Girl Crazy

This movie isn't really that good a version of the 1930 Broadway Gershwin musical, as it leaves the songs aside and is reworked as more of a comedy vehicle for Wheeler and Woolsey. Eddie Quillan and Arline Judge are the flotsam hero and heroine – not really needed, except to murder ‘But Not For Me'. Dorothy Lee is pretty much wasted with little to do (just a couple of scenes and one song with Bert Wheeler – the classic Ella Fitzgerald later made famous, ‘You've Got What Gets Me').

The best bits really are the ones that are purely silly: the hypnotism scenes between the boys and the bad guy; the cacti dancing to ‘I Got Rhythm' (oddly sung here as ‘I've Got Rhythm' by sparky Kitty Kelly); Mitzi Green and her imitations (particularly of George Arliss!); little Wheeler elected as sheriff and then chased by the village heavy; and the long-distance taxi ride early in the film with the cardboard cop.

So the good news is it is a funny film with lots to enjoy on that front; however this movie doesn't do justice to the stage show; and the photography does most of the cast no favours.

Almost everyone involved hated this film – Quillan and Lee didn't see the finished article until several decades later and the songs are dealt with inappropriately. What a pity that the best movie versions of the Gershwin shows (Porgy and Bess; An American in Paris; and of course the remake of Girl Crazy, in 1943) came after George Gershwin died.

Unless you are a Wheeler & Woolsey enthusiast, you'll find this a complete waste of popcorn. Ostensibly a Gershwin musical (and would legitimately be remade as such), it has the numbers grafted onto a proto-screwball comedy. Nearly everything is turned toward setting up the standard jokes of the pair.

The one exception is Mitzi Green, the thirteen year old "sister." Her moments are golden. I'd never seen her before. She's not a performer in the mold of Shirley and Judy who charm you with their portrayals. You get the impression that this really is how she is, basically.

She does some impressions that lack power today because the targets are mostly forgotten. But she does a dance with two others and continuously gets bumped off. If you've ever done any serious dancing you'll know that what she does is much harder than it seems. This girl shines; wonder whatever happened?

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

This is one of two filmed versions of George & Ira Gershwin's musical-Girl Crazy-I'm reviewing on this site. This one stars Bert Wheeler & Robert Woolsey as they end up in the West. Child performer Mitzi Green does some imitations during the "But Not for Me" number. Bert has another number with frequent female co-star Dorothy Lee. Kitty Kelly does the "I Got Rhythm" song which was partly choreographed by Busby Berkeley who later did that number in the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland version of GC. Oh, and among the players is Stanley Fields who makes a very funny nemesis for the comedy team. I mainly remember him as the sheriff in my favorite Laurel & Hardy movie, Way Out West. In summary, this version of Girl Crazy may not have a lot of the Gershwins' songs but it does have plenty of hilarity so there's that! P.S. Norman Taurog did retakes for this movie. He'd eventually direct the Mickey/Judy version of GC.

As this is one of the projects that young David Selznick did as a producer for Radio pictures before moving on to MGM and his own production company, it's shocking to think that this man (somehow universally celebrated for his taste) could have taken the great 1930 Broadway musical featuring Ethel Merman and Ginger Rogers and reduced it to a Wheeler & Woolsey slapstick comedy; in the process, Selznick eliminated most of its great Gershwin songs among them "Bidin' My Time" and "Embraceable You" and treated the other immortal tunes like "But Not For Me" as novelty numbers. An appalling example of how old Hollywood didn't recognize genius when it stared it in the face.

This version of Girl Crazy was the first of three films made from the famous Gershwin Brothers musical. MGM bought the rights from RKO who did this version to do their more famous and much better adaption that starred Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland.

In the tradition of Hollywood RKO junked nearly the entire memorable Gershwin score with only a few numbers left. The main characters of the Broadway story were relegated to the background and a whole new plot was written for RKO's comedy stars Wheeler&Woolsey. It's the reverse of what MGM did when they bought Rio Rita which RKO did film faithful to the Broadway show and turn it into an Abbott&Costello film.

Now if you're a fan of Wheeler&Woolsey that's not the worst thing, if you're a Gershwin purist, skip this one absolutely. All that's left from the Broadway show is Bidin' My Time, But Not For Me, and I've Got Rhythm the last done as a saloon ballad by Kitty Kelly.

Eddie Quillan as the playboy from Chicago gets sent west to grow up a little, but instead he brings the nightlife of Chicago out west when he opens a dude ranch. One of the people he sends for his sharpie Robert Woolsey who gets taxi driver Bert Wheeler to drive him from Chicago to Arizona. Wheeler's not a total dummy however, he does have his own reasons for fleeing the Windy City.

The two of them get to tangle with tough guy Stanley Fields out west and of course they come out on top.

Somehow RKO persuaded the Gershwin Brothers to write one original song for this film and it was done by Bert Wheeler and Dorothy Lee and it's entitled You've Got What Gets Me. It's worse than any of the discarded stuff from Broadway which includes Could You Use Me, Embraceable You, and Sam and Delilah. I think George and Ira pulled this one from the trunk.

This film is the worst of the three versions of Girl Crazy and far from the best Wheeler&Woolsey.