Bright Lights

"Bright Lights" (re-named "Adventures in Africa" for TV broadcasting many years after its release) is a cinematic Mulligan stew consisting of a murder mystery, multiple love stories, several musical numbers, and tedious stretches of low comedy barely held together by a witless and improbable script about a show girl (Dorothy Mackaill) who, with her partner- manager (Frank Fay) shimmies her way from small-time tropical dives and traveling carnivals to the Broadway big-time only to announce that she's giving up the stage to marry into wealth (in the person of Philip Strange as Mr. Emerson Fairchild of Long Island whose accent is British but whose mother's is Midlantic).

The Fay character loves and protects Mackaill in a fatherly or businesslike manner but refrains from marrying her; every time he is about to give in to that urge he pulls back because some part of him senses that he is not worthy to be her husband. Mackaill finds his hot/cold behavior frustrating and infuriating. The development of this complex relationship takes a back seat to sometimes heavy-handed subplots enacted by the likes of Eddie Nugent in an ill-defined role (star's press agent?) eagerly trying to manage a gaggle of reporters which includes a barely visible young John Carradine and an all-too-visible Frank McHugh as an obnoxious drunk, who have assembled to cover Mackaill's final performance; James Murray and Inez Courtney as young lovers; Tom Dugan and Daphne Pollard as a violently discordant married dance team; Noah Beery as a lecherous figure from Mackaill's and Fay's sordid African past. Other, later, pre-Code films with similar elements include "I'm No Angel," "Forty-Second Street," "Murder at the Vanities" and Mackaill's outstanding 1932 feature "Safe in Hell."

As far as the songs go, "Wall Street" near the beginning, despite a stage-filling chorus and carloads of set pieces and costumes, falls flat, even with expert song-and-dance man Fay at the center. He comes off better in the Harry Akst-Grant Clarke standard "Nobody Cares If I'm Blue." In dramatic scenes, however, his haggard appearance distracts from his emotionally nuanced performance. The makeup applied to his rugged features suggests Count Dracula and clashes with his gently rapid speaking voice and smooth singing style and stage manner. Among the other musical numbers, "Song of the Congo," "I'm Crazy for Cannibal Love" and "I'm Just a Man About Town" are the catchiest, both visually and melodically, though one can't help wondering what Busby Berkeley might have done with the staging. Mackaill is the centerpiece of all three; she performs a hula-type dance in the first two and wears a man's tux and top hat in the first half of the latter before emerging via camera trickery from the huddle of a male chorus wearing a dress. She also has some effective dramatic moments but, due perhaps to sloppy editing, misfires during a poorly staged dressing room temper tantrum. Her vocal range is limited, but she carries her songs confidently, dances gamely and looks magnificent in skimpy, spangled costumes as well as in screen-filling closeups.

It is a shame that no Technicolor print of this Vitaphone musical has survived, because the aesthetic oddities of the 2-color process would be a match for this preposterous Broadway story. Star Louanne (Mackaill) plans to marry a rich dud, but deep down pal Wally (Fay). Sadly, Wally is a jerk. There is a flashback to an African local (like Disney's Tarzan, sans Africans), and some silly backstage gunplay. Frank McHugh is swell as a drunk reporter. Mackaill is appealing in the production numbers, but as lost as everyone else with the poor script. Guilty fun for fans of early musicals, though.

"Bright Lights" is a good example of early cinema after the advent of sound. It includes some popular actors from the silent era who transitioned well enough in sound, but whose careers lasted less than a dozen more years. Dorothy Mackaill, Frank Fay, Inez Courtney, Edward Nugent, Daphne Pollard, and Philip Strange had short careers in sound.

James Murray and Edmund Breese died in the mid-1930s and Noah Beery died in 1946. Only Tom Dugan had a film career that lasted into the 1950s and ended with his death in 1955. I mention this as one reason that few of these names may be known today – other than by serious movie buffs.

Mackaill was a moderately talented singer and actor who played glamor roles in a variety of film genres. But, as film technology advances leapfrogged within a few short years of sound, the competition increased. The glamor age of Hollywood was just beginning. Many new beautiful and talented actresses came on the scene. That included several multi-talented women who could also sing and/or dance. Alice Faye, Jeanette MacDonald, Deanna Durbin, Judy Garland, Eleanor Powell and Ginger Rogers had talents that dwarfed Mackaill. Mackaill made her last theatrical movie in 1937. She was just 34, and she would live to be 87.

Frank Fay started in movies with sound. Although a talented actor and singer, he faced the same competition Mackaill had. But, added to his declining career was his huge ego, a drinking problem, and difficulty in working with others. His film career all but ended with three early films in the 1940s.

Some viewers and the DVD sales company like to promote this as a "pre- code" movie. I think that's done for a lot of films that would not have much of a problem when the motion picture industry began to enforce its code in 1934. But, Mackaill was one of the stars who played roles that had provocative scenes or scantily dressed women. This film has a silhouette scene of the actress undressing behind a screen. Other than that, the chorus costumes and performances were no more revealing or suggestive than any of the many musical films from the mid-1930s onward.

"Bright Lights" is what might be called a formulaic film of early musicals. The musicals most of us remember and enjoy from the past are those that have considerable plots. They tell the stories with musical and/or dance numbers at intervals. But, the earliest of the sound era musicals were mostly revues. They had scripts with very thin plots, if any, and were mostly staged music and dance numbers, sometimes with comedy stuck in, as in the vaudeville days.

Besides this example, the technical and production aspects of "Bright Lights" are examples of the early transitions in film. For instance, the heavy use of makeup in this film is most obvious with Frank Fay. The acting at times seems stuck in place – probably because this was filmed with fixed microphone locations. And, the acting itself still has some twinges of melodrama – a carryover from the silent film days.

There are no memorable songs from this film, and the choreography of the big numbers is rudimentary compared to later accomplished musicals. The film has a thin plot, but there are no exceptional performances. It has some historical value for a look at a handful of early actors who bowed out of films within a few short years. And, it has some value in showing the state of the film craft in its early years of transition to sound and other major advances.

The First National Musicals that have been turning up on TCM are interestingly elephantine antiques for fans of old movies. In many ways they are as interesting for what the film makers got wrong as what they got right. No Broadway theater ever had such immense stages as are seen in this one, not even the new ones, miked when they were built. The chorus lines are dwarfed on the stage.

Likewise, director Michael Curtiz and cinematographers Lee Garmes and Charles Edgar Schoenbaum can't seem to figure out how to stage people for camera and microphone. Frank Fay seems stagy and ill at ease in close-ups and two-shots, but when he is performing on stage and shot in medium long range from about the sixth row, (although there are no seats) he is fine. Contrariwise, star Dorothy MacKaill is at her best in Dutch angle close-ups. She may have started as a chorine, but she had become a star in silent pictures.

The other performers offer interesting contrasts. Who knew that Daphne Pollard could sing? Can you spot John Carradine in his first film performance? Could Frank McHugh be more annoying as a drunk reporter? These are the things that make this movie interesting more than eighty years later.

They don't make it good. The movie musical went into eclipse for three years from ill-managed things like this. It's certainly not hard to understand why.

This backstage musical and murder mystery was originally filmed in 2-strip Technicolor but only a B&W version exists.

Dorothy Mackaill stars as a stage star on the night of her final performance. She's leaving show biz and marrying into a wealthy family. As the tributes pour in about the great star, we are shown via flashbacks her true past. It's an interesting narrative structure and keeps the plots moving.

Despite her cleaned-up image, Mackaill is shown to have started out in a dive in South Africa, doing a sleazy hula number and cavorting with several men. Frank Fay plays her devoted (and ignored) pal, and Noah Beery is a lecherous suitor. When the men get into a fight, Mackaill hurls a lit oil lamp at Beery and burns his face. Of course Beery shows up on Mackaill's final night and gets involved in murder.

Mackaill gets to sing and dance to outrageous numbers like "Cannibal Love" and "Song of the Congo." She also gets to dress in a tuxedo and sing and dance to "I'm Just a Man About Town." Frank Fay sings several songs as well, and the spirited Inez Courtney sings a terrific "Hey, Hey, He's Not So Dumb."

Also along for the ride are James Murray as Courtney's suitor, Frank McHugh as a drunken reporter, Tom Dugan and Daphne Pollard as the comic relief, Edward Nugent as a chorus boy, and Jean Laverty as a chorus girl.

Mackaill had been a Ziegfeld showgirl before hitting movies in 1920. She was a big star by the mid-20s and made 65 films, easily making the transition to talkies. But when Warners bought out First National in 1928, Mackaill was on of several stars (Colleen Moore, Alice White, Betty Compson) whose contracts were not renewed. She freelanced for a while and finally quit films in 1937.