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The Gay Divorcee
''The Gay Divorcee'' is a 1934 American musical film directed by Mark Sandrich and starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. It also features Alice Brady, Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore, and Erik Rhodes (actor, born 1906), Erik Rhodes. The screenplay was written by George Marion Jr., Dorothy Yost, and Edward Kaufman. Robert Benchley, H. W. Hanemann, and Stanley Rauh made uncredited contributions to the dialogue. It was based on the Broadway theatre, Broadway musical play, musical ''Gay Divorce'', written by Dwight Taylor (writer), Dwight Taylor, which had been adapted into a musical by Kenneth S. Webb and Samuel Hoffenstein from an unproduced play by J. Hartley Manners. The stage version included many songs by Cole Porter which were left out of the film, except for "Night and Day (song), Night and Day". Though most of the songs were replaced, the screenplay kept the original plot of the stage version. Three members of the play's original cast repeated their stage roles: Astair ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mark Sandrich
Mark Sandrich (born Mark Rex Goldstein; October 26, 1900 – March 4, 1945) was an American film director, writer, and producer. Early life Sandrich was born in New York City on October 26, 1900 into a American Jews, Jewish family. His sister was Ruth Harriet Louise. He was an engineering student at Columbia University when he accidentally fell into the film business. While visiting a friend on a film set, he saw that the director had a problem setting up a shot; Sandrich offered his advice, and it worked. He entered the movie business in the prop department. Career Shorts director Sandrich became a director in 1927, making comedy shorts. His first feature was ''Runaway Girls'', in 1928. In an exciting time in the film business with the arrival of sound, he briefly returned to shorts. In 1933, he directed the Academy Award-winning short ''So This Is Harris!''. Feature films Sandrich returned to directing features with ''Melody Cruise'' (1933). He followed it with ''C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Erik Rhodes (actor, Born 1906)
Erik Rhodes (born Ernest Sharpe; February 10, 1906 – February 17, 1990) was an American film and Broadway singer and actor. He is best remembered today for appearing in two classic Hollywood musical films with the popular dancing team of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers: ''The Gay Divorcee'' (1934) and ''Top Hat'' (1935). Early years Rhodes was born Earnest R. Sharpe at El Reno, Indian Territory, now Oklahoma, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Ernest A. Sharpe. He attended Central High School and the University of Oklahoma. While he was a student at the university, he earned a scholarship that enabled him to spend a year in New York studying voice. During World War II, Rhodes was a language specialist in the intelligence service of the Army Air Force. Career Rhodes started performing on the Broadway stage in ''A Most Immoral Lady'' (1928) using his birth name, Ernest R. Sharpe. This was followed by two musicals, ''The Little Show'' (1929) and ''Hey Nonny Nonny!'' (1932). He first ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Austin (actor)
William Crosby Percy Austin (12 June 1884 – 15 June 1975) was an English character actor. He was the first actor to play Alfred in a Batman adaptation. Early years William Austin was born in Georgetown in British Guiana. His parents were Charles Percy Austin and Rosalie Ann Sarah Austin. On the death of his father, he was brought to the United Kingdom to complete his education. He was the brother of actor Albert Austin. Austin attended Reading College in England and gained theatrical experience via Little Theatre and Drama Shop plays. Career Austin filled a business post in Shanghai and on being sent to San Francisco by the company he worked for, he decided to stay in America and take up acting on the stage and later in films. Beginning in 1919, Austin acted at the Morosco Theatre in Los Angeles for three years. He began working in films in 1922. He appeared in many American films and serials between the 1920s and the 1940s, though the vast majority of his roles were sm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fred Astaire And Ginger Rogers
Fred Astaire (May 10, 1899 – June 22, 1987) and Ginger Rogers (July 16, 1911 – April 25, 1995) were dance partners in a total of 10 films, nine of them with RKO Radio Pictures from 1933 to 1939, and one, ''The Barkleys of Broadway'', with MGM in 1949, their only color film. Career at RKO Astaire and Rogers were first paired together in the 1933 movie ''Flying Down to Rio''. They were cast in supporting roles, with fifth and fourth billing, respectively, but their performance in the "Carioca" number was the highlight of the film, and RKO Radio Pictures was eager to capitalize on their popularity. In 1934, Astaire and Rogers made the musical movie ''The Gay Divorcee'', which co-starred Edward Everett Horton. It was their first joint starring roles in a movie and grossed even more than ''Flying Down to Rio'', with worldwide rentals of $1.8 million;Richard Jewel, "RKO Film Grosses: 1931-1951", ''Historical Journal of Film Radio and Television'', Vol. 14, No. 1, 1994, p. 55 the m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flying Down To Rio
''Flying Down to Rio'' is a 1933 American pre-Code RKO musical film famous for being the first screen pairing of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, although Dolores del Río and Gene Raymond received top billing and the leading roles. Among the featured players are Franklin Pangborn and Eric Blore. The songs in the film were written by Vincent Youmans (music), Gus Kahn and Edward Eliscu (lyrics), with musical direction and additional music by Max Steiner. During the initial year that a Best Original Song was given during 7th Academy Awards, the film obtained a nomination for MUSIC (Song) – "Carioca," Music by Vincent Youmans; Lyrics by Edward Eliscu and Gus Kahn ame in 3rd Ironically, the song lost to "The Continental" from ''The Gay Divorcee'', the subsequent film of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers (the duo now top-billed) after ''Flying Down to Rio''. The black-and-white film (later computer-colorized) with, according to Arlene Croce's ''The Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Book ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RKO Pictures
RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum (KAO) theater chain and Joseph P. Kennedy's Film Booking Offices of America (FBO) studio were brought together under the control of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in October 1928. RCA chief David Sarnoff engineered the merger to create a market for the company's sound-on-film technology, RCA Photophone, and in early 1929 production began under the RKO name (an abbreviation of Radio-Keith-Orpheum). Two years later, another Kennedy holding, the Pathé studio, was folded into the operation. By the mid-1940s, RKO was controlled by investor Floyd Odlum. RKO has long been renowned for its cycle of musicals starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in the mid-to-late 1930s. Actors Katharine Hepburn and, later, Robert Mitchum had the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Production Code
The Motion Picture Production Code was a set of industry guidelines for the self-censorship of content that was applied to most motion pictures released by major studios in the United States from 1934 to 1968. It is also popularly known as the Hays Code, after Will H. Hays, president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) from 1922 to 1945. Under Hays's leadership, the MPPDA, later the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Motion Picture Association (MPA), adopted the Production Code in 1930 and began rigidly enforcing it in 1934. The Production Code spelled out acceptable and unacceptable content for motion pictures produced for a public audience in the United States. From 1934 to 1954, the code was closely identified with Joseph Breen, the administrator appointed by Hays to enforce the code in Hollywood. The film industry followed the guidelines set by the code well into the late 1950s, but it began to weaken, owing to the combined ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Night And Day (song)
"Night and Day" is a popular song by Cole Porter that was written for the 1932 musical ''Gay Divorce''. It is perhaps Porter's most popular contribution to the Great American Songbook and has been recorded by dozens of musicians. Fred Astaire introduced "Night and Day" on stage. His studio recording of the song with the Leo Reisman orchestra was released on Victor Records on January 13, 1933, and it became a No. 1 hit, topping the charts of the day for ten weeks. In December, it beat " The Last Round-Up" by George Olsen (nine weeks) and " Stormy Weather" by Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler (eight weeks) to become the Number 1 record for the year 1933. Astaire performed it again in the 1934 film version of the show, renamed ''The Gay Divorcee'', and it became one of his signature songs. There are several accounts about the song's origin. One mentions that Porter was inspired by an Islamic prayer when he visited Morocco. Another account says he was inspired by the Moorish architect ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cole Porter
Cole Albert Porter (June 9, 1891 – October 15, 1964) was an American composer and songwriter. Many of his songs became standards noted for their witty, urbane lyrics, and many of his scores found success on Broadway and in film. Born to a wealthy family in Indiana, Porter defied his grandfather's wishes for him to practice law and took up music as a profession. Classically trained, he was drawn to musical theatre. After a slow start, he began to achieve success in the 1920s, and by the 1930s he was one of the major songwriters for the Broadway musical stage. Unlike many successful Broadway composers, Porter wrote the lyrics as well as the music for his songs. After a serious horseback riding accident in 1937, Porter was left disabled and in constant pain, but he continued to work. His shows of the early 1940s did not contain the lasting hits of his best work of the 1920s and 1930s, but in 1948 he made a triumphant comeback with his most successful musical, ''Kiss Me, Kate ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Internet Broadway Database
The Internet Broadway Database (IBDB) is an online database of Broadway theatre productions and their personnel. It was conceived and created by Karen Hauser in 1996 and is operated by the Research Department of The Broadway League, a trade association for the North American commercial theatre community. This comprehensive history of Broadway provides records of productions from the beginnings of New York theatre in the 18th century up to today. Details include cast and creative lists for opening night and current day, song lists, awards and other interesting facts about every Broadway production. Other features of IBDB include an extensive archive of photos from past and present Broadway productions, headshots, links to cast recordings on iTunes or Amazon, gross and attendance information. Its mission was to be an interactive, user-friendly, searchable database for League members, journalists, researchers, and Broadway fans. The League recently added Broadway Touring shows t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Samuel Hoffenstein
Samuel "Sam" Hoffenstein (8 October 1890 - 6 October 1947) was a screenwriter and a musical composer. Born in Russia, he emigrated to the United States and began a career in New York City as a newspaper writer and in the entertainment business. In 1931 he moved to Los Angeles, where he lived for the rest of his life and wrote the scripts for over thirty movies. These movies included ''Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931 film), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde'' (1931), ''The Miracle Man (1932 film), The Miracle Man'' (1932), ''Phantom of the Opera (1943 film), Phantom of the Opera'' (1943), ''The Wizard of Oz (1939 film), The Wizard of Oz'' (1939), ''Tales of Manhattan'' (1942), ''Flesh and Fantasy'' (1943), ''Laura (1944 film), Laura'' (1944), and Ernst Lubitsch's ''Cluny Brown'' (1946). In addition, Hoffenstein, along with Cole Porter and Kenneth Webb (director), Kenneth Webb, helped compose the musical score for ''Gay Divorce'' (1933), the stage musical that became the film ''The Gay Divorcee'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Musical Play
Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical – humor, pathos, love, anger – are communicated through words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an integrated whole. Although musical theatre overlaps with other theatrical forms like opera and dance, it may be distinguished by the equal importance given to the music as compared with the dialogue, movement and other elements. Since the early 20th century, musical theatre stage works have generally been called, simply, musicals. Although music has been a part of dramatic presentations since ancient times, modern Western musical theatre emerged during the 19th century, with many structural elements established by the works of Gilbert and Sullivan in Britain and those of Harrigan and Hart in America. These were followed by the numerous Edwardian musical comedies and the musical theatre work ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
