Words and Music (Blu-ray Review)
- Review Date: Nov 11, 2024
- Format: Blu-ray Disc
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Director
Norman TaurogRelease Date(s)
1948 (September 3, 2024)Studio(s)
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (Warner Archive Collection)- Film/Program Grade: B
- Video Grade: A
- Audio Grade: A
- Extras Grade: A+
Review
Hollywood during its Golden Age turned out many musicals, including some biopics about song writers, such as Night and Day (about Cole Porter), Till the Clouds Roll By (Jerome Kern), Deep in My Heart (Sigmund Romberg), and Three Little Words (Bert Kalmer & Harry Ruby). Usually, their stories were whitewashed to exorcise any unpleasantness or controversy. Words and Music, about Rodgers and Hart, did the same, forgoing an authentic portrayal of its subjects and devoting most of the film to elaborate stagings of their most timeless songs.
Words and Music begins with how the partnership of composer Richard Rodgers (Tom Drake, Meet Me in St. Louis) and lyricist Lorenz “Larry” Hart (Mickey Rooney, National Velvet) came about. We get a sugary look at their lean years waiting for a break and a bit of their romantic lives. Rodgers woos and weds Dorothy Feiner (Janet Leigh, Touch of Evil), while Larry has his eyes on showgirl Peggy Logan (Betty Garrett, On the Town). The bulk of the film depicts their “overnight” success with The Garrick Gaieties and their subsequent triumphs on Broadway and in Hollywood. As the story unfolds, a hefty selection of their musical output is presented by a talented cast, featuring Judy Garland, Perry Como, June Allyson, Lena Horne, Gene Kelly, Ann Sothern and others.
The biggest departure from reality is the portrayal of Hart as a womanizer. In fact, he was a closeted gay man tortured by his unattractive physical appearance and socially unaccepted, professionally disqualifying homosexuality. He eventually turned to drink, becoming an alcoholic and disappearing for days, sometimes weeks at a time, frustrating creative teams and especially Rodgers. Hart died at age 48 of pneumonia. As portrayed by Rooney, he’s a manic genius who pines for his former girlfriend and ultimately suffers from a mysterious movie malady until he collapses in the rain during a revival of one of his shows.
Rooney is an actor who never mastered subtlety, and his performance in Words and Music is undisciplined and all over the place. There’s more wide-eyed Andy Hardy in his performance than Larry Hart, and he never convinces that he’s the clever, masterful lyricist who made so many songs memorable. As Rodgers, Drake is bland and comes off as a generic nice guy. This might be partly because of Richard Rodgers’ unwillingness to have his private life bared on the screen and the script by Fred Finkelhoffe that doesn’t give the character much to do other than write one successful tune after another. But Drake’s line readings lack cadence and any evidence of emotion, and his wooden performance is a detriment to the film. Janet Leigh and Betty Garrett have little to do and fail to make much of an impression. In real life, Rodgers and Hart had a rocky working relationship. The film downplays this. The intent is not to offer an accurate version of their lives but to avoid controversy and showcase their music.
And what music there is! Standouts include I Wish I Were in Love Again, a great duet performed by Garland and Rooney, The Lady Is a Tramp (Lena Horne), With a Song in My Heart (Perry Como), Blue Moon (Mel Torre), and There’s a Small Hotel (Betty Garrett).
MGM pulled out all the stops with production numbers staged by Robert Alton: Mountain Greenery (Perry Como and Allyn Ann McLerie), Where’s That Rainbow (Ann Sothern and chorus), Thou Swell (June Allyson and the Blackburn twins), Blue Room (Perry Como and Cyd Charisse), and Slaughter on Tenth Avenue (Gene Kelly and Vera-Ellen). Many of these are staged far more elaborately than they could have been for Broadway, and they’re definitely impressive, particularly with the backing of the huge MGM orchestra.
Slaughter on Tenth Avenue features Kelly performing the jazzy ballet from Rodgers and Hart’s 1936 show On Your Toes. Kelly initiated the practice of incorporating a ballet sequence with Anchors Aweigh, and continued with On the Town, American in Paris, and Singin’ in the Rain. He would even star in an all-dance musical, Invitation to the Dance (1956). Slaughter on Tenth Avenue is beautifully staged in a seedy dive frequented by shady men and streetwise ladies rife with jealousy and quick tempers. Kelly and Vera-Ellen perform a sensual dance until an envious bystander decides to challenge Kelly. A choreographed fight ensues, leading to unforeseen tragedy. The tone of this number differs markedly from the rest of the film.
Other Rodgers and Hart songs featured in the film include Where or When, Johnny One Note, This Can’t Be Love, Manhattan, and Way Out West on West End Avenue.
The dramatic scenes are directed perfunctorily by Norman Taurog, who had the unenviable task of making dull dialogue tolerable as we wait for the next musical number. The camera work is routine and displays little imagination. Taurog is far from period-accurate in the 1920s scenes, with costumes, hair, and make-up in the contemporary styles of the 1940s, likely at the behest of the studio. And the orchestrations, though rich and exciting, don’t reflect the musical styles of the flapper era.
Words and Music was shot by directors of photography Charles Rosher and Harry Stradling, Sr. on 35 mm film with Technicolor three-strip cameras and spherical lenses, finished photochemically, and presented in the aspect ratio of 1.37:1. This 1080p transfer from the Warner Archive Collection is sourced from a new 4K scan of the original Technicolor negatives and exhibits the same high quality as other releases from Warner Archive. The color palette is vivid, with both primary and pastel hues beautifully rendered. Reds are especially bold and deep. Yellows are buttery, blues rich, and greens striking. There’s no evidence of surface scratches, dirt specks, splices, or other imperfections. Dramatic low angles are used in the Slaughter on Tenth Avenue number, and master shots of other numbers are taken from the audience’s point of view. A brief montage at the end of the film reprises some of the musical numbers seen earlier.
The soundtrack is English 2.0 DTS-HD Master Audio. English SDH subtitles are an option. Dialogue is clear and distinct, but it’s the musical numbers where the sound truly comes alive. Backed by the large MGM orchestra, these sequences sound great and feature the studio’s distinctive style, which may not be true to the way the songs were heard on Broadway originally but add excitement to their presentation. A party scene features ambient crowd noise and background music.
Bonus materials on the Blu-ray release from Warner Archive include the following;
- Audio Commentary by Richard Barrios
- A Life in Words and Music (20:09)
- Unused Musical Sequences (13:28)
- Audio Only Musical Outtakes (19:54)
- The Cat That Hated People (7:03)
- Going to Blazes! (21:12)
- Original Theatrical Trailer (3:34)
Audio Commentary – Film historian Richard Barrios provides a thoroughly researched commentary. He stresses that Words and Music is far from an authentic biography of Rodgers and Hart. It falls under the category of musical film biography, introduced in 1936 with The Great Ziegfeld. The format consists of a few episodes from the team’s lives along with lots of their music. Some bio details had to be invented, others downplayed or eliminated. Hart, for instance, was a short gay man whose self-hatred led to dissipation and alcoholism, topics too grim for a 1948 MGM musical. Barrios describes the working relationship of Rodgers and Hart and discusses their frequent clashes over Hart’s latenesses and sudden disappearances. The production numbers are designed to look as if they could have taken place on a theater stage, unlike the numbers in Till the Clouds Roll By, which were overly grand. Lena Horne’s roles at MGM were mostly guest appearances that could be edited out for Southern audiences. Blue Moon existed in several forms before the one that became a standard. The song originally was called Prayer and intended for a Jean Harlow film. Hart later rewrote the lyrics as The Bad in Every Man for the non-musical film Manhattan Melodrama. Blue Moon is the only Rodgers and Hart song not attached to a specific show or film. Barrios points out slight differences in Judy Garland’s appearance in her two numbers which occur sequentially in the film but were shot weeks apart. In Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, the choreography conveys earthiness and sensuality.
A Life in Words and Music – Lorenz Hart was “a man plagued by inner demons.” An accurate representation of his life couldn’t be shown in 1948. Hart was homosexual and alcoholic. The early years of the team were tough until The Garrick Gaieties, when they became “hot on Broadway.” Rodgers and Hart were innovators. Among their Broadway shows were Jumbo, On Your Toes, Babes in Arms, The Boys from Syracuse and Pal Joey. In the 1940s, things between them became strained. Often, musical biographies have little to do with the real lives of composers. Words and Music was expensive to make and wound up “in the red” despite being popular at the box office, but Mary Rodgers, Richard Rodger’s daughter, notes that Rodgers and Hart songs “have a lasting resonance.”
Unused Musical Sequences – Two numbers that were shot but don’t appear the final film: You’re Nearer, performed by Perry Como, with beeps to cue him for accurate lip syncing; and Lover, also by Como, in what was intended to be the opening of the film.
The Audio Only Musical Outtakes include the following:
- Medley: Falling in Love With Love/You Took Advantage of Me (Gene Kelly, Vera-Ellen)
- I Feel at Home With You (The Blackburn Twins)
- It Never Entered My Mind (Betty Garrett)
- My Funny Valentine (Betty Garrett)
- My Heart Stood Still (Perry Como)
- The Lady Is a Tramp – Extended Version (Lena Horne)
- Way Out West – Complete Version (Betty Garrett)
- With a Song In My Heart – Complete Version (Perry Como)
The Cat That Hated People – In this 1948 Technicolor cartoon directed by Tex Avery, a frustrated black cat (voiced by Paul Frees doing a Jimmy Durante impersonation) is fed up with people and decides to escape to the moon for relief. When he does, he discovers characters there that make him realize people aren’t so bad after all.
Going to Blazes! – Filmed in collaboration with the Los Angeles Fire Department, this black & white short shows firefighters in the firehouse, answering alarms and rushing to fires. The film emphasizes fire safety and prevention, and shows an elaborate switching system used to dispatch the proper equipment to fires.
Don’t look to Words and Music for a true recounting of the lives and partnership of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. It’s just a really enjoyable collection of some of their best-known songs, expertly staged and performed by great talents of the 1940s. The commentary is a fine accompaniment to the feature that clarifies differences between actual facts and Hollywood’s interpretation of two creative lives.
- Dennis Seuling