Author Archives: Jnpickens

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About Jnpickens

Classic film lover and reporter in North Carolina.

Musical Monday: Sweet Surrender (1935)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
Sweet Surrender (1935) – Musical #811

Studio:
Distributed by Universal Pictures

Director:
Monte Brice

Starring:
Frank Parker, Tamara, Helen Lynd, Russ Brown, Arthur Pierson, Otis Sheridan
Themselves: Jack Dempsey, Abe Lyman

Plot:
When radio singer Danny O’Day (Parker) loses his job and dancer Delphine Marshall (Tamara) needs a rest, they both end up on a sea voyage to Paris. Delphine travels in disguise as a mousy woman named Martha so she isn’t bothered by fans. So thief Maize Marshall (Tamara) takes the opportunity to pose as Delphine in order to rob people. Meanwhile, Danny, who is smitten with Delphine, is trying to romance the wrong woman.

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Musical Monday: The Sun Comes Up (1949)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
The Sun Comes Up (1949) – Musical #810

Studio:
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Director:
Richard Thorpe

Starring:
Jeanette MacDonald, Pal the Dog, Claude Jarman Jr., Lloyd Nolan, Percy Kilbride, Margaret Hamilton, Lewis Stone, Nicholas Joy, Dwayne Hickman (uncredited)

Plot:
After experiencing tragedy in her household, singer Helen Winter (MacDonald) takes a trip to the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina to be alone. She begrudgingly takes the family dog Lassie (Pal), though she blames the dog for the accident. While she spends time like a recluse, she is softened by a young boy Jerry (Jarman), who helps her around the rented house.

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Musical Monday: The Barkleys of Broadway (1949)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
The Barkleys of Broadway (1949) – Musical #73

Studio:
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Director:
Charles Walters

Starring:
Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Oscar Levant, Billie Burke, Gale Robbins, Jacques François, George Zucco, Clinton Sundberg, Inez Cooper, Carol Brewster, Wilson Wood, Hans Conried (uncredited), Dee Turnell (uncredited)

Plot:
Husband-and-wife performers Josh (Astaire) and Dinah Barkley (Rogers) are successful Broadway musicals stars. Dinah becomes restless with lighter musical theater and is convinced by producer Jacques Pierre Barredout (François) that she should try her hand at dramatic theater. The decision breaks up the Barkley marriage. However, while Dinah struggles with the new play, Josh watches from afar and finds a way to help.

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Musical Monday: The Big Broadcast of 1937 (1936)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
The Big Broadcast of 1937 (1936) – Musical #526

Studio:
Paramount Pictures

Director:
Mitchell Leisen

Starring:
Jack Benny, George Burns, Gracie Allen, Bob Burns, Martha Raye, Shirley Ross, Frank Forrest, Don Hulbert, Virginia Weidler (uncredited)
Themselves: Leopold Stokowski, Benny Goodman and His Orchestra, Benny Fields

Plot:
Jack Carson (Benny) produces a radio show and is working to get Mr. and Mrs. Platt (Burns and Allen) to sponsor the show with their golf ball product. In the midst of signing their sponsorship, Jack discovers radio deejay Gwen Holmes (Ross), who sings along to his star singer, Frank Rossman (Forrest), and ribs his singing. Jack is not too pleased, and hires Gwen to keep her off of the radio, and publicity man, Bob Miller (Milland), woos her. However, they find that Gwen actually is a great singer and she quickly rises to fame.

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Musical Monday: Moonlight and Pretzels (1933)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
Moonlight and Pretzels (1933) – Musical No. 809

Studio:
Universal Pictures

Director:
Karl Freund

Starring:
Roger Pryor, Mary Brian, Leo Carrillo, Lillian Miles, Herbert Rawlinson, Bobby Watson, William Frawley, Donald MacBride, Bernice Claire, Alexander Gray, Robert Young (uncredited)
Themselves: Jack Denny and His Orchestra, Frank and Milt Britton and His Band

Plot:
Songwriter George Dwight (Pryor) is down-on-his-luck and fired from a vaudeville show while performing in a small town. There, he meets Sally Upton (Brian), who hires him to work in her music store and encourages his songwriting. With her motivation, George successfully sells a song and heads to New York City, promising to write to Sally. While George climbs to fame and works with singer Elise Warren (Miles), he never writes to Sally, so she comes to New York.

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Musical Monday: Nice Girl? (1941)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
Nice Girl? (1941) – Musical #808

Studio:
Universal Pictures

Director:
William A. Seiter

Starring:
Deanna Durbin, Franchot Tone, Robert Stack, Robert Benchley, Walter Brennan, Helen Broderick, Ann Gillis, Anne Gwynne, Elisabeth Risdon, Nana Bryant, Georgia Billings, Tommy Kelly, Marcia Mae Jones, Frank Sully (uncredited)

Plot:
Prof. Oliver Dana (Benchley) is a professor living with his three daughters: actress Sylvia (Gwynne), boy crazy Nancy (Gillis) and practical Jane (Durbin), who helps her father with his experiments. Everyone considered Jane as a reliable nice girl, including her unromantic boyfriend, Don (Stack), who cares more about cars than love. When famed traveler and researches Richard Calvert (Tone) comes to town to meet with Professor Dana, the three sisters are all smitten with the young professor. When it’s time for Richard to leave, Jane fixes it so that he will miss his train and that she’ll have to drive him back to New York City, so that Don and everyone will no longer dismiss her as just a nice girl.

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Musical Monday: Are You With It? (1948)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
Are You With It? (1948) – Musical #807

Studio:
Universal Pictures

Director:
Jack Hively

Starring:
Donald O’Connor, Olga San Juan, Martha Stewart, Lew Parker, Walter Catlett, Patricia Dane (billed as Pat Dane), Ransom Sherman, Louis Da Pron, Noel Neill, Julie Gibson, George O’Hanlon, Eddie Parks, Raymond Largay, Jody Gilbert, Howard Negley, Charles Bedell, Jimmie Dodd (uncredited), Sally Forrest (uncredited), Edward Gargan (uncredited),

Plot:
Milton Haskins (O’Connor) is a math wiz at the Nutmeg Insurance Company and rarely makes a mistake. But when one day he makes a decimal error, Milton leaves work feeling like a failure. He meets Goldie (Parker), who helps Milton become “with it” by hooking him up with a carnival and becoming a performer. Milton’s sweetheart, Vivian (San Juan), becomes concerned about Milton’s whereabouts and begins looking for him. Vivian also joins the carnival, and shortly after, strange and dangerous things begin to happen, and Milton begins to investigate.

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Musical Monday: Evergreen (1934)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
Evergreen (1934) – Musical #529

Studio:
Gaumont-British Pictures

Director:
Victor Saville

Starring:
Jessie Matthews, Sonnie Hale, Betty Balfour, Barry MacKay, Ivor McLaren, Harley Power, Patrick Ludlow, Betty Shale, Marjorie Brooks, Stewart Granger (uncredited)

Plot:
In the early 1900s, popular stage performer Harriett Green (Matthews) says goodbye to her audiences, as she plans to retire to get married. But on the eve of her wedding, her past shows up and she disappears. Thirty years later, her daughter—also named Harriett (also Matthews)—is wearily looking for a job in a musical show. A down-on-his-luck publicity man Tommy Thompson (MacKay) makes the connection between Harriett and her mother. With the help of performers who knew Harriett in the old days (Hale, Balfour), Tommy hatches a plan to have young Harriett pose as her mother returning to the stage.

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Musical Monday: Kiss Me Again (1930)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
Kiss Me Again (1930) – Musical #807

Studio:
First National Pictures, a Warner Bros. subsidiary

Director:
William A. Seiter

Starring:
Bernice Claire, Edward Everett Horton, Walter Pidgeon, June Collyer, Frank McHugh, Claude Gillingwater, Judith Vosselli, Albert Gran

Plot:
Fifi (Claire) works in a dress shop with ambitions of becoming an opera singer. She’s in love with soldier Paul de St. Cyr (Pidgeon), but he is also engaged to Marie (Collyer), the daughter of the general (Gran). When Paul’s father (Gillingwater) asks Fifi to leave her son alone, she departs to fulfill her dreams of a singing career.

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Musical Monday: Lucky Me (1954)

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It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
Lucky Me (1954) – Musical #184

Studio:
Warner Bros.

Director:
Jack Donohue

Starring:
Doris Day, Robert Cummings, Phil Silvers, Martha Hyer, Eddie Foy Jr., Nancy Walker, Bill Goodwin, Marcel Dalio, Hayden Rorke, James Burke, John Alvin (uncredited), Angie Dickinson (uncredited), Dabbs Greer (uncredited)

Plot:
Candy Williams (Day) is incredibly superstitious. She’s also part of an unsuccessful acting troupe, led by Hap Schneider (Silvers). When they wrap up a stint in a movie house, the group doesn’t know where to go next since they are out of money. When the group enjoys an expensive dinner in a Miami hotel with no way to pay for it, they all get jobs at the hotel to pay for their debt. While there, they meet successful songwriter Dick Carson (Cummings), who tries to work them into his show. The only problem is that the show is financed by the father of Lorraine Thayer (Hyer), who carries the torch for Dick.

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