Trois gosses sur les bras

My Blue Heaven which starred Dan Dailey and Betty Grable are a happy show business couple who started in vaudeville and now are going into that happy new medium television. This was one of the first films that dealt with the phenomenon of television. As Dailey says during the course of the film, right now only Milton Berle and Howdy Doody are in it, the field is wide open.

Dailey and Grable are a happy couple, but they'd even be happier with a child, in fact Betty loses a baby almost at the beginning of the film. Friends and sponsors, David Wayne and Jane Wyatt suggest adopting because three of their six are adopted. The rest of the film is a lighter treatment of the themes from A Penny Serenade. Things go a lot happier for Dailey and Grable than they did for Cary Grant and Irene Dunne.

Because they are a musical performing couple Grable and Dailey get a whole lot of numbers and there's even a few tossed in for Mitzi Gaynor who was doing her second film. What a pity she came along as late as she did, she would have been a Grade A star in the Thirties. Gaynor plays an eager young understudy who'd just as soon Grable stay out on maternity leave.

Other than the title song, there's nothing terribly memorable in the score that Harold Arlen and Ralph Blane wrote for My Blue Heaven. Of course very few songs are as memorable. Until Bing Crosby introduced White Christmas in Holiday Inn, My Blue Heaven was the largest selling song in history with Gene Austin's version topping the charts.

My Blue Heaven is a pleasant enough diversion. Grable and Dailey work well as a team together, you'll enjoy them.

Popular radio-program duo in New York City, a chummy married couple about to make that transition to television, have troubles adopting a baby. Colorful Betty Grable vehicle weighted down with musical chaos. Granted, "My Blue Heaven" is a 20th Century-Fox musical--and anyone going into it should rightfully expect lots of singing and hoofing--but here the story is far more substantial than the song numbers, which simply get in the way. Screenwriters Claude Binyon and Lamar Trotti, working from S.K. Lauren's story "Stork Don't Bring Babies", tentatively touch upon several topical issues (both satiric and dramatic) which are not explored with any depth. The sudden boom in television (and its impact on radio), the perils of a working mother who leaves her job to be with her child, and the reluctance of adoption agencies to assign babies with those "constantly divorcing" show-biz couples are all products for a satisfying comedy-drama. Grable and Dan Dailey are a lot of fun on the dance-floor, but this glossy product could actually use less pussyfooting around and more narrative heart. It's a feel-good movie, all right, but a picture for its time and not for the ages. **1/2 from ****

This film really isn't much. The performers are all agreeable, but the real star is the score by Harold Arlen and Ralph Blane. The lost gem is "Halloween", an Arlen waltz performed by Betty Grable, Dan Dailey, and David Wayne. Arlen did not write many waltzes. Only "When the Boys Come Home", "Sunday in Cisero Falls", and "Fancy Free" come to mind. This is a fine waltz with a witty lyric by Blane telling us that Irving Berlin forgot to write a song about "Halloween". "Don't Rock the Boat", Arlen's take on Calypso music, is also a winner. "Friendly Island" is a hilarious send up of Rodgers and Hammerstein's "South Pacific". Blane has never been so archly funny. Dailey even makes fun of Ezio Pinza's singing in this number. Aside from these numbers, "Mother Wore Tights" and "Call Me Mister" are superior Grable-Dailey films. Wayne gives us some comedy, but it is not enough to make the film sparkle.

One of Bettys more grown up movies and she does well. Strong acting on her part and always a joy to watch her sing and dance. Plot is melodramatic as was her Dolly Sisters movie. Some mistakes in the screenplay though. I go for realism and a couple of scenes had me confused due to sloppy writing. Toward the beginning when Bette and Dan go into their dressing room at the radio station, they confront their dog. A few lines and they leave by closing the door. The dog is still inside??? Who looks after him till the next day?? They don't take the dog home with them? Another example of poor writing is when the couple visit their writers and best friends at the farmhouse. They are are surprised to see the couples six kids and say they didn't know they had kids. WHAT?? They've known them for years and didn't know they had kids???? Didn't anyone, including the actors question this oddity?? So very strange. And while the friends/writers are in their NY place, who watched those six kids???? Debut of Mitzi Gaynor and she doesn't have much to do, but dances well.

The songs and dances are wonderful! Kitty and Jack are actors so when they sing/perform there are scenery and wardrobes that go along with the songs, making it less like an ordinary "musical." The story itself is modern and realistic even for the time (like someone else mentioned some of the things they say may have been considered "risque.") If you like old movies or musicals, I recommend you find a way to see this! You'll never get these songs out of your head, and you probably wont want to either. A classic!

I grew up watching this movie over and over again. I wish that I could find another copy but it seems impossible. :( If any decides to release it again, let me know!