Musicals
The 'Sound Era' was ushered in with Warner Brothers' 1927 part-talkie sensation The Jazz Singer (1927) starring Al Jolson and since then the musical genre has experienced several key phases of popularity and artistic development.
After an initial glut of all-singing, all-dancing extravaganzas in the closing years of the twenties, musicals had exhausted their potential audience until Warner Bros. again breathed new life into the formula with their kaleidoscopic Busby Berkeley-choreographed, depression-era productions. As their star waned RKO teamed up Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers for the first time in 1933 as supporting players in the Dolores Del Rio musical romance Flying Down To Rio (1933). This film marked the beginning of a decade-long partnership graced with songs by legendary songwriters Berlin, Kern and Gershwin and culminating in 1939 with The Story Of Vernon And Irene Castle.
Between the 1940s and late 1950s the emphasis shifted to Arthur Freed's production unit at M.G.M. which nurtured the talents of notable stars such as Vincente Minnelli, Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly reaching a peak with An American In Paris (1951) and Singin' In The Rain (1952).
Never again would such a remarkable and at times daringly experimental unit exist inside any film studio. The musical genre faded in magnificent style with such super-productions of the sixties as West Side Story (1961) and My Fair Lady (1964). After this basic economics made film musicals an increasingly rare phenomenon very much associated with Hollywood's more glorious past.
Philip Masheter
An American In Paris
Details
An American In Paris
1951, M.G.M., U.S. one-sheet - 41 x 27in. (104.1 x 68.6cm.), (A)
1951, M.G.M., U.S. one-sheet - 41 x 27in. (104.1 x 68.6cm.), (A)
Further details
The Mel Tormé Collection