Harmony Lane

The life story of songwriter, Stephen Foster, whose songs have now fallen largely into disrepute. Surprisingly good biopic from Poverty Row outfit Mascot, anchored by a strong performance from Montgomery who walks the tightrope between naïve, idealistic youth and embittered, disillusioned drunk without once losing his footing. Poignant and moving if you can get past our modern-day aversion to racial stereotyping. And there must be many, many men would have permitted the lovely Adrienne Ames to destroy them...

Poverty Row Mascot Pictures probably because the songs of Stephen C. Foster were all in public domain decided to produce this cheaply done musical about Foster. It cost the studio not a dime to buy rights to his work.

Douglass Montgomery played the tragic composer who came from a middle class background and whose father disapproved of his interest in a musical career.

The tragedy of Foster as shown here is that the woman who truly loved him, Evelyn Venable refused to wait for him and he married society conscious Adrienne Ames. When she left him he takes to drink and eventually can't find his muse.

William Frawley played minstrel performer and impresario E.P. Christy. Frawley before he became best known as the irascible Fred Mertz was a vaudeville performer. He was also one of the great drunks in Hollywood as you see here.

The musical numbers are done on the cheap, but the acting is not too bad. Montgomery does well as the frail and tragic Foster.

Still you can see it all done better at 20th Century Fox with Don Ameche as Foster and Al Jolson as E.P. Christy in Swanee River.

Very moving account of American composer Stephen Foster's life and how he came to write his memorable and heartfelt songs. Lots of music included. It's a dated and idealized presentation in some ways but a great way to learn about this talented man. Also learned something about once-popular minstrel shows, where white men painted their faces black and sang and danced in an imitation of slaves - but not as well as they did it! Learned that Stephen Foster found early musical inspiration in a black church, as did Elvis Presley a century later.

Think about it. Stephen Collins Foster was a HUGE influence on minstrel shows in the middle of the 19th century--minstrel shows! So how can you do a film that does his career justice without offending a whole lotta folks?! Well, during the 1930s, this was easy--the public didn't blanch at the antics of the 'happy Negroes' seen throughout the film not at groups of men in black-face performing his tunes. But today, this is bound to ruffle a few feathers--and rightfully so. However, he was a brilliant composer and deserves to be remembered...in context.

This biopic stars Douglass Montgomery--an actor pretty much forgotten today. In fact, the only readily recognizable star is the film is William Frawley--though he's in black-face for several scenes. As for the most important part of the film, its historical accuracy, the movie naturally plays a bit fast and loose with the details of his life--but less so than the typical biopic of the era. What you are left with is a reasonably interesting and watchable film--considering it was made by a low-budget studio. But it is by no means a noteworthy film--except for the moments that it makes you cringe! I particularly loved the film showing how gosh-darn happy and well-treated all the black people were during the days of slavery! So, if you do watch it, hold on to your seats...it might be a very bumpy ride!

Stephen Foster songs are no longer part of the Great American Songbook, but for more than a century they were. Movies like this were inevitable. What was less inevitable that it would come from a Poverty Row Producer like Mascot and be so good.

Certainly director Joseph Santley does a good job. He is one of the many directors who came into the movies, turned out good work, and rarely rose out of the Bs. Here he offers good performances and set-piece camera set-ups that are quite lovely. While none of the actors are great. they are certainly up to the rigors of their roles, and it is a bizarre pleasure to see William Frawley playing Edwin Christy.... and playing him as William Frawley.

In this modern age we sneer at artists like Foster because they accepted the standards of their era, instead of the superior standards of our era. Even with that proviso, and understanding that Foster's commercially successful music didn't make him a wealthy man, because he would typically sell a song for $30, and glad to get it, because copyright enforcement was virtually non-existent.

So why was his music so popular that when I was taught the piano as a child, several of his songs were still standards? Their simplicity was one reason. The tune could be picked out with a single finger. However, their original popularity was due to the same sort of thing that made Dickens' A CHRISTMAS CAROL and Sha-Na-Na's doo-wop so popular: nostalgia. In the tumult of the 1850s, with the industrialization of the North, many of the new urban population yearned for a simpler, rustic existence, and Foster's songs gave it to them, three minutes at a time.