A Vida é uma Canção

"Tin Pan Alley" is a rare misfire for Fox, which had a string of hits around this time period. In fact, they used several of the same stars in this one as in previous pictures. Alice Faye, John Payne, Betty Grable and Jack Oakie - what more could you ask for? Well, you might ask for some better songs and a better storyline, because this plot is threadbare and had been done better many times in the past. Boy meets girl, Boy loses girl ( because pride goeth before a fall), boy wins girl back. Did you read the list of song titles? Well, most of them are background music except for "You Say The Sweetest Things", which was written especially for this picture and was the best number.

Special mention should be made of "America, I Love You", to which I have awarded a Hand-Painted Mustache Cup for the Worst Production Number In A Major Musical. Mournful and tuneless, this song was given a big build-up as a flag-waving tribute to the troops in WWI and all concerned tried mightily to put it over. This dreadful song, however, defied all efforts and pulled down an already routine musical into subpar status.

If you like the cast and if you like Fox musicals - and there are many to like - try another picture.

Tin Pan Alley was the first try at a successful experiment Darryl Zanuck was trying. An actor who was as good looking as Tyrone Power and could contribute musically to the film. He found one in John Payne this was the first of four films that Payne and Faye did together. They were scheduled to do a fifth with The Dolly Sisters, but Alice retired after being offered that script.

Payne slipped very well into Ty Power's hero/heel character that he patented at 20th Century Fox. Payne's character Skeets Harrigan and his partner Jack Oakie are trying to hit it big in the music publishing industry pre World War I. He meets Alice Faye and her sister Betty Grable doing a vaudeville act and he falls for Faye bigtime. He loves her, but he wants success more. How they resolve their ambitions is crux of the movie.

Alice Faye and Betty Grable in their only film together play the Blane sisters. Alice is in good voice as always and she gets the best songs in the film. Payne partners her in the film's best number America I Love You and he also reprises with her in the only original song for the film, You Say The Sweetest Things, Baby.

You Say The Sweetest Things Baby was written by composer Harry Warren and lyricist Mack Gordon. Gordon had written with Harry Revel a whole group of songs that Faye introduced. But Revel left Fox and Darryl Zanuck teamed Gordon with Warren who had just left Warner Brothers. It was a felicitous teaming and Gordon and Warren wrote a whole group of some of the best loved tunes of the 40s, Chatanooga Choo Choo being the most famous and also You'll Never Know, probably Faye's best loved song.

In watching films like Tin Pan Alley something is lost unless you're an amateur historian like me. Esther Ralston does a cameo as Nora Bayes who was one of the best loved vaudeville stars pre-World War I. In 1940 people still knew who Nora Bayes was. Now I'm sure she draws a great big "who" from most people if they're asked who she is. A key scene in the movie is after Faye has delivered a smash version of America I Love You, Payne gives in to Nora Bayes request for the song because of his ambition. That's totally lost on younger viewers.

Actually Nora Bayes did introduce a very famous World War I era song, written by a guy who normally introduced his own material. She gave the first public performance of Over There written by George M. Cohan and documented nicely in Yankee Doodle Dandy.

You never ever go wrong watching an Alice Faye film.

Alice Faye and Betty Grable team up in this costume musical as a pair of singing sisters. You have to hear the classic tune "K-K-K-Katy," sung by Jack Oakie using different lyrics throughout the movie, then sung and danced at the end by the sisters on stage and by marching World War I doughboys. --Musicals on the Silver Screen, American Library Association, 2013

This is a delightful film with some of the best stars from the 40's. Alice Faye has been a personal favorite of mine for years and her beautiful contralto singing voice is only one reason. She is also charming and beautiful, and it's no wonder she was 20th Century Fox's top blonde star for many years (until Betty Grable, who is, of course, also in this film). Alice and Betty make believable sisters and perform some knockout numbers together (especially "The Sheik of Araby", which also boasts the talents of the marvelous Nicholas Brothers). Alice is paired romantically in the film with John Payne (a frequent costar), and their chemistry makes you understand why Fox paired them often in film. The songs are delightful and the movie captures the image of Tin Pan Alley that may not have existed in reality, but isn't the image on film more romantic and lovely to look at? The only quibble I have: why, oh why wasn't this filmed in Technicolor?

Alice Faye was my favorite singer actress and made so many good films when I was in High School. Tin Pan Alley was especially entertaining and had our favorite Ethel Merman. As always she was the great belter; remember her in Alexander's Ragtime Band with Tyrone Power and Don Ameche. Both Power and Ameche played in several of Alice's films; and then there were Jack Oakie and June Havoc; what an amusing pair they were! The films I liked best were Tin Pan Alley 1940; The Gang's All Here and Hello Frisco Hello both 1943; and State Fair remake with Pat Boone and Bobby Darin (1960s?) In 1985 Alice Faye was at the Arlington Theater promoting health care products, and I had the privilege of talking to her. She was a great lady and very nice!