Blessed Event

I was a bit torn on this one--I wasn't sure whether to give it a 7 or an 8. Either way, it's a very good little film. Apparently, James Cagney was supposed to originally star in the movie but Lee Tracy eventually got the role. This film is a very good fit for Tracy, as he was the only guy at Warner Brothers who could talk as fast as Cagney---or even faster! Tracy plays a Walter Winchell-like muckraking journalist. His scruples are minimal and he seems very willing to stretch the truth in order to tell a good story---even if it means hurting a few people in the process. Because of this, his fiancé isn't sure whether she should marry him and she begs Tracy to find another line of work. But, it's obvious Tracy LOVES the work--he lives, eats and breathes this sort of scandal. Along the way, there are a few juicy stories you see in the film--including a funny one with Allen Jenkins as a mobster and a distraught pregnant lady who is at her wits end.

The film works well because of its style and fast-paced script. A few very choice scenes also spice things up. The best is Tracy as he's giving a VERY vivid account of what it's like to be electrocuted--as Jenkins recoils in horror. My favorite was the cop at the end after he caught a shooter--seeing him slap the guy around was very funny (even if it does violate the crook's Constitutional rights). Plus, I saw one scene where Ned Sparks actually looked like he was about to smile! All in all, an incredibly breezy and enjoyable little film.

By the way, although the ending and overall message is very different, another great film about muckraking journalism is "Five Star Final" (1931) and it sure appears as if Warner Brothers was strongly inspired by this previous film to make "Blessed Event".

Fast paced and very clever Lee Tracy vehicle playing a Walter W. type gossip columnist with a grudge against "crooners"generally and one in particular played by Dick Powell. Definitely precode with dialogue and subject matter that would have been totally rejected just a few years later. One scene culminates in a phrase spoken by Tracy's"mother" containg a word that rocked the film world at the end of Gone With the Wind. Among other wonderful sequences watch for Tracy's evocation of a trip to the "hot seat", and Dick Powell's rendition of a singing commercial extolling the qualities of"Shapiro's Shoes". With Shapiro himeself beaming at his side. Do catch this film also a similar effort also with Tracey "The Half Naked Truth".

"Blessed Event" is a parody of its time and of the media and entertainment of its day including newspapers and radio. But one wonders how exaggerated it really is. The sensationalism of the press and rise of yellow journalism was a frequent part of movie plots in the 1930s. But this one treats of another aspect as well - gossip.

Lee Tracy plays Alvin Roberts, who quickly becomes a famous New York gossip columnist. The movie is billed as a drama and comedy. While there is comedy in Robets' character and some of the funny things he says, the drama of the film isn't lost on the audience. We soon feel the distastefulness of Roberts' gossip column. We soon see the inconsiderate character that he becomes. We soon see his ego and pride and relish for the power he has assumed. These are sad situations, and the film shows the tragic results of such power and behavior. Of course, amidst all of this we have occasional funny lines or clever comments.

This film could be a biopic of a real person. Other reviewers have pointed this out. Roberts is as an obvious copy of Walter Winchell who was then on the rise as the king of gossip. Winchell was the original gossip columnist of Broadway and New York. He rose to such power through the press that politicians, the rich and famous, sports celebrities, gangsters, and actors feared him or tried to get close to him. Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons would become the Walter Winchells of Hollywood.

Lee Tracy's high-pitched voice and rapid-fire delivery closely emulate Winchell's persona. Although carried to the extreme for this film, those also were natural characteristics of Tracy. For a time, he was a leading actor in great demand. Some of his real lifestyle was similar to Winchell's. He was arrogant and seemed to bathe in the power of his position. Tracy also lived a racy, reckless, self-centered life. His temper, rowdiness and bad manners earned him a "bad-boy" reputation. He was given the boot from MGM after a public incidence in Mexico during filming of a movie there. Tracy urinated in public off a balcony and got in fisticuffs with the police.

His later roles about hard-bitten, muck-racking, sensationalist reporters soon wore thin with the public. Tracy returned to the stage and later ended up on television in supporting roles. He had a successful marriage and apparently tamed down before his 1968 death from cancer at age 70.

Winchell's fortunes were quite different. From the mid-1930s on, his star continued to rise through the 1950s. He had his own radio show and his newspaper column was syndicated in more than 2,000 papers worldwide. Winchell was very controversial. He had powerful friends and enemies. He was the first media personality to attack Adolf Hitler and the rise of Nazism. He also hated Communism and attacked the National Maritime Union during World War II as being a communist front. He admired Franklin D. Roosevelt and was invited to the White House. He also liked J. Edgar Hoover. Winchell was one of the earliest and most outspoken supporters of civil rights for African Americans. He attacked the Ku Klux Klan and other racist groups. He also supported Sen. Joseph McCarthy's efforts to ferret out communists in Hollywood.

Winchell held court at the Stork Club in New York for years. But by the late 1950s, his appeal began to wane. And, his power dropped quickly. His family life was unstable and unconventional and experienced sad deaths. He lived alone his last two years in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. He died of cancer at age 74 in 1968.

In this movie, Tracy's Roberts says repeatedly, "Pride ain't power." He has a few funny lines. "I almost starved to death for two weeks," was one. The story is all about so-called "entertainment journalism." The supporting cast are fine, with Mary Brian doing an excellent job as Gladys Price, Roberts' secretary and right-hand man.

This movie is interesting in its snapshot of the time and its parodies. It has some historical value for that reason. The cast and production values are all good. And, it's somewhat entertaining.

"What do you want to interview Mr. Roberts about?" "Oh you know, how he lives, and where he goes, and what he thinks about." "My dear, you think they would print that in a high school paper?"

This is a satire of Walter Winchell, the ruthless gossip columnist who wielded great power for decades in the entertainment industry, and who by 1932 had already achieved celebrity. He's played here by slick talking Lee Tracy, a good fit for the role, but I found the character so unlikeable that when he was made out to be the good guy, it was tough to enjoy.

The character loves publishing secrets and personal details that ruffle feathers, e.g. Upcoming birth announcements ("blessed events") with due dates less than nine months after a couple got married. People sue the paper, but that just fans the flames and he goes merrily along raking in money (the $90,000 a year is over $2 million in today's money). His assistant (Ruth Donnelly) is feisty and a good supporting character, handling a deluge of phone calls and cracking jokes like "You want to see Mr. Roberts? Oh, you want to SUE Mr. Roberts? The line forms on the left." Unfortunately, the scenes of him frenetically operating in the newsroom got a little monotonous despite their energy level, with the exception of his rather gruesome description of electrocution to intimidate a gangster (Allen Jenkins).

Things go especially sour when the gossip columnist reports about a desperate young woman (Isabel Jewell) who's pregnant and literally just told him she's suicidal over the idea of people finding out. Instead of making this a point of reckoning for the character, the script pays lip service to a little guilt, then has him be the hero in standing up to gangsters as well as his rival (a crooner played by Dick Powell, in his very first film). By the end I had really tired of the character and how it was playing out, hence the middling review score.

Interesting quote about TV, pretty early for 1932: "Ask him about sex appeal by television." "By television? I'll tell you right now it'll never prove a popular method."

A brash tabloid columnist turns his BLESSED EVENT style of gossip mongering into a sensation, but creates many enemies along the way.

This is the film that made Lee Tracy an authentic movie star - the role and the actor were perfect for each other. For the next couple of years Tracy would specialize in fast talking shyster lawyers, agents, reporters & flimflam men. In the process, he became one of the most enjoyable performers of the era, always fresh & entertaining. However, after misbehaving in Mexico while under contract to MGM, he would be banished to the Poverty Row studios to continue acting in minor films. Today, regrettably, he is almost forgotten.

But in pre-Code BLESSED EVENT Tracy is at the top of his form: exasperating, maddeningly irritating & wonderfully funny. Warner Brothers gives him an excellent supporting cast to bounce off of - acerbic Ned Sparks as a disgruntled tabloid reporter; peppy Frank McHugh as an overeager publicity agent; porcine Edwin Maxwell as a nasty gangster; and Allen Jenkins as a softhearted criminal (his ‘electric chair' scene with Tracy is a classic).

Boyish Dick Powell, in his film debut, seems an odd choice to play Tracy's nemesis, but there's no doubt about his charm & fine singing style, both of which would soon make him a major movie star.

Mary Brian is lovely as Tracy's girlfriend & Emma Dunn is sweet as his mother, but each tends to be a bit smothered by Tracy's oversized personality. His true co-star is tart-tongued Ruth Donnelly as his secretary. No slacker in slinging the dialogue around, she's able to match Tracy line for line.

Movie mavens will recognize Charles Lane as a reporter; Isabel Jewell, terrific as a much-abused showgirl; and hilarious Herman Bing as a chef - all of them uncredited.