(Anthem Art and Culture), by Gary Morris (Editor), Bert Cardullo (Introduction), Jonathan Rosenbaum (Foreword). London and New York: Anthem Press, 2009.
— David Hudson, IFC.com
- Superb performances by leads Howard Keel, Kathryn Grayson, and Ann Miller
- Superb dancing by Bob Fosse, Tommy Rall, Bobby Vann, Carol Haney, and Jeanne Coyne
- Superb choreography by Hermes Pan
- Solid direction from musical-comedy pro George Sidney1
- A not-bad script from an uncredited Bill Shakespeare
- And, most importantly, a brilliant score from Cole Porter (words and music) — 14 songs, and every one a winner2
The
musical Kiss Me Kate started out back in the thirties as a gleam
in the eye of Arnold Saint-Subber, a young devotee of the theater who
managed to finagle his way backstage to watch a production of The
Taming of the Shrew that starred Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne,
a husband and wife team who were once the classiest act on Broadway. 3
He was fascinated to see that they argued just as much offstage as on,
and it gave him the idea for a play that would mix modern theatrical egos
with Shakespeare's classic farce.
In a previous review,
I sneeringly referred to Ann as "usually a boring and predictable tap
specialist."
8
Well, here's where Ann makes a liar, not to say an idiot, out of me, because
she's a triple delight as actor, singer, and dancer in this film. Fifteen
minutes later, on opening night, she's up again with the charming "Why
Can't You Behave?", directed at bad boy boyfriend Bill Calhoun (dancer
Tommy Rall9 ). Then they're
followed by Fred and Lilli, reliving happier times with "Wunderbar" —
Porter's tongue-in-cheek salute to gemütlichkeit.10
After Ann has had her say, we get to the meat of "The Taming of the
Shrew" — the battle of the sexes. It's at this point that Keel
comes into his own. As "Fred Graham" Keel always seems awkward and out
of place, too big and too clumsy for real life. But put him on stage,
where he can be larger than life, then he is larger than life.
In his pirate boots, doublet, cape, slouch hat, and Van Dyke beard he's
a Petruchio's Petruchio, so virile he looks ready to burst his tights.
In "I've Come to Wive it Wealthily in Padua," he gives us a taste of
his worldly wisdom: "If she scream like a teething brat, if she claw
like a tiger cat, if she fight like a raging boar, I've oft borne a
bore before!"
Lois
and Bill are in the clear, but Lilli seems to have vanished. Fred goes
out for the third act with desperation in his heart, expecting that
he will have to finish the play with Lilli's understudy. Fortunately
for us, the dancers take the stage with "From This Moment On." Bianca
and Lucentio celebrate their marriage, leaving Hortensio and Gremio
to be consoled by Carol Haney and Jeanne Coyne. Haney and Fosse practically
steal the whole picture with two minutes of blazing jazz choreographed
by Fosse.
21
The
1999 revival of Kiss Me Kate, a huge success on Broadway, broadcast
by PBS live from London is now available on DVD as well. 23
The production features Brent Barrett as Fred Graham/Petruchio, Rachel
York as Lilli Vanessi/Kate, Nancy Anderson as Lois Lane/Bianca, and Michael
Berresse as Bill Calhoun/Lucentio, along with Nick Winston as Gremio and
Barry McNeill as Hortensio.
1. Sidney, not terribly well known, directed a number of late 40s/early 50s musical blockbusters, like Annie Get Your Gun and Show Boat. His œuvre included both Little Rascals shorts and the famous 1955 Howard Keel/Esther Williams disaster Jupiter's Darling, still the only underwater musical ever based on Hannibal's invasion of Rome.
2. Yes, there are a few nits to pick, to wit: "Kiss Me, Kate" is more of a curtain closer than a song; "Brush Up Your Shakespeare" should be just a tad bit wittier; "I'm Always True to You, Darlin', in My Fashion" could be a lot less cynical; and "Where Is the Life that Late I Led?", while it has a terrific chorus, is also burdened with heavy-handed wit (and heavy-handed rhymes) in its multitudinous verses.
3. As the epitome of good taste and refinement, the Lunts attracted the unlimited contempt of perennial outsider Holden Caulfield: "She [Sallie Hayes — "old Sallie, queen of the phonies"] liked shows that were supposed to be very sophisticated and dry and all, with the Lunts and all."
4. Theatrical couples are theatrical. Who knew?
5. Damon Runyon, once one of the most
famous writers in America, invented the cute gangster, and it made him
rich. The musical Guys and Dolls is based on his work. Now, though
Runyon is forgotten, the cute gangster lives on, Pulp Fiction being
a most egregious example.
6. It's anybody's guess why the producers came up with this lame "breaking the proscenium" gag. At the time of the filming, Randall was about thirty years younger and a hundred times straighter than Cole Porter. Randall cannot be called a talented actor, but he was a game one, fashioning a forty-year career that included a stint as the host of the British version of "What's My Line," as well as the lead in Omoo-Omoo the Shark God, pegged by many as the worst film ever based on a Melville novel. (Among other things, "Omoo," as Melville tells it, means "traveler," not "shark god.")
7. "Superman" had been around for a decade when Kiss Me Kate premiered on December 30, 1948, so I guess this represents some sort of in-joke.
8. In my remarks on Lovely to Look At, the remake of Roberta. In my defense, I gave Ann a good review for her performance in Lovely to Look At as well.
9. Rall, a trained ballet dancer, threw a lot of acrobatics into his act, probably so folks wouldn't think he was a sissy. But swinging on ropes, bouncing on trampolines, etc., have an aesthetic content of roughly 0.
10. The setup to this — "Remember that funny little room where we stayed" — is pretty goddamn gemütlichkeit itself. (And for those of you who lack my mastery of the German tongue, gemütlichkeit refers to all things quaint, cute, and cozy — the strudel mit schlag of life.)
11. Both Grayson and Keel could sing and look good in tights! How rare is that!
12. Grayson really was trebly blessed.
13. Among other things, the cast sings "No Theatre Guild attractions are we". Back in the thirties, the Theatre Guild stood for hard-hitting, real-life dramas about real-life issues and real-life people — everything that Porter hated. (Naturally, they were a bunch of commies.)
14. "I was always a beat off," Grayson remarks ruefully in the "Making of Kiss Me Kate" video. Remarkably, Grayson, Keel, Miller, and Rall were all alive to tell the tale fifty years after the film was made.
15. Bobby suffers even more in "From This Moment On," because he's gotten just a bit chunky for wearing tights (always a hazardous occupation).
16. We get it, Cole, ya fricking homo! Why don't you just beat us over the head with a fricking penis?
17. Brit English for "Z".
18. Women got spanked a lot in the fifties, particularly in John Wayne films.
19. Sample lyrics: "If a custom-tailored vet asks me out for something wet and the vet starts in to pet I'll not say nay! But I'm always true …." (After all this ranting, I must confess I recently heard a version of this song by Blossom Dearie that was quite nice. Sometimes it helps to undersell.)
20. Wynn tries. Whitmore, as he indicates on the "Making of …" video, considered singing and dancing to be seriously non-guy stuff, and refused to rehearse, essentially daring the studio to fire him. Instead, they caved.
21. Sadly, a variety of physical and emotional ills resulted in Haney's early death, just as her career was taking off. She left behind only one other musical number, the superb "Steam Heat," from the otherwise worse than mediocre Pajama Game.
22. We get this in All's Well That Ends Well and Measure for Measure as well as The Taming of the Shrew.
23. Two earlier TV versions, a 1958 broadcast with Alfred Drake and Patricia Morison, who created the roles on Broadway, and a 1968 version with Robert Goulet and Carol Lawrence, are not currently available on home video, but online reviews suggest that second-hand tapes may exist.
24. The worst decision of all was
to convert Lois Lane/Bianca, played by Ann Miller in the movie as a spunky,
working-class chick, into a squeaky-voiced bimbo, whose "common" accent
and lousy grammar, even more than her loose morals, make her the butt
of every joke. The "dumb blonde" is perhaps the most tedious of all Broadway
clichés, more or less invented so that audiences could ogle an actress'
breasts and cluck their tongues at the same time. (The fact that Lois/Bianca
is a redhead in the 1999 version is a non-significant variable.)
25. Naturally, the production is also salted with numerous bits of tediously raunchy "business," to show how sophisticated we are these days.
26. And if you are a sucker for Kiss Me Kate, you'll probably want to spring for the CD release of the original soundtrack album, recorded way back in 1949, with Alfred Drake and Patricia Morison as the leads. The CD comes with an "in-depth booklet, unseen photos, and more!"
Subscribe to BLFJ
