Gold Diggers of 1935

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Gold Diggers of 1935
Gold diggers of 1935 poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Busby Berkeley
Screenplay by Manuel Seff
Peter Milne
Story by Robert Lord
Peter Milne
Produced byRobert Lord
Starring Dick Powell
Adolphe Menjou
Gloria Stuart
Alice Brady
Hugh Herbert
Glenda Farrell
Frank McHugh
Cinematography George Barnes
Edited by George Amy
Music bySongs:
Harry Warren (music)
Al Dubin (lyrics)
Production
company
Distributed byWarner Bros.
Release date
  • March 16, 1935 (1935-03-16)
[1]
Running time
95 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$567,000 [2]
Box office$1,365,000 [2]

Gold Diggers of 1935 is an American Warner Bros. musical film directed and choreographed by Busby Berkeley, his directorial debut. It stars Dick Powell, Adolphe Menjou, Gloria Stuart, Alice Brady, Hugh Herbert, Glenda Farrell, and Frank McHugh, and features Joseph Cawthorn, Grant Mitchell, Dorothy Dare, and Winifred Shaw. The songs were written by Harry Warren (music) and Al Dubin (lyrics). The film is best known for its famous "Lullaby of Broadway" production number. That song, sung by Shaw, also won the Academy Award for Best Original Song. The screenplay was by Manuel Seff and Peter Milne, based on a story by Robert Lord, who also produced the film, and Milne.

Contents

The movie was the fourth in the Gold Diggers series of films, after the silent film The Gold Diggers (1923), the partially lost "talkie" Gold Diggers of Broadway (1929), and Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933). The first three films, all financially successful, had all been based on the 1919 play The Gold Diggers ; Gold Diggers of 1935 was the first one based on a wholly original story. It was followed by Gold Diggers of 1937 and Gold Diggers in Paris .

Plot

In the resort of Lake Waxapahachie in New Hampshire, the swanky Wentworth Plaza is where the rich all congregate, and where the tips flow like wine. Handsome Dick Curtis is working his way through medical school as a desk clerk, and when rich, penny-pinching Mrs. Prentiss offers to pay him to escort her daughter Ann for the summer, Dick can't say no – even his fiancée, Arline Davis thinks he should do it. Mrs. Prentiss wants Ann to marry eccentric middle-aged millionaire T. Mosley Thorpe, who is a world-renowned expert on snuffboxes, but Ann has other ideas. Meanwhile, her brother, Humbolt has a weakness for a pretty face: he has been married and bought out of trouble by his mother several times.

Every summer, Mrs. Prentiss produces a charity show for the "Milk Fund", and this year she hires the flamboyant and conniving Russian dance director Nicolai Nicoleff to direct the show. The parsimonious Mrs. Prentiss wants to spend the least amount possible, but Nicoleff and his set designer Schultz want to be as extravagant as they can, so they can rake off more money for themselves, and for the hotel manager and the hotel stenographer Betty Hawes, who's blackmailing the hapless snuffbox fancier Thorpe.

Of course, Dick and Ann fall in love, Humbolt marries Arline, and the show ends up costing Mrs. Prentiss an arm and a leg, but in the end she realizes that having a doctor in the family will save money in the long run. [3]

Cast

Busby Berkeley's "Lullaby of Broadway" production number from Gold Diggers of 1935 Gold Diggers of 1935 Lullaby.jpg
Busby Berkeley's "Lullaby of Broadway" production number from Gold Diggers of 1935

Songs

The songs in Gold Diggers of 1935 were written by Harry Warren (music) and Al Dubin (lyrics), and the two production numbers were staged by Busby Berkeley.

Production

Gold Diggers of 1935 was filmed at Warner Bros.' Burbank studios, completing on January 14, 1935; it was released on March 16 of that year. [1] During production a chorus dancer, Jack Grieves, died on the set due to acute indigestion. [4] [6]

The film was Busby Berkeley's first time at the helm of a film as the official director, although he had his own unit at Warners to do the elaborate production numbers he conceived, designed, staged and directed, which were the major elements of the Warners musicals of that period.

Critical response

In 1935, Mae Tinee of the Chicago Daily Tribune wrote "As revues go, the present "Gold Diggers" has considerable to offer. There is some bright patter and a number of really amusing situations". [7] In The New York Times the same year, Andre Sennwald wrote "The photoplay, in its preparations for the climactic Berkeley effects, is a brash and lively entertainment which allows Adolphe Menjou and Hugh Herbert to be reasonably amusing." [8]

Box office

According to Warner Bros records, the film earned $897,000 in the U.S. and $468,000 in other markets. [2]

Awards and honors

Harry Warren and Al Dubin received an Oscar for Best Original Song for "Lullaby of Broadway", and Busby Berkeley was nominated for the short-lived category Best Dance Direction. [9]

The film is recognized by American Film Institute in these lists:

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Gold Diggers of 1935 at the AFI Catalog of Feature Films
  2. 1 2 3 Warner Bros financial information in The William Schaefer Ledger. See Appendix 1, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, (1995) 15:sup1, 1-31 p 16 DOI: 10.1080/01439689508604551
  3. Green, Stanley (1999) Hollywood Musicals Year by Year (2nd ed.). Hal Leonard Corporation ISBN   0-634-00765-3 p.42
  4. 1 2 TCM Notes
  5. Hirschhorn, Clive (1991) [1981]. The Hollywood Musical (2nd ed.). New York: Portland House. p. 101. ISBN   0-517-06035-3.
  6. "Dancer Drops Dead". The Rochester Evening Journal. January 11, 1935. Retrieved 2013-02-27.
  7. Tinee, Mae (March 27, 1935). ""Gold Diggers" Has Amusing Scenes, Patter". Chicago Daily Tribune .
  8. Sennwald, Andre (March 15, 1935). "'Gold Diggers of 1935,' the New Warner Musical Film at the Strand -- 'Times Square Lady.'". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved February 6, 2019.
  9. IMDB Awards
  10. "AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs Nominees" (PDF). Retrieved August 13, 2016.
  11. "AFI's Greatest Movie Musicals Nominees" (PDF). Retrieved August 13, 2016.