wrote anything else) lack any sense of urgency or topicality. They could not be described as crisp or incisive. They are not models of economy. Instead, they are long, leisurely-paced, full of inconsequential chit-chat. I have always maintained that there is no place on the screen, just as there is no place on the stage, for dialogue that does not fulfill at least three of the following functions: advancing the plot, giving the audience explanatory information, revealing the character of the speaker, being witty, and setting the mood of the scene. Trotti's dialogue rarely did justice to one of these functions, and frequently none."There's No Business Like Show Business" is a typical Lang-Trotti effort, just as were their previous collaborations: Wife, Doctor and Nurse (1937), Mother Wore Tights (1947), When My Baby Smiles At Me (1948), You're My Everything (1949), Cheaper by the Dozen (1950), With a Song in My Heart (1952). Trotti was working on "There's No Business Like Show Business" when he died of a heart attack in August 1952.

I recently reviewed "Jack the Giant Killer", a blatant ripoff of "Seventh Voyage of Sinbad". I'd never seen "There's No Business Like Show Business", and wasn't aware it ripped off "Singin' in the Rain".The latter was inspired (if that's the right word) by Arthur Freed's desire to exploit the many songs he and Nacio Brown had written. Betty Comden and Adolph Green provided an amusing script about Hollywood's transition from silent films to talkies, and (as they say) history was made.Though MGM was the king of musicals (Freed headed its musical unit), Fox must have longed for the same kind of success. Why not a film tapping Irving Berlin's huge library of successful songs? Unfortunately, the story is nothing more than the usual romantic claptrap, with a young woman (MM) threatening to disrupt a show-biz family. Who cares?Unless you enjoy watching lavish production numbers featuring Berlin's songs, and/or hearing Ethel Merman (whose voice could crack titanium) belt 'em out, there's nothing of interest for most viewers -- then or now. The critics mostly panned it, and the production was so expensive "No Biz" didn't turn a profit. Whatever current respect it holds is probably based more on nostalgia than quality.* It's generally considered the best musical ever made. I find it a bit tedious. It's funny (Jean Hagen is hilarious as the silent actress with a silly voice), but there are too many songs. And Gene Kelly's athletic, self-conscious dancing has never appealed to me.

By now, Fox's musical comedy stars of the -40s and very early '50s(Grable, Miranda, Blaine, Haver, Como) were gone or nearly gone. They needed new faces. In this extravaganza, we have a collection of 5 proved extraordinary musical comedy talents, plus a pop singer, whose film debut would also be his last. In addition, we have access to Irving Berlin's vast treasure chest of old songs, as well as a few new ones. Should be a shoe in for a classic! Marilyn Monroe was still a relatively new face, but already hot property.Her starring character is the only one not included in the Donahue vaudeville family, and clearly was written in later, as insurance for audience enthusiasm. As other reviewers have emphasized, she turned out to be the crown jewel in this film, with her 3 very sensual musical numbers and occasional inclusion in the dialog. She would be the only one of the 6 stars to do a future Fox musical comedy.Ethel Merman was a long time fixture on Broadway stages, with her more than ample vocal cords, brassy stage presence, and excellent comedic timing. She was also Berlin's favorite female interpretor of his songs. However, she had largely been avoided for film making, because she carried her brassy stage persona onto the screen, not everyone found her often rather harsh singing voice with vibrato to their liking, and she was considered relatively plain looking and heavy. Nonetheless, her Fox musical of the year before: "Call Me Madam" was considered a success, and Fox decided it was worthwhile to bring her back with another Berlin extravaganza.Unfortunately, Fox lost millions on the expensive film, and critics generally weren't kind. Today, it is generally considered a classic. Donald O'Connor had finally achieved long overdue fame in the MGM "Singing in the Rain", costarring with Gene Kelly. But, apparently MGM didn't feel they had long term room for O'Connor, along with Kelly and Astaire. Thus, aside from being loaned out for a few more musicals for Fox, MGM and Paramount, he was mostly stuck talking to a mule, however popular and profitable for his home studio of Universal.The previous year, he had costarred with Merman in Berlin's "Call Me Madam". In that film, and the present one, he was asked to play essentially toned down versions of Kelly or Astaire."Singing in the Rain" was unique in that we had both Kelly and O'Connor performing together, as well as individually. In these Fox films, O'Connor had no male dancer to partner with, although a great female dancer.In the present film, the nascent O'Connor-Monroe romance didn't look like it was more than a brief flirtation. He was much more comfortable with Vera-Ellen(in "Call Me Madam"), with Mitzi and Debbie Reynolds presumably somewhere in between. Mitzi Gaynor was another vastly underutilized talent in film. Whereas Monroe exuded her unique blend of smoldering sensuality and child-like innocence in her dialog and unbridled sensuality in her musical numbers, Mitzi was cute, pixie-like, a very lively dancer as well as a good singer: my kind of ideal stage woman! Here, we get to see her dancing, singing and comedic talent. In the "I'm Lazy" number, although Monroe is the central focus, Mitzi and O'Connor add considerably to the liveliness of the scene with their gymnastic and dance maneuvers around the reclining Monroe. She and O'Connor would again costar, with Bing Crosby, in the Paramount "Anything Goes" This would be Dan Dailey's last musical for Fox, after costarring with Betty Grable or June Haver in a number of musicals.Tall, easy going, likable, with good all around vaudevillian talents, he was Grable's favorite male costar, and ideal for his part, having played a similar role in "Mother Wore Tights". In this film, his vaudevillian talents were mostly displayed only in the first portion.I don't know why Johnny Ray, an eccentric pop singer of the times, was chosen to play one son. His partial deafness is said to partly explain his unusually intense style of singing. I didn't think his acting was bad. He just had to play the morally good son, who decides being a priest is his thing, and smiled a lot. His rendition of "Alexander's Ragtime Band" sounded rather bizarre, while his "If You Believe" was a spirited spiritual. They become less exotic-sounding with repeated viewings.Four of the songs had been included in the 1938 "Alexander's Ragtime Band", in which Merman also costarred. Besides the title song for that film, "When the Midnight Choo-Choo Leaves Alabam"(also done in "Easter Parade"), "Heat Wave", and "A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody" were again featured. However, Merman sang only the last in both films. Unfortunately, this was perhaps the worse sounding song she did here,with her voice sounding harsh, with excessive vibrato. The second of these was done twice in this film, with Mitzi doing a good job mimicking Merman's very different voice in the second version.The title song comes from Berlin's "Anne Get Your Gun", which Merman did on Broadway, but Betty Hutton did in the film. Sorry, but I much prefer Hutton's more exuberant(believe it or not!) version...Berlin composed several counterpoint duet songs. Merman did "Your Just in Love" with O'Connor in "Call Me Madam". Here, she does "Play a Simple Melody" with Dailey... O'Connor does his MGM-like solo dance to the ironic tune "A Man Chases a Girl Until She Catches Him", with a bit of help from an off stage Monroe: an interesting novelty dance worthy of MGM, in which the courtyard female statues sometimes come alive, after a coconut hits O'Connor on the head...Favorite comedy bit: Mitzi got rid of her unwanted date by having him hold both their drinks on the backs of his hands. Very clever!