Howard, King of the Beggars

The Poet (Howard Keel) has come to the Baghdad marketplace to sell his poems. Discouraged by the lack of business, he sits to contemplate his situation and is given money. He has inadvertently taken residence in the place of Hajj the beggar. Not one to let a good opportunity pass him by, The Poet claims to be a relative of Hajj (who has gone to Mecca), and proceeds to set up shop and solicit alms. However, when he is kidnapped by the thief Jawan (Jay C. Flippen) and ordered to reverse Hajj's curse. The Poet discovers that everything in life is a matter of Kismet (1955).

Back in 2016, we viewed the non-musical Ronald Colman version of Kismet (1944). Also filmed in color, that version was a delightful fairy tale, with strong performances from Mr. Colman and Marlene Dietrich.  The musical version is much the same story, but it's hard to compare it to the earlier rendition, precisely because it is a musical. The addition of the lush score changes the whole dynamic of the film, making it a very different experience.

Howard Keel is excellent as The Poet. He's actually too young for the part - he is only nine years older than his "daughter," Ann Blyth (Marsinah). But he is so engaging and appealing you really don't care. If we had one complaint, it was that he doesn't get to sing the most exquisite song from the production, "Stranger in Paradise". That pleasure goes to Vic Damone (Caliph), who has a pleasant voice, but nowhere near the richness of Mr. Keel's bass-baritone. Mr. Keel was second choice for the part - Ezio Pinza was the original selection of Arthur Freed (TCM article).

After working in public relations, Howard Keel was hired as the understudy for John Raitt in Carousel - he would appear in the role while Mr. Raitt was on vacation. (PBS) He next became the replacement for Alfred Drake in Oklahoma! (Mr. Drake was the original Poet in Kismet). Mr. Keel would eventually appear in 6 Broadway plays. His breakout film role was as Frank Butler in Annie Get Your Gun (1948), but his ultimate singing partner was Kathryn Grayson - they co-starred in Show Boat (1951) and Kiss Me, Kate (1953). After leaving MGM (following Kismet), he continued to appear on film and television; then in 1981, he became a regular on the television show Dallas as Clayton Farlow, Miss Ellie's second husband. He would continue with Dallas for the next 10 years; the show had the added benefit of introducing him to a new audience, and invigorating his singing career (though he never actually sang on the show!). Mr. Keel died in 2004, at the age of 85. (Guardian obituary)

Also outstanding is Dolores Grey; she makes Lalume into a sultry seductress, and her musical routines are memorable. It was surprising to learn that she was upset by the daylight shoot of the film, fearing it would show up flaws in her complexion (A Hundred or More Hidden Things: The Life and Films of Vincente Minnelli by Mark Griffin). She need not have worried, She looks awesome.  Cyd Charisse was under consideration for the role (AFI catalog) and while she certainly had the dancing ability (let's face it, she could outdance anyone!), her singing was not at Ms. Gray's level.

Ann Blyth has a beautiful singing voice, and she is an excellent actress, but the part of Marsinah is so terribly small, she feels almost wasted. She does get to sing the lovely "Baubles, Bangles, and Beads" and supports Vic Damone in "Stranger in Paradise".  She's at her best with Howard Keel - he gives her someone to bounce off. She's less engaged with Vic Damone, which is not her fault. He's stiff and flat when he is not singing, it's as though he thinks he making a record album. It probably didn't help that director Vincente Minnelli, usually an actor's best support, was downright unpleasant to Mr. Damone during the shoot. This was not a film Mr. Minnelli wanted to make; as a result, he went quickly, sometimes to the detriment of his actors (That Was Entertainment: The Golden Age of the MGM Musical by Bernard F. Dick). 

There are some interesting supporting parts worth a mention - Monty Woolley as Omar the merchant, who starts The Poet on his long, strange journey (this was his last film appearance). Sebastian Cabot as the Wazir, a wicked man plotting to line his own pockets at the expense of his Caliph. Mike Mazurki appears in the small role of a policeman. Jack Elam (Hasan-Ben), Jamie Farr (Orange Merchant), Ted de Corsia (Policeman), and Barrie Chase (Harem Dancer) also appear - some in parts that if you blink, you will miss them (but worth looking for!)

While being able to view the film on demand in your own home is wonderful, this Cinemascope production does lose some of its impact when shown on a small screen. One of our members commented that so much was going on, it was hard to concentrate on it as she watched on her computer monitor. It's a film that begs for a big screen revival.

Kismet had many lives, most of them as a straight play (see our post on the Ronald Colman film, linked above). The musical opened on Broadway in 1953, with Alfred Drake as The Poet,  Doretta Morrow as Marsinah, and Richard Kiley as Caliph (Neile Adams as a Dancer). It ran for 583 performances.

The New York Times review of the film by Bosley Crowther was lukewarm. It paled by comparison to the stage version, but did receive positive review for Mr. Keel and Ms. Gray, and for the  music. It had a Christmas release at Radio City Music Hall, but lost money for MGM.

Kismet is not a bad film - it could have been better, but is well worth seeing for Mr. Keel, Ms. Grey, and Ms. Blyth.  We'll leave you with a trailer:

Marilyn Joins the Chorus

May (Adele Jergens) and Peggy Martin (Marilyn Monroe) are Ladies of the Chorus (1949) in a burlesque theatre. When the star of the current show resigns, May is asked to take the lead role, but instead sends out daughter Peggy. An instant hit with the audience, Peggy also is has an unknown admirer who sends orchids to her every day. After a few weeks, Peggy's curiosity gets the better of her, and she decides to find out the identity of her mystery man.  She also finds love - and complications.

Nowadays, this film is remembered as a Marilyn Monroe film - her first "starring" role, in fact.  But when it was released (as you can see in the poster to the left), the "star" was actually Adele Jergens, and Ms. Monroe was given second billing. All that changed once Ms. Monroe became a phenomenon.  The title credits of the film were altered - Marilyn Monroe was listed above the title, and poster art featured her picture, not that of Ms. Jergens (as you can see below).  In 1949, this was a B picture that didn't rate big stars, and Ms. Monroe was certainly NOT a big star.  This was her first - and only - movie at Columbia Pictures (more on that later). But Ms. Monroe is used to good advantage in the pictures, and she is engaging as the ingenue.

The casting of the film is interesting - there is only nine years between the mother and daughter (Ms. Jergens was only 31). The studio makeup people put a little grey in her hair to make the alleged age difference more convincing. Regardless, the two worked well together and were quite friendly, with Ms. Jergens becoming very protective of her younger co-star (TCM article). Their easy rapport is evident in the film and adds to the audience's enjoyment.

Adele Jergens worked as a model, a chorus girl, a Rockette at Radio City Music Hall, and a performer and understudy for Gypsy Rose Lee in the Broadway review Star and Garter. When Ms. Lee was ill, Ms. Jergens was able to step in, which led to a contract with Columbia. While there, she appeared primarily B movies (The Guardian). The year this film was released, she met her future husband (they were together for 40 years, until his death), Glenn Langan on the set of Treasure of Monte Cristo. After the birth of her son, she returned to work, primarily television, retiring from performing in 1956. She died of pneumonia at the age of 84, a year after her only son died of a brain tumor.

This was Marilyn Monroe's only Columbia film. It's been said that Harry Cohn propositioned her, and Ms. Monroe declined. Cohn, not noted for being a beneficent boss, cancelled her contract (Marilyn Monroe: Her Films, Her Life by Michelle Vogel). The rest, as they say, is history. Of course, once she became known, Columbia capitalized on her appearance in the film and changed the billing (as previously mentioned) (AFI catalog). This, by the way, is not the breathy Marilyn of later pictures - she's not yet the sexpot into which she would be molded.

The film really belongs to the women in the cast, including Nana Bryant as Adele Carroll, our hero's mother. Without giving too much away, her performance is a majro reason that this movie is a fun ride. Her actions take what could have been a really trite weeper and turn it into a delightful romance. 

We do have a couple of male performers. Rand Brooks (Randy Carroll), best remembered today as Charles Hamilton (Scarlett's first husband in Gone with the Wind) is fine as the enamored society gent. He is very convincing in his big scene with May (asking for Peggy's hand in marriage).  Eddie Garr (Billy Mackay) only has a few scenes as the man in love with May.  Mr. Garr is probably best remembered today for being the father of actress Teri Garr.

There is one fairly inane scene in which Dave and Alan Barry play decorators Ripple and Ripple Jr.  It wants to be a burlesque routine, but it really is just silly. Otherwise, this is an enjoyable film, and a chance to see Marilyn Monroe as you will never see her again.  

We'll leave you with with scene of Ms. M singing:

Vincent's House is Haunted

Millionaire Frederick Loren (Vincent Price) is having a haunted house part for his wife, Annabelle (Carol Ohmart). He has invited five strangers to the House on Haunted Hill (1959), with the understanding that he will pay them each $10,000 for spending a night. Once the doors are locked at midnight, they cannot leave until 8am. The "guests" - pilot Lance Schroeder (Richard Long), psychiatrist Dr. David Trent (Alan Marshal), office worker Nora Manning (Carol Craig), columnist Ruth Bridges (Julie Mitchum), and the house's actual owner Watson Pritchard (Elisha Cook) all need the money. But can they survive the night?

If you like short, campy movies with special effects so low budget that you can see the wires, this is the film for you. The inimitable William Castle directed and produced the production which goes, as always, for the shock value. A believer in promotion, Mr. Castle felt it "should be an integral part of the entire movie going experience." (Showmanship: The Cinema of William Castle by Joe Jordan). He would design gimmicks for his films, like vibrating motors attached to some seats for the thriller, The Tingler (1959) or voting on the main character's fate in Mr. Sardonicus (1961). The House on Haunted Hill, too, had its gimmick, which we'll discuss later on.

Without Vincent Price, this movie would be nothing. He gives it cache - he plays the role with his tongue firmly implanted into his cheek. As a result, the audience can sit back and enjoy the proceedings, understanding that taking ANY of it seriously would be a drastic mistake. Mr. Price had just lost a role in a Western film - he was judged too tall to play opposite the new star, Alan Ladd. Mr. Castle offered Mr. Price the lead in The House on Haunted Hill, which was in development. In exchange, Mr. Castle gave him a piece of the movie, which ended up netting Mr. Price a new painting for his extensive collection, and a new career as the king of the horror film (The Price of Fear: The Film Career of Vincent Price, In His Own Words by Joel Eisner).

Vincent Price was very much a Renaissance man. He began his acting career in London with The Mercury Players, after having worked as a teacher and studied fine arts. By 1936, he was working on Broadway, playing Prince Albert to Helen Hayes' Victoria Regina. He would appear in 11 Broadway productions, including the Mercury Theatre production of  Heartbreak House, starring Orson Welles (1938),  Angel Street (1944), and Richard III, playing the Duke of Buckingham to Jose Ferrer's Richard (1953). He'd moved to Hollywood by 1938, with a co-starring role with Constance Bennett in Service de Luxe.  While he played good guys on some occasions, it seems he was destined to specialize in villains or weaklings, like Nicholas Van Ryn in Dragonwyck (1946) and Shelby Carpenter in Laura (1944). He moved easily from film to radio to television (where he appeared as one of my favorite villains in "The Foxes and Hounds" episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E). A highly regarded art collector, Mr. Price donated works from his collection to form the basis for The Vincent Price Art Museum, so that students at East Los Angeles College would have access to a teaching collection. He also wrote several books on gourmet cooking with his second wife, Mary Grant.  His final on-screen film role was in Edward Scissorhands (1990), but he contributed his vocal talents to a number of films, and even to the music video Thriller. Mr. Price died of emphysema in 1993 at the age of 82.

I was unimpressed with Carol Ohmart when I saw her in The Scarlet Hour; the group opinion was not any different. She's an expressionless actress, who thinks making a moue with her mouth is the epitome of fine acting. It's not. In 1955, James Bacon called her a "female Brando" for her "savage realism" (Chicago Daily Herald, 3 July 1955).  One wonders how much Paramount paid him for that compliment. 

Carol Craig gets to scream a lot during the film. The one character who is truly terrified by what is going on, Nora has the brains of a pea. She goes wandering off behind curtains and into empty rooms. Why someone that frightened would be wandering this revolting house alone is beyond us.

Though she doesn't have a lot to do (except for some Lady Macbeth hand cleaning), Julie Mitchum is worth noting as Robert Mitchum's sister.  We also enjoyed Richard Long as the "hero" of the piece. He's effectively stalwart, with not a lot of screen time. And let's not forget Elisha Cook, who keeps warning the audience about the dangers of the house and the ghosts. He's a puzzling character, who remains a question even as the film ends.

The exterior of the house is a Frank Lloyd Wright home - Ennis House, in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles (The house was also used as Spike and Drusilla's residence in Buffy, the Vampire Slayer). (Los Angeles Conservancy) The inside is studio created - it's an upscale albeit rather dirty haunted house, though you might find a head in your luggage.

Always the showman, William Castle devised a special gimmick for this film. Called "Emergo," it involved a glow-in-the dark skeleton appearing over the audience's head at a pivotal point in the movie (TCM article). According to Joel Eisner, the first time he tried this trick was at a private screening for major producers. The skeleton was operated from a fishing reel in the projectionist's group, which worked at first. Unfortunately, the line snapped, and fell on the assembled producers.  Mr. Castle had to redesign the skeleton, so that, if it fell in a real theatre, it was light enough to not hurt any audience members!.

The New York Times review  by Howard Thompson, called the film "a stale spook concoction. " However, in a review of a 1999 remake, Lawrence Van Gelder said the new film was "a sorry reincarnation of the 1950s William Castle horror film". That rendition starred Geoffrey Rush in the Vincent Price part (AFI catalog). Today, Mr. Price's version is considered a cult classic.

We'll leave you with a trailer: 

Ginger Won't Marry

Victoria Stafford (Ginger Rogers) has had three trips to the altar, all unsuccessful - she bolts the minute she is asked to say "I Do". She's about to take a fourth trip, this time to Oliver H.P. Harrington (Ron Randall).  However, fearing another botched ceremony, his father (Thurston Hall) suggests a cooling off period before the vows are exchanged. After a month in her sculpting studio, far from her family and fiance, Vicki decides she will marry Oliver. But when she arrives in New York City, she finds an American Indian (Cornell Wilde) in her upper berth, saying It Had to be You (1947).
 
This is a remarkably silly movie, with few redeeming values; with a cast headed by Ginger Rogers and Cornell Wilde, one expects better. Unfortunately, the script is weak (and at this point in history, rather offensive), and the acting is overdone.

When Ginger Rogers did Tom, Dick, and Harry (1941), she presented the character with a high-pitched voice; she would do something similar when she appeared in The Major and the Minor (1942). The little-girl voice was perfect (albeit a tad over-young) for the allegedly 12-year old Susu Applegate. She does it again here, and all it accomplishes is to let us know Vicki is a moron. She shouldn't be - she's a talented sculptress with confidence in her abilities. Her inability to commit to a man, except to someone she met when she was 10 is odd. But Ms. Rogers makes her into a nincompoop, who vibrates through the picture with no apparent focus, leaving the audience with no focal point as well. Ms. Rogers allegedly liked the role (TCM article), though one wonders why.

Cornel Wilde is usually an enjoyable actor, but he is out of his element in this movie. When he plays the native-garbed George McKesson, he is goggled-eyed and ridiculous - if his eyes got any wider, they would pop out of their sockets.  When enacting fireman Johnny Blaine, he is the exact opposite - almost flat in his portrayal of a man allegedly in love.

Spring Byington only gets to flutter helplessly as Vicki's mother Mrs. Stafford.  The events whirl around her and she is incapable of understanding ANYTHING about her daughter. It's a real shame to waste her in this piece of nonsense.

If there is one thing that is extraordinary about the film, it is the costuming. Jean Louis designs four spectacularly gorgeous wedding gowns, as well as dresses and suits for Ms. Rogers that would make any woman proud to wear them. 

In her book A Woman's View: How Hollywood Spoke to Women 1930-1960, Jeannine Basinger comments on the wedding dresses as means of demonstrating Victoria's emotions prior to each of her weddings. Yet, in each marriage, she bolts. Ms. Bassinger believes that the film is "a case of the audience having it all. They get to ogle three gorgeous wedding gowns for the price of one. They get to see three wimpy grooms rejected. And Ginger Rogers is still intact for further plot development, free and easy and not saddled with a dreary marriage." For a film aimed at a female audience, the story may have been aimed at the many unhappily married women among them.

In April 1948, Lucille Ball and Cornell Wilde starred in a Screen Guild Theater radio version of the story (AFI Catalog).  A January 1950 Screen Directors' Playhouse show starred Joan Fontaine (subbing for an ill Ginger Rogers).

Bosley Crowther's New York Times review was scathing - he said that even his 8 year old son didn't like it. Unfortunately, we are forced to agree with him. It's not the worst film ever made, but it is a Ginger Rogers low point.  If you are a completest of Ms. Rogers work, or in the mood to see great costumes, then see it (but have a remote in hand to fast forward through some of the silliness).

Police Inspector Ralph

Gloria Gale (Shirley Grey), a spoiled socialite, is bored. When she meets Dan Terrence (Charles Sabin), a crook who works for gang leader  Mike Russo (J. Carrol Naish), she agrees to be his wheel-person during a jewel theft. Once the crime is committed and the police, led by Inspector Steve Trent (Ralph Bellamy) hone in on her, Gloria, the Girl in Danger (1934), has second thoughts about the adventurous life.

The fourth (in a series of four) movies (released between 1933 and 1934) that featured Ralph Bellamy as Inspector Trent, the movie really should be named "The Girl is an Airhead." The film's major problem is that from the start, one cannot believe that Gloria could be stupid enough to get involved in a life of crime merely because she is jaded.  We're not talking about a bit of shoplifting, or hanging out in a casino. We're talking breaking and entering and grand theft.  Dan Terrence is also armed, so had someone entered the room he was pilfering, he'd have had no qualms about shooting the unsuspecting intruder. It doesn't seem like any amount of ennue would entice a woman with a brain in her head to set herself up for 5 to 10 years in prison.

If the plot is a little lacking, the movie does have some bright spots. Ralph Bellamy is always a pleasure to watch, and it's nice for a change to see him in the lead, and not playing a put-upon dolt.  He's clearly comfortable as Trent, and his laconic attitude works well for this precise character.

Mr. Bellamy was born in Chicago; by 1919, he'd left home (he was 15) to work in theatrical road shows. Ultimately, he made his way to New York, started his own theatre company, and began getting work on Broadway, where he worked off and on from 1929 to 1959. He originated roles such as Grant Matthews in State of the Union (which would star Spencer Tracy in the film version), Michael Frame in Tomorrow the World (Fredric March in the film), Detective McLeod in Detective Story (Kirk Douglas n the movie), and what is perhaps his finest performance FDR in Sunrise at Campobello, a role he finally got to play himself when the film was made. He received a Tony Award for that performance. He spent a lot of his long career playing put-up second bananas, like the character of Daniel Leeson in The Awful Truth (1937), which got him his only Oscar nomination. Married and divorced three times, his 1945 (4th) marriage to Alice Murphy lasted until the end of his life in 1991 at the age of 97. He worked until nearly the end - his last role was Richard Gere's industrial nemesis in Pretty Woman (1990)

Another plus to the film is seeing early work by Ward Bond (Wynkoski), J. Carroll Naish, and Vincent Sherman (Willie Tolini) - here in an acting role! This was, in fact, Mr. Sherman's last role in front of the screen. He worked as a screenwriter, as a dialogue director, and finally as a director in films such as Old Acquaintance (1943), Mr. Skeffington (1944), and Harriet Craig (1950).

Originally titled, By Persons Unknown (AFI catalog), this is a so-so film with some engaging actors and a slapped-together script. It's blessedly short (57 minutes), with a pre-code ending that will have you shaking your head. Personally, I think Gloria Gale needs a time-out.