La marraine de Charley

Due to copyright issues (the widow of Frank Loesser has kept it from circulation due to the misguided belief that it was one of her husband's lesser works), Where's Charley? has not been seen by many people for decades. It is a good film and Ray Bolger's favorite, so it is a shame that it is not accessible.

I saw it screened at Cinevent 2017, and though the color on the print was beginning to fade, it was an enjoyable hour and a half.

The story is the famous stage play Charley's Aunt set at the turn of the century at Oxford where two men try to woo their sweethearts. "Better Get Out of Here" is the best staged musical number in the film and it appears in the beginning when the girls discover there is no adult chaperone and they are therefore in violation of the morals of the time. This is what causes Charley (Bolger) to impersonate his own aunt in fear that he will not get to spend enough time with Amy (Allyn Ann McLerie) to win her heart and her hand. Although it wasn't my favorite part of the movie, I was surprised to find myself humming "Once in Love With Amy" after the fact.

I was fortunate to see this film while a freshman in college the year it was released. Having always enjoyed musical theater I loved the movie. Unfortunately I never got to see it again until it showed up once on television about thirty years ago. By that time I had the British original cast recording with Norman Wisdom so I knew the songs and found it even more fun. Then we saw a Ray Bolger nightclub act and I got to speak with him afterward. His "Once in Love With Amy" was the high point of his act as it was in the Broadway show. In the movie he repeats his famous interaction with an audience during that number as he did on the stage. According to Cy Feuer it was that number and that interaction that made the show a hit. I agree that this movie is part of show business history and should be available on DVD.

Ray Bolger gets to re-create his most famous stage role, right down to the audience-participation gimmick in "Once In Love With Amy." The George Abbott-Frank Loesser stage hit was a little ramshackle to begin with, and there's plenty to complain about in this adaptation, if you're ornery: It's stagy, with too-elaborate choreography. (The opening number, with the stylized dance steps played against the natural setting, looks terribly stilted.) Bolger, great as he is, isn't remotely convincing as an Oxford undergrad -- twice the right age, and with an accent that goes in and out. Some good songs from the stage version are missing, notably "Lovelier Than Ever." David Butler directs with his usual dull competence.

But there's Bolger's eccentric dancing, not only wonderful itself but a valuable historical link to a theatrical style that was old by the time Bolger appropriated it (think Montgomery and Stone, and all their imitators). There's a fun, unpretentious "dream ballet" set in Brazil, sort of like MGM's "The Pirate" as reimagined with a Warners-cartoon sensibility. The old "Charley's Aunt" plot still plays, the Technicolor is pretty, the production is handsome. And one mystery: How does someone as pretty, charming, unaffected, talented, and spirited as Allyn McLerie not get to be a movie star?

Ray Bolger's career in movies has a passing resemblance to another performer who did not quite fit in, but who achieved stardom through a back door of sorts: Robert Preston. If one looks at the credits of both men most of their films are quite forgettable, but their musical work lifts them. Yet Bolger, although recognized for his abilities as an eccentric dancer, only hit the target on film twice: as the Scarecrow in "The Wizard of Oz" and as Charley Wykeman in "Where's Charlie". The first one was a lucky fluke, as he was hired in the Hollywood studio system at it's height. But after appearing in that classic, Bolger was wasted in movies (one can make an exception with his appearance in "The Harvey Girls" but it is still pale in comparison). He had a habit of returning to Broadway, appearing in Roger & Hart's "By Jupiter" in the early 1940s. Then he returned to Broadway in the late 1940s. And he got his greatest Broadway success there as Charley Wykeman in "Where's Charlie". A musical version of the farce, "Charlie's Aunt", he played the hero who dresses up as his wealthy aunt from Brazil (where the nuts come from). The highpoint of the musical was when he sang "Once In Love With Amy", and got the audience to join in the singing. Bolger's performance and enthusiasm made Broadway history. With his established reputation in Hollywood musicals he was able to get the lead in the Hollywood version. So as a result of this we are able to still enjoy that rarity - an actual Broadway star's performance on celluloid in the role he made famous. It is identical to Preston's return to Hollywood as "Professor Harold Hill" in "The Music Man". But the latter film really began a second half to Preston's career. He would spend most of his later years on Broadway, not in Hollywood, and only pick and choose those films that he wanted to do, culminating with "Victor/Victoria". That did not happen with Bolger. His next musical, "April in Paris" was with Doris Day, but was not very good. He never starred in another Hollywood film. He played "Barnaby" in Walt Disney's "Babes in Toyland, but most critics did not care for that film either. Bolger's stardom was never in doubt, but his days of growth in his movie roles were over. Not quite like Preston, who seemed to have a better presence for some reason. Still, "Where's Charley?" is in that select group with "The Man Who Came to Dinner" and "Call Me Madame!" wherein we are able to see what the Broadway audiences saw. For that alone we should be grateful.

You can go to Turner Home Movies website and vote for movies you'd like to see released on DVD. They keep a list, and Where's Charley is on there. You can also suggest other movies if you don't see them on the list. They've got tons of old movies, and apparently lots of them haven't been re-released yet. It's really a shame that something as classic as Where's Charley isn't available to adoring fans. To vote for Where's Charley you can just go to http://www.tcm.com/suggestamovie/index/#suggestions and complete their "suggestion" box & tell them why you want it. They send the list out to DVD companies regularly, apparently. It's worth a shot. Maybe we'll all be watching it again next year!