Girl Crazy

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.

Mr. Oliver summed up "Girl Crazy" very well. I found a collecter's copy of this, mostly to catch Mitzi Green's performance. Mitzi, born in 1920, worked in fifteen films before she was thirteen. Mitzi, at least in this film, was completely different than anything before or after her. Not the sweet, loving little girl... not Mitzi. Here she's a 12 year old flapper, with just the right amount of brattyness to be sweet, smarter than anyone else, and with a talent for "imitations" of the popular singers of the epoch. She had only one short tap dance number that didn't really show her talent. And I'll bet her colleagues loved working with her... for once a child actress who isn't a scene stealer!

Much to my surprise, I found this practically forgotten film has a score and lyrics by the Gershwin brothers, and one of the funniest casts ever, none of whom I'd ever heard of. I generally avoid comedies like the plague, mostly because the modern ones don't seem to be very funny, but this comedy is fast, non-stop, and really funny, right down to the uncredited walk-ons. The scenes & jokes are clever, instead of stupid.... multi-faceted jokes and intelligent slapstick that never lags. The speed and cleverness of it reminds me of the first few minutes of "Romancing the Stone".

Only a few of Mitzi's films are available on video in the classics collectors' market. Her screen time is limited to about 15-20 minutes but, as always, she's worth watching and remembering. The combination of Wheeler & Woolsey, the Gershwin bros. and Mitzi Green make this a film well worth seeing.

GIRL CRAZY (RKO Radio, 1932), directed by William A. Seiter, is the first of three screen adaptations to the popular 1930 musical-comedy by John McGowan and Guy Bolton that starred Allen Kearns (Danny Churchill), Ginger Rogers (Molly) and Ethel Merman (Kate) in the cast. Most notable for the songs by George and Ira Gershwin, and the 1943 remake for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in name only starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland, this edition is mostly centered upon the antics of the studios' own comedy team of Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey, with the central characters of Danny Churchill and Molly Gray placed mostly as background material.

The story opens at a cemetery of tombstones belonging to murdered sheriffs, all killed off by "Arizona Heavy" outlaw Lank Saunders (Stanley Fields), whose sole purpose is to take control over the sleepy western town of Custerville, Arizona. Playboy Danny Churchill (Eddie Quillan) enters the scene as a girl crazy individual whose millionaire father has sent him to the Molly O Ranch for two years to forget about the opposite sex. Easier said than done as Danny meets and falls in love with the post girl, Molly Gray (Arline Judge). Wanting to add some good entertainment to his relatively dull surroundings, Danny telegrams his friend, Slick Foster (Robert Woolsey), in Chicago, formerly a medicine man, auctioneer and hypnotist, now a compulsive gambler and husband to Kate (Kitty Kelly), to come over and convert the dude ranch into a place of jazz music, show girls and gambling. The Fosters soon acquire the taxi service of Jimmy Aloysius Deegan (Bert Wheeler), nine-year employee of the Checker Cab Company, to drive them all the way to Arizona, thus leaving his annoying kid sister, Tessie (Mitzi Green) behind. Following a long distance drive to Custerville, with the fare total of $465.30, Jimmy is accused of being the sheriff killer. After being saved from a lynch mob by Patsy (Dorothy Lee), the "girl of the golden west," she soon becomes Jimmy's love interest. Other than finding Tessie, who has stowed away by bus, awaiting for him at the ranch, Jimmy is then selected to become the town's next sheriff, with Slick acting as his campaign manager. As Jimmy unwittingly wins 800 to 1 vote (Slick demanded a recount), his biggest problem now is avoiding getting killed off by the habitual sheriff killer, Saunders. As for Danny, his biggest problem is the arrival of his New York City George Mason (Brooks Benedict) coming between he and Molly's romance. Other supporting players include Monty Collins (The Bartender); Lita Chevret (Maria); Chris-Pin Martin (Pete) and Nat Pendleton (The Motorcycle Cop).

Songs presented in this production include: "Bidin' My Time" (sung by cowboys); "I Got Rhythm" (sung by Kitty Kelly/cast); "You Got What Gets Me" (sung by Bert Wheeler and Dorothy Lee, danced by Wheeler, Lee and Mitzi Green); "But Not For Me" (sung by Eddie Quillan and Arline Judge/reprized by Mitzi Green); and "I Got Rhythm" (sung by chorus during closing credits). The "I Got Rhythm,"the film's signature number, might have benefited better from the singing style of Ethel Merman from the stage version, yet Kitty Kelly holds her own in her deep throaty rendition, with camera cutaways to a rhythm dancing owl and cactus trees. Aside from Mitzi Green singing "But Not for Me," she does this in her own imitating style of current celebrities of the day as Bing Crosby, the stuttering Roscoe Ates, George Arliss and Edna May Oliver. Of the four personalities, her best imitation goes to good ole Edna May.

For anyone who's seen the better known GIRL CRAZY (1943) will notice how much the original has no bearing with the remake except for the character names and a few good songs carried over from the Broadway show. With this being the ninth screen teaming of Wheeler and Woolsey, unlike their previous comedies starting with RIO RITA (1929), they don't start off as friends or partners. The first half finds Wheeler and Woolsey more as individual characters than an item, with Woolsey (the cigar smoker with horn-rim glasses) dealing mostly with his on-screen wife (Kelly) and Wheeler coping with his younger sister's (Green) annoyance. The second half reverts to traditional Wheeler and Woolsey material following their campaigning Wheeler's character for sheriff. As with many of their comedies for RKO, their gags and verbal exchanges are either hit or miss. Fine amusements include confuse dialogue mix between Mitzi Green and Bert Wheeler to Dorothy Lee (in similar fashion of Amos and Andy in CHECK AND DOUBLE CHECK (1930)); Wheeler and Woolsey disguised as Indians, Sitting Bull and Sitting Pretty, among others. With Wheeler and Woolsey carrying on much of the comedy, the romantic girl crazy subplot between Eddie Quillan and Arline Judge offers little significance to the story.

Due to the latter MGM remakes, including the updated edition retitled WHEN THE BOYS MEET THE GIRLS (MGM, 1965) with Connie Francis and Harve Presnell, this GIRL CRAZY has been out of circulation for decades. It wasn't until July 14, 1995, when cable television's Turner Classic Movies brought this long unseen 76 minute movie back in circulation again. Available on DVD with another Wheeler and Woolsey comedy, PEACH O'RENO (1931) on the flip side, regardless of its current availability, it's the 1943 edition of GIRL CRAZY that remains the best of the three screen editions thus far. (**1/2)

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.

It is not easy to turn GIRL CRAZY into a disaster, given the Gershwin score and a somewhat serviceable plot - but the creators of this version have succeeded in doing just that. There were six writers given screen credit for this scenario: perhaps that was the problem, or maybe the screenplay was even worse until that number was reached.

The gags (can I call them that if they are not funny?) are so forced, so weak, so juvenile as to make an audience squirm. Wheeler and Woolsey were never worse; at their best (it says here) they were second-raters, with a very limited assortment of poses, gestures, and facial expressions. No one in this cast offers demonstrable talent. An amateur cast (and director) could have done more with the material (I've seen it happen). And let us not overlook totally mindless rendering of "I Got Rhythm" in the film's big production number.

Why did you tell me to watch this?