Review - VIENNESE NIGHTS (1930) Warners
The rarest of the rare! Vivienne Segal's Warners output in two-strip Technicolor musicals during the year 1930 consisted of four films. Of these, two (Song of the West ((sound discs survive)) and Bride of the Regiment) are lost. Golden Dawn only exists in a black and white version and Viennese Nights survives as a sole copy at UCLA. She appeared only in one more feature film, The Cat and the Fiddle (1934) in a supporting role opposite Ramon Novarro and Jeannette MacDonald.
A shining Broadway star (she created the role of Vera and introduced "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered" to the world in Rodgers and Hart's Pal Joey (1940)), her film work suffered from the 1930s audiences' distaste for the glut of Technicolor operettas and musicals that year.
In Viennese Nights, she shines as both a singer and an actress. In the second act, the parted young lovers of the first act, age in stages, are parted, finally by death, only to be reunited by music. The first act lasts one hour and the second act just over a half hour. There is a "ten minute intermission" card at the break.
The story is bittersweet and sad, but very memorable. Impoverished Otto romances Elsa, but her father chooses Baron Franz for her husband. In later years, Otto and Elsa, both unhappily married, encounter one another briefly, and part. The last scene was recreated in the MacDonald-Eddy film, Maytime. I shall say no more.
The score, though brief, with only six songs (but these by Sigmund Romberg and Oscar Hammerstein II) is thoroughly enjoyable with two standards emerging: You Will Remember Vienna and I Bring A Love Song, the latter echoing throughout from a simple tune to a full blown tone poem. Along the way are two more gems: Here Are We and When You Have No Man to Love.
The acting is not great, but the comedy is sprightly (Bert Roach and Louise Fazenda in supporting roles). The singing by Alexander Gray and Vivienne Segal is glorious. Walter Pidgeon as the nasty Baron is acceptable and sings. An opera balcony scene features Bela Lugosi (the year before Dracula) and Dorothy Hammerstein, (Oscar's wife).
Get through the operetta first hour and then be devasted by the utter poignancy of the second act.
The modern tone poem in reel 10 is crap writing and I don't blame the character of Elsa in her wheelchair wanting to leave before the climactic moment.
I viewed a pirated and very fuzzy Technicolor print that contained the blank leaders of all the reels, both beginning and ending. This lasted until 1:42:20, which is a good ten minutes longer than the given running time of 92 minutes.
The rarest of the rare! Vivienne Segal's Warners output in two-strip Technicolor musicals during the year 1930 consisted of four films. Of these, two (Song of the West ((sound discs survive)) and Bride of the Regiment) are lost. Golden Dawn only exists in a black and white version and Viennese Nights survives as a sole copy at UCLA. She appeared only in one more feature film, The Cat and the Fiddle (1934) in a supporting role opposite Ramon Novarro and Jeannette MacDonald.
A shining Broadway star (she created the role of Vera and introduced "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered" to the world in Rodgers and Hart's Pal Joey (1940)), her film work suffered from the 1930s audiences' distaste for the glut of Technicolor operettas and musicals that year.
In Viennese Nights, she shines as both a singer and an actress. In the second act, the parted young lovers of the first act, age in stages, are parted, finally by death, only to be reunited by music. The first act lasts one hour and the second act just over a half hour. There is a "ten minute intermission" card at the break.
The story is bittersweet and sad, but very memorable. Impoverished Otto romances Elsa, but her father chooses Baron Franz for her husband. In later years, Otto and Elsa, both unhappily married, encounter one another briefly, and part. The last scene was recreated in the MacDonald-Eddy film, Maytime. I shall say no more.
The score, though brief, with only six songs (but these by Sigmund Romberg and Oscar Hammerstein II) is thoroughly enjoyable with two standards emerging: You Will Remember Vienna and I Bring A Love Song, the latter echoing throughout from a simple tune to a full blown tone poem. Along the way are two more gems: Here Are We and When You Have No Man to Love.
The acting is not great, but the comedy is sprightly (Bert Roach and Louise Fazenda in supporting roles). The singing by Alexander Gray and Vivienne Segal is glorious. Walter Pidgeon as the nasty Baron is acceptable and sings. An opera balcony scene features Bela Lugosi (the year before Dracula) and Dorothy Hammerstein, (Oscar's wife).
Get through the operetta first hour and then be devasted by the utter poignancy of the second act.
The modern tone poem in reel 10 is crap writing and I don't blame the character of Elsa in her wheelchair wanting to leave before the climactic moment.
I viewed a pirated and very fuzzy Technicolor print that contained the blank leaders of all the reels, both beginning and ending. This lasted until 1:42:20, which is a good ten minutes longer than the given running time of 92 minutes.