For a film entitled The Goldwyn Follies Sam Goldwyn got some of the very best acts from the opera, the ballet, and the radio to make a nice musical for United Artists to release. A very skimpy backstage plot doesn't get too much in the way. And any film that has everything from the grand opera to the Ritz Brothers has got something for everyone to enjoy.
Truth be told the plot is a bit silly, a kind of modified and lighter version of Maytime. Producer Adolphe Menjou has had a run of bad pictures and he gets the idea that he's losing touch with the public. So fresh and wholesome Andrea Leeds is hired to be his influence with her being attuned to the movie-going public.
Menjou's condition is that she have no contact with other show business entertainers lest she be unduly influenced. But one fine night she finds short order cook Kenny Baker flipping hamburgers and singing to the radio. After that it's Maytime though it ends a lot better for all three of these people.
For ballet you have a couple of numbers choreographed by the immortal Georges Balanchine with his prima ballerina Vera Zorina who was also Mrs. Balanchine. Zorina had just scored very big on Broadway in Rodgers&Hart's On Your Toes and she had a brief Hollywood career as well.
Opera lovers will like hearing Charles Kullman and Helen Jepson singing some selections. The radio furnished us with Phil Baker, Bobby Clark appearing solo for the first time since the death of his partner Clyde McCullough and Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy.
Andrea Leeds who was fresh from her Oscar nominated performance in Stage Door also with Menjou does well when she doesn't sing. But with Kenny Baker's tenor and Helen Jepson in the cast her non-singing singing stands out like a sore thumb. As for Baker he was appearing around this time on the Jack Benny Show as Benny's vocalist before Dennis Day came on the scene. Baker introduces those two Gershwin classics Our Love Is Here To Stay and Love Walked In. Those were the last songs composed by George Gershwin who died before seeing this film.
One thing Goldwyn completely ripped off was a sequence with the Ritz Brothers and Menjou. A similar sequence was done in the Warner Brothers musical Varsity Show with Warren William and a quartet of Ritz Brothers like burlesque comedians. Jack Warner could have sued.
The Goldwyn Follies is a fun bit of entertainment fluff with something literally for all kinds of taste.
Truth be told the plot is a bit silly, a kind of modified and lighter version of Maytime. Producer Adolphe Menjou has had a run of bad pictures and he gets the idea that he's losing touch with the public. So fresh and wholesome Andrea Leeds is hired to be his influence with her being attuned to the movie-going public.
Menjou's condition is that she have no contact with other show business entertainers lest she be unduly influenced. But one fine night she finds short order cook Kenny Baker flipping hamburgers and singing to the radio. After that it's Maytime though it ends a lot better for all three of these people.
For ballet you have a couple of numbers choreographed by the immortal Georges Balanchine with his prima ballerina Vera Zorina who was also Mrs. Balanchine. Zorina had just scored very big on Broadway in Rodgers&Hart's On Your Toes and she had a brief Hollywood career as well.
Opera lovers will like hearing Charles Kullman and Helen Jepson singing some selections. The radio furnished us with Phil Baker, Bobby Clark appearing solo for the first time since the death of his partner Clyde McCullough and Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy.
Andrea Leeds who was fresh from her Oscar nominated performance in Stage Door also with Menjou does well when she doesn't sing. But with Kenny Baker's tenor and Helen Jepson in the cast her non-singing singing stands out like a sore thumb. As for Baker he was appearing around this time on the Jack Benny Show as Benny's vocalist before Dennis Day came on the scene. Baker introduces those two Gershwin classics Our Love Is Here To Stay and Love Walked In. Those were the last songs composed by George Gershwin who died before seeing this film.
One thing Goldwyn completely ripped off was a sequence with the Ritz Brothers and Menjou. A similar sequence was done in the Warner Brothers musical Varsity Show with Warren William and a quartet of Ritz Brothers like burlesque comedians. Jack Warner could have sued.
The Goldwyn Follies is a fun bit of entertainment fluff with something literally for all kinds of taste.