Busby Berkeley
From Warner Brothers films of the 1930's comes 21 complete musical numbers that established forever the genius of Busby Berkeley. The segments are escapism, pure and simple, except they're never simple. Instead Berkeley shoots through floors, through roofs and through one kaleidoscopic array of leggy chorines after another.
A documentary film about dancing on the screen, from it's orgins after the invention of the movie camera, over the movie musical from the late 20s, 30s, 40s 50s and 60s up to the break dance and the music videos from the 80s.
Period music, film clips and newsreel footage combined into a visual exploration of the American entertainment industry during the Great Depression.
After overcoming polio, Annette Kellerman achieves fame and creates a scandal when her one-piece bathing suit is considered indecent.
A World War I widow loses her only child and spends the rest of her life as a children's nurse.
The Robinson family are spending two weeks of summer vacation at a resort in the Catskills. Older daughter Patti vies with her friend, Valeria, for the affections of Demi Armendez but Patti is at a disadvantage because her parents think she is too young for boys. But with Patti singing at an amateur show and a dance, her adventures in quest of Armendez ends happily.
The Wolves baseball team gets steamed when they find they've been inherited by one K.C. Higgins, a suspected "fathead" who intends to take an active interest in running the team. But K.C. turns outs to be a beautiful woman who really knows her baseball. Second baseman Dennis Ryan promptly falls in love. But his playboy roommate Eddie O'Brien has his own notions about how to treat the new lady owner and some unsavory gamblers have their own ideas about how to handle Eddie.
Doris Day, in her film debut, plays Georgia Garrett, a singer sent by jealous wife Elvira Kent on an ocean cruise to masquerade as herself while she secretly stays home to catch her husband cheating. Meanwhile equally suspicious husband Michael Kent has sent a private eye on the same cruise to catch his wife cheating. Love and confusion ensues along with plenty of musical numbers.
Rich kid Danny Churchill has a taste for wine, women and song, but not for higher education. So his father ships him to an all-male college out West where there's not supposed to be a female for miles. But before Danny arrives, he spies a pair of legs extending out from under a stalled roadster. They belong to the Dean's granddaughter, Ginger Gray, who is more interested in keeping the financially strapped college open than falling for Danny's romantic line. At least at first...
Playboy Andy Mason, on leave from the army, romances showgirl Edie Allen overnight to such effect that she's starry-eyed when he leaves next morning for active duty in the Pacific. Only trouble is, he gave her the assumed name of Casey. Andy's eventual return with a medal is celebrated by his rich father with a benefit show featuring Eadie's show troupe, at which she's sure to learn his true identity...and meet Vivian, his 'family-arrangement' fiancée. Mostly song and dance.
This short film showcases six production numbers from various Warner Bros. musicals.
The process by which girls are chosen for chorus line members in movie musical is shown. Numbers from popular 1930s musicals are then presented. These include "Don't Say Goodnight" from Wonder Bar (1934); "Lullaby of Broadway" from Gold Diggers of 1935 (1935) ; "Shadow Waltz" from Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933); and "By a Waterfall" and "Shanghai Lil" from Footlight Parade (1933).
A short history of movie music is presented, from silent films accompanied by a single piano, to the elaborate song scores for musicals (with scenes from MGM's musicals) and background music for dramas. Conductor/composer
Two vaudeville performers fall in love, but find their relationship tested by the arrival of WWI.
A writer (John Shelton) of pulp Westerns cranks out more words than his editor and publisher (Albert Dekker) want to pay for.
Discovery by Flo Ziegfeld changes a girl's life but not necessarily for the better, as three beautiful women find out when they join the spectacle on Broadway: Susan, the singer who must leave behind her ageing vaudevillian father; vulnerable Sheila, the working girl pursued both by a millionaire and by her loyal boyfriend from Flatbush; and the mysterious European beauty Sandra, whose concert violinist husband cannot endure the thought of their escaping from poverty by promenading her glamor in skimpy costumes.
Penny Morris and Tommy Williams are both starstruck young teens but nobody seems to give them any chance to perform. Instead they decide to put up their own show to collect money for a summer camp for the kids.
Jimmy and Mary get a group of kids together to play in a school orchestra. A huge contest between schools is coming up and they have a hard time raising money to go to Chicago for the contest.
An out-of-work professor gets a break from an old college buddy to teach at an exclusive girl's school. But events conspire against him: he finds an abandoned child which he takes under his wing, despite the school's rules against teachers having a family; and the girls in the school resent his replacing a handsome and popular teacher, and do everything in their power to get him fired.
Mickey Moran, son of two vaudeville veterans, decide to put up his own vaudeville show with his girlfriend Patsy Barton. But child actress Rosalie wants to make a comeback and replace Patsy both professionally and as Mickey's girl.
Joel and Garda Sloan, a husband and wife detective team, who also sell rare books in New York, take a vacation to Seaside City. At Seaside, Joel's pal, Mike Stevens is managing and preparing for their beauty pageant. Joel is made one of the judges plus he has invested $5,000 in it, to Garda's dismay. Eric Bartell, promoter, arrives to dupe Stevens. When Ed Connors, New York racketeer arrives, Bartell is mysteriously murdered. Joel and Garda set out to investigate the murder.
A boxer flees, believing he has committed a murder while he was drunk.
Don Vincente is determined to make a success of himself and his band. He gets his break by performing at the Garden of the Moon, which is broadcast over the radio. The problem is that John Quinn is the club's ruthless, scheming manager who will do anything to keep Vincente under his thumb. John's assistant, Toni Blake, falls for Vincente, complicating the escalating war.
Story of a rising stage star and the trouble she causes by her ambition.
The romantic hills and valleys of advertising agency secretary Linda Lawrence (Priscilla Lane) provide the basis of this comedy drama. Unlike her soon-to-be-married roommate Nancy (Penny Singleton), Linda is determined to remain single and forge a strong career. She does have a suitor, Jimmy Hall (Wayne Morris), but he is not ambitious enough for her and she keeps her distance. The girl gets her chance to climb the corporate ladder after she invents a sure-fire cure for hangovers. Sure enough she begins her ascent. Meanwhile, her suitor continues to plead with her to leave her job and become his bride. But the secretary has fallen for ambitious adman Harry Galleon (Humphrey Bogart) who is already engaged. At this point, the stage is set for considerable romantic confusion .
Ronny Bowers, a saxophonist in Benny Goodman's band has won a talent contest an got a ten week contract with a film studio. On his first evening he is supposed to go with the studio's star Mona Marshall to a movie premiere. But this lady doesn't want to go, so the bosses decide to use for Mona a double, Virginia. When Mona finds out next morning that happened, she insisted to fire her double and Ronny. Ronny finds work as singing waiter in a drive in, and is spotted by a director of the same studio, who wants him to lend his voice for an leading actor in a musical.
The partners of stage-producer J. J. Hobart gamble away the money for his new show. They enlist a gold-digging chorus girl to help get it back by conning an insurance company. But they don’t count on the persistence of insurance man Rosmer Peck and his secretary Norma Perry.
A Broadway show is forced to bow to the whims of a talentless,whacky, but rich, Broadway actress with a contract.
Collection of Warner's stars blundering through missed takes.
Romance strikes when a vacationing millionairess and her daughter and son spend their vacation at a posh New England resort.
This short shows the entrances of the various Hollywood studios, then specifically visits Warner Bros. / First National Studios. We start at the casting office, then see Busby Berkeley and choreographer Bobby Connolly working with chorus girls on production numbers. Then come some candid shots of several contract stars. Finally we see comedian Hugh Herbert filming a scene for an upcoming release, then the various behind the scenes steps that transition the raw film in the camera into the finished product.
At a Mexican resort, a fast-talking magazine editor woos the dancer he's trashed in print.
A potpourri of features involving Hollywood celebrities. The Columbia University football team, winner of the 1934 Rose Bowl game, visits the Warner Bros. Studios and is greeted by several stars; Margaret Lindsay, Guy Kibbee, and Dick Powell work at a gold mine; Joan Blondell, recovered from a recent illness, thanks her fans; songs from the movie Harold Teen (1934) are performed by the songwriters and the film's stars.
Students at New York's Rovina Finishing School for Girls send their photographs to the makers of Claybury's Beauty Soap, in the hope of being chosen as "Miss Complexion of 1934." Martha Howson wins the contest, which includes a trip to Hollywood and a tour of the Warner Brothers lot with Lyle Talbot. When she gets to the studio, all she wants to do is meet Dick Powell, star of the new Warner Brothers film Dames (1934).
Things get tough for Carol and her showgirl pals, Trixie and Polly, when the Great Depression kicks in and all the Broadway shows close down. Wealthy songwriter Brad saves the day by funding a new Depression-themed musical for the girls to star in, but when his stuffy high-society brother finds out and threatens to disown Brad, Carol and her gold-digging friends scheme to keep the show going, hooking a couple of millionaires along the way.
Florence Denny (Loretta Young) is Daniel Drew's (Lyle Talbot) girlfriend and secretary at a clothing manufacturer during the Great Depression. In order boost sales they have been using professional female entertainers to keep their clients very happy, but the clients are getting bored of them. Daniel convinces management to replace the professionals with "volunteers" from the pool of stenographers. Inevitably some clients expectations are greater than their "dates", boyfriends become unhappy and the "voluntary" duty becomes less so over time. At first, Daniel prevents Florence from being a volunteer but eventually the prospect of a bonus becomes too great and he encourages her to volunteer. Afterwards, Daniel considers Florence as a loose woman.
A producer puts on what may be his last Broadway show, and at the last moment a chorus girl has to replace the star.
A fledgling producer finds himself at odds with his workers, financiers and his greedy ex-wife when he tries to produce live musicals for movie-going audiences. This film has been inducted into the Library of Congress National Film Registry.
Wilkie and Mitchell, trying to desert their draft into the army, stow away on a ship which takes them into the war zone. While AWOL, the rivals for Mary's affections accidently destroy an ammunition dump.
Musical comedy antics in an art deco bakery (motto: "Glorifying the American Doughnut") with Eddie Cantor as an assistant to a phoney psychic, who is mistaken for an efficiency expert and placed in charge. Complications ensue when the psychic and his gang attempt to rub the payroll.
