Good Morning, Eve!

Warner Bros. must have been gearing up for producing their first full-length feature in Technicolor when they made this experimental short starring LEON ERROL as Adam and JUNE MacCLOY as Eve, both wearing abbreviated costumes covered with leaves. The only real asset is the Technicolor which looks fine.

Story has the two of them dreaming about frolicking through the centuries with various famous people--beginning in Nero's garden in Ancient Rome, King Arthur's court, and ending in the 19th Century at the beach where a bevy of bathing beauties do a routine dance number at the beach. Says Adam: "It's a nice century you have here." That's a good sample of the wit.

All of the gags are lame, full of flat one-liners, and the musical interludes are downright dumb. MAXINE DOYLE sings a forgettable tune in a very thin voice that the soundtrack makes sound even tinnier.

The big surprise is that this was 1934, a few years before Warners made THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD, their most acclaimed Technicolor feature at that time. The color photography looks fine but the short is weak on wit and the cast fumbles through some bad material.

The most amazing thing about this entertaining little short is the fantastic condition that it has survived in for the past 77 years. Not only does it feature color that is perfect, but the clarity and cleanliness of the print are extraordinary. This film looks like it was shot last week instead of decades ago. The slender storyline has Adam and Eve wandering through the ages and there are a few good lines and some pretty good musical numbers interpolated. This film was probably made as an experiment to test the then-new three color Technicolor which is seen to beautiful advantage. There are costumes of every color, interior shots, exterior shots, and just for good measure, A gorgeous beach shot. Simply breathtaking.

Adam (Leon Erroll) and Eve (June MacCloy) eat the apple and go wandering down the road of musical-comedy history, to Nero's Rome, King Arthur's Camelot, and Atlantic City.

Warner Brothers spared no expense on this short, the second live-action 3-strip Technicolor short -- Erroll had also starred in the first, SERVICE WITH A SMILE. There are songs, dances, and dozens of beautiful chorines dressed in bright colors, to show off the new standard in color movies. By modern standards, it is silly, but that was its intent all along; Erroll had been a star of Broadway comedies for more than a decade at this point, and was moving into films with a will. He would become a major supporting comic in features, as well as the star of a long-running series of short subjects (in black&white) at RKO.

Adam (Leon Errol) and Eve (June MacCloy) leave the Garden of Eden and stroll through history, stopping for production numbers in Rome with Nero and in England with King Arthur.

Light comedy and dancing. Some nice vaudeville touches, like the hillbilly band in Rome.

Called the second live action three strip (full color) Technicolor film (it was released after La Cucaracha), the surviving print is in great shape with wonderful color.

Adam (Leon Errol) and Eve (June MacCloy) have their leisurely life. Adam is tired of the same food. The snake offers them an apple. They get thrown out of Eden and into later eras. They visit Rome with Emperor Nero, Sir Lancelot fights the Black Knight, and finally at a modern day airfield.

I would like a less balding Adam, but I do really like the couple's sarcastic tone. It's a silly short. It is an early production with the full Technicolor process. The colors are bright and gaudy in the best Technicolor way. I have to give it an extra point for pushing the technical envelope. The short is stupid fun and it never pretends to be anything more. Mostly, it's to showcase all the bright colors.