Alas. A great cast, a director who knew about colorful musicals, based on a warm comedy by a Nobel-winning playwright. And it doesn't quite come together.
The story resembles Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" a little. It's set in turn-of-the-century New England, and a song by Walter Huston tells us all about how nice it is to live there. In case we had any doubt, it skips from one celebration (a high school graduation) to another (the Fourth of July), each even getting a song of its own.
And that's the problem, Conrad Salinger's songs. The lyrics sometimes rhyme in a clever manner but, all in all, they're entirely forgettable. The scenes that were funny in O'Neill's play, "Ah, Wilderness," are still funny here, though. We can watch Mickey Rooney go through his antic experience getting drunk for the first time and kissing a dance hall girl.
And the most amusing scene of all, Uncle Sid returning home, drunk, from the picnic is still the most amusing scene in this musical, although Frank Morgan as Uncle Sid isn't as outrageous as Wallace Beery was in an earlier version of the play. Beery sits down to lunch at the family table and begins munching a lobster, shell and all.
The story retains is charm. Everybody wants to be Mickey Rooney and Gloria DeHaven, young, beautiful, and virginal. And we want an understanding, common-sense Dad, like Walter Huston. And we all want to change the world. O'Neill must have had a hell of a hard time writing comedy.
The story resembles Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" a little. It's set in turn-of-the-century New England, and a song by Walter Huston tells us all about how nice it is to live there. In case we had any doubt, it skips from one celebration (a high school graduation) to another (the Fourth of July), each even getting a song of its own.
And that's the problem, Conrad Salinger's songs. The lyrics sometimes rhyme in a clever manner but, all in all, they're entirely forgettable. The scenes that were funny in O'Neill's play, "Ah, Wilderness," are still funny here, though. We can watch Mickey Rooney go through his antic experience getting drunk for the first time and kissing a dance hall girl.
And the most amusing scene of all, Uncle Sid returning home, drunk, from the picnic is still the most amusing scene in this musical, although Frank Morgan as Uncle Sid isn't as outrageous as Wallace Beery was in an earlier version of the play. Beery sits down to lunch at the family table and begins munching a lobster, shell and all.
The story retains is charm. Everybody wants to be Mickey Rooney and Gloria DeHaven, young, beautiful, and virginal. And we want an understanding, common-sense Dad, like Walter Huston. And we all want to change the world. O'Neill must have had a hell of a hard time writing comedy.