Spring Is Here

Early musical about fickle Betty of the Long Island "fashionable set", the kind who seem to mostly go around with tennis rackets and ukuleles gripped in their hands. She stays out 'til five in the morning "riding" with a new fellow (leaving her regular beau high and dry at the dance) - so her grump of a dad decides he needs to put a stop to that kind of stuff and "get her a good husband". Well, when the regular fellow, Terry, shows up next morning, dad practically proposes himself - but Betty won't marry Terry. Terry IS in love, so - given the push by Betty's little 16-year-old sister (who looked to me about 35), he decides to spark Betty's jealousy by flirting with other women. And boy does he - including giving a passionate kiss to Betty's mom!

This film is pretty silly, though has moments - such as the dad spouts a number of pretty good one-liners and there is a little bit of pre-code naughtiness too. The whole film comes across as a little stiff and stage play like - it includes characters bursting into song here and there, most of which are fairly mediocre, though I thought a few of the numbers were kind of catchy. The lead actors in this are not very memorable (though, at least, they sing well) - the most interesting characters are actually the girl's parents, quite amusingly portrayed by Ford Sterling and Louise Fazenda - the mom is depicted as very dizzy (reminded me of Gracie Allen). Betty turns into a "yes dear" baby talker kind of gal in the end, oh well. Fun, light entertainment.

...-and short!-adaptation of Rodgers & Hart's Broadway success (the movie adds some songs by Harry Warren and lyricists Sam Lewis and Joe Young). And I admit my affinity for such a movie probably springs from my curiosity regarding early sound musicals, so your mileage -and appreciation - may vary.

Alexander Gray is well cast as the hero, coming across rather more relaxed here than he did in the previous year's Sally; the engaging Bernice Claire also stars as one of the era's stock characters, the young woman yearning for excitement. Lawrence Gray plays-much as he did in The Patsy-the good-natured bad boy enticing our heroine from her too-meek suitor, and gets to bestow his pleasant light tenor on the score's most enduring hit, "With a Song in My Heart."

I'm having difficulty tracking down a detailed description of the story of the original Broadway show; but it appears to me that there must have been a subplot in the Broadway show involving the younger sister (in the movie, played by Inez Courtney) and her beau (the movie's Frank Albertson) which was subsequently cut for the movie, as Albertson's role serves no purpose plot-wise in the movie (but he contributes some sprightly song and dance, notably-with Courtney-the title song). All of this is cheerfully entertaining and well-done, if somewhat standard fare; elevating the movie into must-see status, however, are Mack Sennett veterans Ford Sterling and Louise Fazenda as the much-tried comic parents. Sterling, who always completely inhabits whatever role he plays-OK, he hams it up (but all to the good)!-has been underappreciated for about three-quarters of a century or more, and is long overdue for a renaissance of interest, for his early work as well as his late work.

The Brox Sisters give a wonderful rendition of "Cryin' for the Carolines." Direction and camera-work are workmanlike-skillful if uninspired; but the writing is clever and blithe, and sometimes refreshingly suggestive. Recommended. I'm surprised that the stage show Spring Is Here has not been a regular on the community theater and civic light opera circuit; cheerful, undemanding, modest in its production needs, uncontroversial, with familiar theatrical "types," it seems to be tailor-made for semi-professional offerings.

SPRING IS HERE (First National Pictures, 1930), produced and directed by John Francis Dillon, is a surprisingly entertaining early sound musical comedy taken from the story by Owen Davis Jr., and stage musical by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, who also composed the songs. Though headed by two Gray actors, Lawrence and Alexander (no relation), the plot very well belongs to the third billed Bernice Claire, a talented young singer in her day with few film credits to her name. Most noted for her screen pairing with Alexander Gray, a baritone singer, in both feature-length (1929-30) and later 20-minute musical short subjects (1934), SPRING IS HERE, their second collaboration, is believed to be their only surviving musical feature film.

Opening title: "The Peter Bealey Home on Long Island's fashionable North Shore - a morning in June." The domestic comedy set to song interludes revolves around Betty Bealey (Bernice Claire), a free-spirited young lady whose father, Peter (Ford Sterling), disapproves of her being out all night and sleeping in all day. After returning home at 5 a.m., Peter draws the line of his daughter's carefree activities. Aside from coping with his younger daughter, Mary Jane (Inez Courtney), and her courtship with Stacey Hayden (Frank Albertson), along with his ditsy but squeaky speaking wife, Emily (Louise Fazenda), Peter disapproves of Betty's latest beau, Steve Alden (Lawrence Gray), whom she's only known a short time. Hoping she'd settle down and get married, Peter tries his best to encourage Betty into marrying Terry Clayton (Alexander Gray), a clumsy but shy young man with some sense, unaware that Steve who comes from a wealthy family.

Through its brief 68 minutes, SPRING IS HERE contains enough songs for a 90 minute feature, including that of: "Spring is Here" (sung by Frank Albertson and Inez Courtney); "Yours Sincerely" (sung by Alexander Gray and Bernice Claire); "Bad Baby" (sung by Inez Courtney); "Crying for the Carolines" (sung by The Brox Sisters during party sequence); "With a Song in My Heart" (sung by Lawrence Gray and Bernice Claire); "Having a Little Faith in Me" (sung by Alexander Gray); "How Shall I Tell?" (sung by Bernice Claire/ written by Sam Lewis, Joe Young and Harry Warren); "What's the Big Idea?" (sung by Inez Courtney and Frank Albertson); and "With a Song in My Heart" (sung by Gray and Claire). Of the selection of songs, many which are quite good if not everlasting to memory. Only "With a Song in My Heart" is the most familiar, considering how it's been immortalized in the musical biography, WITH A SONG IN MY HEART (20th Century-Fox, 1952) starring Susan Hayward as famed singer, Jane Froman.

While the other Gray-Claire screen collaborations of NO, NO NANETTE (1929) and SONG OF THE FLAME (1930) have been lost to revivals, SPRING IS HERE, survived intact, giving film buffs some basic idea of their work and on-screen chemistry. Other than noting how Claire wears two different hairstyles at once (hair covering the left side of her face and hair combed back on her right side, exposing both face and ear), it's also easy for anyone who missed seeing Claire's name in the opening credits, to somehow mistake her for a youthful, dark-haired Penny Singleton (then performing under her real name of Dorothy McNulty), the same Singleton years before her acclaim in the long-running "Blondie" movie series (1938-1950) for Columbia. Claire also quotes one interesting line worth noting, "A woman is as strong as her weakest moment." As for Alexander Gray, it's worth mentioning how his talking manner and singing differ, from mildly speaking to rich baritone voice. It's a wonder how much further the careers of Gray and Claire might have gone had musicals not fallen out of favor for public acceptance by the end of 1930.

Aside from some surprisingly risqué dialog and funny nifty comebacks during moments of comedy, there's also some very amusing scenes provided by the frustrated Ford Sterling and scatterbrained Louise Fazenda, former comics of silent comedy shorts whose characters here seem to precede that of Archie and Edith Bunker from the classic "All in the Family" TV series of the seventies. There's also Inez Courtney giving a sassy performance for comedy relief so reminiscent to the then notable Warner Brothers comedienne of Winnie Lightner. Other members of the cast include Natalie Moorehead as Rita Conway, and Gretchen Thomas as Maude, among others.

SPRING IS HERE, while no masterpiece, gets by on both comedy and sometimes corny musical interludes. Let's not overlook the legendary "With a Song in My Heart" (which is scored during the opening credits) which highlights the film. Regardless of its age, this musical antique is a worthy rediscovery and something to consider whenever it turns up on the Turner Classic Movies cable channel. Spring is here. (**1/2)

SPRING IS HERE is a breezy, yet undistinguished early sound musical. A hit on Broadway, it suffers from the overproduction of musicals at the time (meaning it received no special consideration during its making) and from a director who brings no visual flair to the medium. What we're left with are pleasant performers and pleasant, if not memorable, tunes. The standout performance here is given by Louise Fazenda, a ubiquitous figure in these early sound musicals made at Warners. Her portrayal of a character who is simultaneously embarrassed and titillated at the innuendo surrounding her is delightful and captures the necessarily frivolous tone needed in such a piece. Incidentally, Fazenda was the first in the sound era to portray the dumb blonde, an archetype that still pleases to this day.

"Spring is Here" is a very early musical. While musicals were quite popular in the early days of talking pictures, most of them were like "The Gold Diggers of Broadway" and "The Broadway Melody"--stage productions where groups of chorus girls danced about for audiences. The musical style where folks were NOT on stage and just broke into song was a bit later invention. But, "Spring is Here" is a fluke--one of those 1930s films where music was woven into the story---much like the later Jeanette MacDonald films of the mid to late 1930s. However, since it is such an early version of this style musical, it came out before the genre was fully developed. In other words, it's a bit rough and doesn't translate as well to audiences today. The singing is DEFINITELY not the sort that will have you humming along with the singers. Instead, it's very operatic and the voices see odd in a movie--not at all natural and a bit tough on the ear. I am not saying it's bad singing--just odd given the plot. Also odd is that the singers stand so still and they are usually filmed in closeups--most likely because the sound equipment was very primitive and wouldn't allow for more naturalistic shots (much like in early talkies where folks stand in one spot so the microphones will pick up the sound properly).

Despite the primitive nature of the film, however, I found "Spring Is Here" to be very watchable--mostly because I liked the parents, Louise Fazenda and Ford Sterling. Both were veterans of Mack Sennett silent comedies and both made nice transitions to sound in this film. In particular, Sterling was a very funny character playing the father of the leading lady. As for the leading lady (Bernice Claire), she is being wooed by two guys--her ex-boyfriend and a handsome new guy. With a little help from her sister and mother, the old boyfriend manages to once again catch her eye. Who will she end up with and how? See this cute little musical comedy.

By the way, this being a Pre-Code film, you might be surprised by a few of the more suggestive but funny lyrics and situations in the film. And, get a load of the kiss in the garden--one that long and passionate never would have been allowed in the post 1934 era.