Artists and Models

To call "Artists & Models" a musical would be a stretch. It's more like a mash-up of various odd musical numbers that occasionally stops for a plot.

The plot (what there is of it) involves Jack Benny as an advertising executive, trying to land a million-dollar ad buy with playboy millionaire Richard Arlen. Benny promises Arlen that the queen of the upcoming Artists & Models Ball – for which Benny is the chairman – will serve as the model in a magazine ad campaign for Arlen's silverware company. But Arlen insists his new model must be a high-society girl.

Ida Lupino, one of Benny's models, follows Arlen down to Miami, where she poses as a high-society girl, while wearing the fancy clothes borrowed from her modeling jobs. She tries to trick him into selecting her as the model for his silverware ad campaign – but of course, they end up falling in love. (There's a scene where Lupino and Arlen are standing together on the diving board of a hotel's indoor swimming pool. She's wearing a fancy dress, and he's wearing a tuxedo. Can you guess what happens next?)

The plot is a thin "clothesline" on which they've hung the most bizarre train-wreck of musical numbers ever jumbled together in a movie. We get "hillbilly" comedienne Judy Canova singing a bubble bath number. Later, she joins Ben Blue for a slip-sliding, "punch-your-sweetheart" song-&- dance. Still later, Judy joins her siblings, Anne and Zeke Canova, to sing a straight-faced version of "The Ballad of Jesse James," complete with yodeling, right in the middle of the high-society Artists & Models Ball.

There's a marionette number in which, for no discernible reason, Ben Blue dances on stage with marionette dancing girls, and a Big Band number featuring a pair of Art Deco swimmers doing a water ballet in a swimming pool. When things start getting dull, the Yacht Club Boys come charging in with a chaotic musical number, or a gypsy dance troupe, or a melee of circus performers.

The best musical number in the movie is also the most problematic. The finale, "Public Melody #1," features Martha Raye in bad blackface makeup, singing on a Harlem street with an all-black dance chorus, while Louis Armstrong plays his horn. The song itself is good, and Martha Raye's performance of it is great – but the staging of it by Vincente Minelli is dated and offensive by today's standards. (If they'd gotten somebody like Lena Horne to sing it, there wouldn't have been a problem.)

But who cares if the movie is just a mash-up? It's still fun to watch. It crams all these crappy musical numbers into 97 minutes, and keeps the numbers coming along quickly, without stopping too long for the plot. I actually enjoyed watching it, and I never found it boring or annoying, as I have with some other 1930s Hollywood musicals (i.e. the "Gold Digger" or "Big Broadcast" musicals).

During the the 1930s' each of the Studios carved out a niche that they were particularly good at. M.G.M. polished presentations and Musicals, Warner Brothers (WB) Gangsters, Bio-Pics and the Common Man, 20th Century Fox & RKO, Action and/or Sophistication. Even a middle tier studio, like Republic knew what it was best at, Serials & Westerns or Universal, the Monsters.

Paramount during this period seemed to be in a quandary. Only Cecil B. DeMille and Ernst Lubitsch seemed to know what they were doing, because they Produced and Directed their own films. Paramount would skip around, trailing after trends other studios initiated or did better. Even when they did get it right they seldom followed up on it. Their films were a collection of samples, much like the French Navy in the 19th Century.

ARTISTS & MODELS (1937) is a perfect example of this. Is it a comedy, a musical or both? Director Raoul Walsh seemed not to be able to make up his mind or just was not interested. The cast led by Jack Benny, Ida Lupino, Richard Arlen and Gail Patrick just meander around through the thinly contrived plot which is interrupted by some rather pedestrian musical numbers. If you are expecting the quality of 42nd STREET (1933) or ROSE-MARIE (1936) you had better look elsewhere. You know you are in trouble when one (1) of your production numbers is led by Judy Canova. The other, Martha Raye in 'Black-Face'! This trend would continue with it's sequel ARTISTS and MODELS ABROAD (1938) and THE BIG BROADCAST of 1938 (1938). They may have memorable songs and even competent dance numbers, but there is nothing to make them standout as extraordinary examples of their genre.

This film is nothing like I anticipated. Crazy as it seems, I actually expected that with Jack Benny in the lead that it would be a comedy...and that, sadly, was not the case. Instead, it's a musical with a lightly comedic touch--but NOT a comedy. If you're looking for laughs, you're more likely to find them in an Ingmar Bergman film! "Artists & Models" begins with Benny owning his own advertising firm. He's a total failure and one step away from bankruptcy. However, rather out of the view, a young millionaire (Richard Arlen) approaches him to run a million dollar campaign. Arlen would like to feature some society woman in his advertising and Benny's girlfriend, Ida Lupino, is disappointed. She's a successful model and is angry that she won't even be considered. So, she sneaks off to where she heard Arlen is headed--determined to convince him that she is this society dame.

Along the way, there are a bazillion musical interludes--some pretty good and many very bad. The worst comes late in the film where Martha Raye stars in a Black musical review--and she's in black-face (uggh) with the likes of Louis Armstrong. I cringed as I watched this one.

Overall, the film is a rather tedious musical. Nothing terrible but nothing particularly good, either. It's a shame, as with this cast, it should have been a lot more interesting.

Jack Benny stars as the owner of a bankrupt as agency. He can save his company by landing the $1 million Townsend Silver account. He convinces the company's owner, playboy Richard Arlen, that the secret to success is finding the Townsend Girl and getting her to be the queen of the annual Artists & Models Ball. Arlen agrees, but the catch is that he does not want the Townsend Girl to be a professional model. He wants a society girl. Young model Ida Lupino overhears and travels to Florida to pose as a society girl and land the Townsend Girl job. This film's split down the middle ... half screwball comedy, half musical. The comedy elements work well, the musical elements are terribly creaky.

Fun collection of stars! Jack Benny stars (without "Rochesterrrrr") in a love quadrangle, and right up to the end, we're not sure just who will end up with whom. Benny is Brewster, who handles the advertising for Alan Townsend (Richard Arlen). The lovely and talented women involved are Paula (Ida Lupino) and Cynthia (Gail Patrick). They sure got their money's worth out of Louis Armstrong and Martha Raye... they do a medley of songs and dance that just goes on and on....Martha Raye in blackface, which so many movies thought they had to do to be hip at the time. Look for Donald Meek as the doctor (worked with WC Fields and all the others) and Hedda Hopper as the rich society dame. Probably the best part of all this is Judy Canova, who sings a fun, lively, saucy number WHILE taking bubble bath. Too bad they didn't put her in more films. Look for a bit with Rube Goldberg. There's a cute bit with violins and orchestra instruments that play themselves. In several scenes, the audio is a little off from the video. Also, the ending is a little abrupt, but all the loose ends are neatly tied up. Lots of fun subtle jokes where Benny lets the costar tell the joke. Ongoing gag with the telephone, but you'll have to watch to hear it. Nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Song "Whispers in the Dark".