Dream House

Dream House (1932)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

A plumber (Bing Crosby) plans on marrying the woman (Ann Christy) he loves but her stubborn mother decides to take her to Hollywood instead. When the mother mails back the ring he gave the daughter, the plumber decides to take a trip to Hollywood to see what's going on and get his girl back. You'd think a Crosby short would be full of music and very little story but that's actually not the case here. I was rather shocked to see how much story the writers threw in here because you could argue that there's too much going on. This is a pretty wild little film that goes off in any direction that it chooses and perhaps some of this is due to the direction of Del Lord who of course is best known for his Three Stooges shorts. There comedy comes in a ride range of ways but the most glaring is when Crosby gets mud splashed on his face, which leads to a blackface gag where he enters the studio and sits down by a couple white girls who are shocked to see him sitting by them. This of course isn't very politically correct but things take an even stranger turn when Crosby, in blackface, finds his girlfriend on the set and gives her a kiss. This is the first time I've seen a (fake) interracial kiss in any type of film from this era. The comedy towards the end of the film has Crosby running into a lion and the two of them eventually get into a fist fight after the big chase sequence. Crosby, the actor, comes off very natural even when he's throwing punches with the king of the jungle. His voice is certainly on the mark even if the songs aren't the greatest.

Sad to say that this two reel comedy required Bing Crosby to go into blackface, otherwise this could be the best of the work he did with Mack Sennett. Bing's a singing plumber in this one, looking forward to marrying Ann Christy, but her mother Kathrin Clare Ward has a show business career in mind for her daughter that doesn't include being hitched to a plumber. Personally I think you could do a whole lot worse than a plumber, even the plumber isn't Bing Crosby.

As Bing comes up to pop the question, ring in hand, the maid tells him that mom has taken her to Hollywood to appear in movies. That doesn't deter Bing in the slightest who chases off to California after Ann.

Getting on the movie set in disguise requires the blackface and in this Arab setting film where Ann's being romanced by desert sheik Eddie Phillips is where all the fun begins. If it wasn't before the film turns into a two reel comedy to the chagrin of director Vernon Kent.

Bing sings three songs in Dream House. When I Take My Sugar To Tea is done while he's racing to Christy's house to pop the question. Crosby finally got around to recording that song for his New Tricks album in 1957 with the Buddy Cole Trio in a jazz arrangement. During the Hollywood sequence Bing sings a song he had already recorded back when he was just going solo as a vocalist with Gus Arnheim's Cocoanut Grove Orchestra, It Must Be True. It's another gem from his classic early years. And the title song Dream House was never put on record by Bing and of course he sings it at the fadeout.

There's a lot of physical comedy in Dream House, Bing got quite a workout here. He wasn't a superstar yet, so I'm betting he had to do a lot of it himself.

This is an early musical comedy from Bing Crosby and while it's pleasant enough to make it worth seeing, I can't understand the weird title--as what does this have to do with a dream house?!

"Dream House" is about Bing wanting to marry his sweetheart. However, a meddlesome mother has intervened--wanting to split up the pair. She's been destroying each of their letters and since they hadn't heard from each other in some time, the girl decides to leave town to become an actress. When Bing finds out, he goes to find her. Now this leads to an unfunny and tacky scene where Bing uses black-face to sneak onto the set-dressed as a black man! Uggh! But, despite this, the film is an interesting curio. And, although it's not laugh out loud funny, it is pleasant and entertaining.

Crosby did a handful of two-reel shorts for the Sennett studio in the early 1930s. In all of these, he sang a few songs and participated in exercises in slapstick. This film was directed by Del Lord, Sennett's best director and the man who directed many of the best Three Stooges opuses at Columbia. There is a sequence in this short where Crosby is in blackface and is mistaken for a black actor. Politically correct, it is not! However, this film contains the most surrealistic gag sequence even put in a two-reel comedy. Crosby fights a lion inside a piano. It is to be seen to be believed! Crosby was always known as a fine comedian who didn't shy away from slapstick. Check out the Road movies with Bob Hope for proof. As a singer, he refined the art of jazz singing (along with Louis Armstrong).