Mon amour t'appelle

Marge and Gower Champion were a popular dance team in the 1950s, probably best-known for 'Show Boat', in which their roles were very much secondary. They did some of their best work in television, notably in a musical special with Yves Montand. Although they were excellent dancers, and Gower was a very talented director/choreographer with some ability as a comedian, neither one of them had much acting ability ... which seriously compromised them when MGM attempted to move them up from supporting roles in other people's musicals.

'Everything I Have Is Yours' was MGM's attempt at a starring vehicle for the Champions. Frankly, they aren't good enough actors to carry the weight of a feature film, even a musical. The Champions play Pamela and Chuck Hubbard, a husband-and-wife dance team. (What a stretch!) The Hubbards have attained stardom together, but there are backstage problems in the marriage, and they agree to a trial separation. Pamela becomes involved with another man (Dennis O'Keefe in a bland performance), and for a while it looks like the Hubbards will go their separate ways permanently. But this is an MGM musical, so of course there's a happy ending...

'Everything I Have Is Yours' is froth ... which wouldn't be bad at all, if it were enjoyable froth. This movie is turgid. Imagine a musical version of a soap opera, and that's what you've got here. Worse luck, the musical numbers aren't incorporated into the plot of the movie ... instead, the plot screeches to a halt (and I do mean 'screeches') whenever it's time for another dance number. When the music stops, the plot lurches forward again. This is a bad movie. I'll rate it 2 points out of 10. As a trivia note, I'll mention that Marge Champion (real name Marjorie Belcher; I wonder why she changed it) was the half-sister of silent-film star Lina Basquette, who was so good in Cecil B. DeMille's 'The Godless Girl'. I recommend you see that movie instead of this one.

The dancing, choreography and costumes were great. Very entertaining.

The Champions were usually supporting players at MGM, so staring them in their own vehicle was something of a risk. It didn't pay off financially, and artistically it's indifferent, but it does allow the gifted husband-and-wife team more elbow room than usual. A soap opera plot about a Champion-like couple whose marriage is threatened by his success (and leading lady) while she raises the baby in the suburbs is no help at all, and neither Marge nor Gower is entirely comfortable acting. But there are several bright numbers, including the smoky "Cairo," a nifty "Derry Down Dilly" (with a nifty Johnny Mercer lyric) that shows Marge off to her best advantage, and a very MGM dream ballet near the end where she pines for him. The supporting cast is so- so; Monica Lewis, so delectable the year before in "Excuse My Dust" and here playing the Other Woman, has such an unsympathetic part that this may well have killed her career, and Dennis O'Keefe, as the faithful producer silently and vainly in love with Marge, can't do much with a walking cliché of a role. But if you can suffer through the plot, you'll find your way to some classy musical diversion. Gower did his own choreography, with Nick Castle, and it's a chance to see an early example of the great dance stager he would become.

Pamela Hubbard (Marge Champion) and Chuck Hubbard (Gower Champion) are a married song and dance team. The newcomers garner some praise. Pamela gets pregnant and Chuck has to get a replacement.

The Champions are a real-life married song and dance team. They are professionals, never more or never less. For their acting, they are a bit stiff in a 50's golly gee stage acting way. This movie stalls whenever it tries to do drama. I never doubted their relationships, both private and professional. So the drama isn't there and there is no tension. I love the old style pretty musical numbers, but there isn't much more to this movie than that. It gets a little boring.

Even with the talented MARGE and GOWER CHAMPION as the stars, EVERYTHING I HAVE IS YOURS is a dreadfully unoriginal backstage story of stage stars whose marriage is on the rocks when the wife discovers she is pregnant before the run of a hit show. Hubby goes on with another actress--and well, you can guess the rest.

Nothing is inspired about the songs which brings all the action to a halt whenever the script calls for a song cue. In other words, unlike most MGM musicals, none of the songs are integrated into the witless plot.

And surprisingly, none of the choreography suggests anything even approaching the routines the duo did in their big MGM hit, SHOW BOAT, where they had some outstanding song-and-dance routines.

This is strictly a programmer, the kind of film that played the lower half of double bills when it opened.