Sur l'Avenue

Alice Faye's singing is a real plus for this movie and Dick Powell sounds pretty good as well. The story is pretty terrible and predictable, but there are lots of good character actors along to help save the day. The dancing is great throughout, really well done. But it's really the Ritz Brothers I wanted to comment on. Is it only me or are they really not that funny? They are great dancers but the skits they performed were for the most part too slap stick for me to find amusing. Overall this movie is well worth seeing and hearing - the singing and dancing is great.

Glowingly photographed in B&W by Lucien Andriot on Zanuck's Twentieth Century Fox's lot, the blonde English beauty Madeline Carroll --best remembered for being handcuffed to Robert Donat in "The 39 Steps"-- never looked more enchanting. The film features some of Irving Berlin's best romantic ballads, foremost of which is the almost forgotten "You're Laughing At Me," which Ella Fitzgerald later revived in her classic 1958 album of The Irving Berlin Song Book. The great character comic Sig Ruman ("To Be or Not to Be") shows up as an over-weight trainer in gym clothes, and for the grand finale even gets to sing part of "Slumming on Park Avenue" in a German accent. Vastly entertaining plot if vastly silly. But who cares?

"On the Avenue" was made in 1937 and starred Madeline Carroll, Dick Powell, Alice Faye and the Ritz Brothers. A musical revue does a send-up of a wealthy family, which outrages them. The writer, Gary Blake, accuses the young woman of the family, Mimi Caraway (Carroll) of being a bad sport. She invites him to dinner, and they fall in love. He promises to rewrite the skit. However, Mona Merrick (Faye), the leading lady who is in love with Gary, performs the skit so that the family comes off as even worse. Mimi retaliates by buying the production and planning some big revenge on Gary.

There are some good numbers and wonderful singing by Faye and Powell; alas, the appeal of the Ritz Brothers has always been lost on me. They always do these incredibly long routines in films, and to me, anyway, they're annoying rather than funny.

Madeline Carroll is stunningly beautiful; it's a shame she wasn't in Hollywood longer (in 1938, she was the highest paid actress in Hollywood). She returned to England to work for the war effort and stayed on after the war. Dick Powell, in the course of a 30-year career, reinvented himself several times. Here he is in his first incarnation, that of a juvenile tenor. He's very good and as he evolved into a serious actor and then a director and producer, he only got better. Alice Faye looks great and sings in her beautiful, smooth contralto; her stardom was just about to hit its peak.

All in all, very pleasant. If you're like me, record this and fast forward through the Ritz Brothers.

There are so many things to recommend this delightful film. The cast is top notch (Alice Faye is outstanding in her numbers and she brings real pathos to her role as the ignored but adoring admirer of Dick Powell), the story silly and witty in that charming mid 1930s screwball comedy style and the score by Irving Berlin is one of his very best. There isn't one dud song here and all were written to order for the film - astonishing facility.

However, I really rate this musical because of the way the numbers are filmed. One actually feels like one has been to the theatre to see a show and the staging is often remarkably elaborate.

For example, "The Girl on the Police Gazette" makes use of an amazing continuous revolving set (the soundstage must have been huge to accommodate this) and appears to have been filmed in almost a continuous take. Think of the rehearsal that must have taken!

The other reason to see it is the Ritz Brothers. I know that these zany comedians are an acquired taste and are often grating and irritating for modern audiences, but this is possibly their best vehicle and the closest we can get to seeing what they were really like in the theatre. Often referred to as a poor second rate alternative to the Marx Brothers, they were quite different in style and were really fabulous comedy dancers. The movies did them no favours at all in grounding their routines, forcing them to fit in with the plots of the films in which they appeared (consider their contributions to The Goldwyn Follies in 1938.....YUK!)

Here, however, they are purely a speciality and their musical contributions are terrific. The parody they do on "Let's Go Slumming" with Harry Ritz in drag, dressed in the identical outfit worn by Alice Faye only moments before, is just priceless.

I wish the print were in better shape but Fox has done the best it could with the surviving elements for the DVD release. Perhaps a Blu ray might improve definition further?

I also miss the trailer which appears to be lost. However I have an acetate of the very entertaining radio promotional trailer (12 minutes long), should the folks at Fox wish to include it on any future release.

Recommended viewing!

Songs include : He Ain't Got Rhythm - This Year's Kisses - You're Laughing At Me - The Girl on the Police Gazette Slumming On Park Avenue - I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm

"On The Avenue" has been sitting on my video shelf for more than a dozen years - unwatched and overlooked. An oversight.

In spite of one of the other reviews above, the film is hardly the cinema tragedy painted by that reviewer.

Dick Powell, on loan out from Warner Brothers to Fox, Madeline Carroll and Alice Faye and The Ritz Brothers head an all star cast of Hollywood favorites - Joan Davis, Billy Gilbert, Alan Mowbray, Walter Catlett, George Barbier, Cora Witherspoon, Sig Ruman, Stepin Fetchit and others.

The production values are quite high, though the story in uninspired. Beautiful crisp blacks and whites fill the screen. Half a dozen hit tunes - some still performed 70 years later - written by Irving Berlin. Both Powell and Faye are in top voice and each get their share of tunes to introduce.

Alice Faye receives third billing under Powell and Carroll. This was likely one of the last times she would be billed as such - top stardom was right around the corner for her.

The dance routines are very 1930s and staged, somewhat generically, by Seymour Felix - lots of chorus girls and big stages. Sadly, "I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm", the most enduring song of the film, is kind of tossed away in a production number of modest proportions.

The Ritz Brothers are an acquired taste, perhaps. They do have some better moments in the film, especially so in the opening number where they are less zany than in the rest of the film. Dance skills? Absolutely!

Madeline Carroll is an attractive woman, but Alice Faye sings, dances and quietly radiant through-out the entire film.

There are some amusing similarities between this film and "Hollywood Hotel" another Dick Powell from 1937 - both are show business stories, Powell gets slapped in the face in both films by a stuck up girl and uses the same facial expression both times, Powell escorts his female star around the circumference of an outdoor fountain at night in both films, Alan Mowbray also appears in both films

It's not a great film or a great musical, but it is as entertaining as many musicals of the era with it's greatest strengths being its score and its 2 top performers, Powell and Faye.