Golden Girl | |
---|---|
Directed by | Lloyd Bacon |
Screenplay by | Walter Bullock Charles O'Neal Gladys Lehman |
Story by | Albert Lewis Arthur Lewis Edward Thompson (From a Story by) |
Produced by | George Jessel |
Starring | Mitzi Gaynor Dale Robertson Dennis Day James Barton |
Narrated by | George Jessel |
Cinematography | Charles G. Clarke |
Edited by | Louis R. Loeffler |
Color process | Technicolor |
Production company | 20th Century Fox |
Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
Release date |
|
Running time | 108 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Box office | $1.5 million (US rentals) [1] [2] |
Golden Girl is a 1951 American Musical Western film directed by Lloyd Bacon and starring Mitzi Gaynor, Dale Robertson, Dennis Day and James Barton. [3]
The original song, "Never," written by Lionel Newman and Eliot Daniel, and sung by Dennis Day in the film, earned the film its only Academy Award nomination. [4]
The picture is loosely based on the life of famed entertainer Lotta Crabtree, who was known as "The Golden Girl" (1847–1924). [5]
In her hometown of Grass Valley, vivacious teenager Lotta Crabtree (Mitzi Gaynor) is thrilled when the famed performer Lola Montez comes to town in 1863. She wants to become a singer like Lola someday, although parents Mary Ann (Una Merkel) and John Crabtree (James Barton), who run a boarding house, don't necessarily approve.
Lotta has a couple of admirers, the local boy Mart Taylor (Dennis Day) and a mature newcomer to town, Tom Richmond (Dale Robertson), who is informed that Lotta is only 16. A boarder named Cornelius (Raymond Walburn) with a surefire way to win at roulette lures Lotta's dad into a game, where he loses all of his money plus the boarding house.
Aware of the way Lola Montez made a fortune singing in mining camps for men who can't get to a theater, Lotta sets out on the road to do likewise. The miners like her, but don't throw gold pieces her way until she strips off part of her costume and gives them quite a show.
Lotta's father wins a San Francisco theater in a card game. Lotta becomes a star there, then travels East to perform in New York City. Older and wiser in two years, she learns that Tom has been committing robberies to raise money for the Confederate army in the Civil War.
The war ends, but she sings "Dixie" on stage in New York, to catcalls from the audience. Dennis Day appeases them by saying the victors should be generous to those who have lost. When Lotta became too emotional to sing, Dennis took over. The audience starts to join in until everyone is singing. Tom has been reported near death from an injury, but, at that very minute, he enters the theater to Lotta's delight.
Eliza Rosanna Gilbert, Countess of Landsfeld, better known by the stage name Lola Montez, was an Irish dancer and actress who became famous as a Spanish dancer, courtesan, and mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who made her Gräfin von Landsfeld. At the start of the Revolutions of 1848 in the German states, she was forced to flee. She proceeded to the United States via Austria, Switzerland, France and London, to return to her work as an entertainer and lecturer.
Charlotte Mignon "Lotta" Crabtree, also known mononymously as Lotta, was an American actress, entertainer, comedian, and philanthropist.
Mitzi Gaynor is an American actress, singer, and dancer. Her notable films include We're Not Married! (1952), There's No Business Like Show Business (1954), The Birds and the Bees (1956), and South Pacific (1958) – for which she was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Comedy or Musical at the 1959 awards.
Dayle Lymoine Robertson was an American actor best known for his starring roles on television. He played the roving investigator Jim Hardie in the television series Tales of Wells Fargo and railroad owner Ben Calhoun in Iron Horse. He often was presented as a deceptively thoughtful but modest Western hero. From 1968 to 1970, Robertson was the fourth and final host of the anthology series Death Valley Days. Described by Time magazine in 1959 as "probably the best horseman on television", for most of his career, Robertson played in western films and television shows—well over 60 titles in all.
John Elmer Carson, known as Jack Carson, was a Canadian-born American film actor. Carson often played the role of comedic friend in films of the 1940s and 1950s, including The Strawberry Blonde (1941) with James Cagney and Arsenic and Old Lace (1944) with Cary Grant. He appeared in such dramas as Mildred Pierce (1945), A Star is Born (1954), and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958). He worked for RKO and MGM, but most of his notable work was for Warner Bros.
Mitzi Green was an American child actress and singer for Paramount and RKO, in the early "talkies" era. She then acted on Broadway and in other stage works, as well as in films and on television.
Raymond Walburn was an American character actor of stage and screen who appeared in dozens of Hollywood movie comedies and an occasional dramatic role during the 1930s and 1940s.
Les Girls is a 1957 American CinemaScope musical comedy film directed by George Cukor and produced by Sol C. Siegel, with Saul Chaplin as associate producer. The screenplay by John Patrick was based on a story by Vera Caspary. The music and lyrics were by Cole Porter.
We're Not Married! is a 1952 American anthology romantic comedy film directed by Edmund Goulding. It was released by 20th Century Fox.
Lola Montès is a 1955 historical romance film and the last completed film of German-born director Max Ophüls. Based on the novel La vie extraordinaire de Lola Montès by Cécil Saint-Laurent, the film depicts the life of Irish dancer and courtesan Lola Montez (1821–1861), portrayed by Martine Carol, and tells the story of the most famous of her many notorious affairs, those with Franz Liszt and Ludwig I of Bavaria. A co-production between France and West Germany, the dialogue is mostly in French and German, with a few English-language sequences. The most expensive European film produced up to its time, Lola Montès underperformed at the box office. However, it had an important artistic influence on the French New Wave cinema movement and continues to have many distinguished critical admirers. Heavily re-edited and shortened after its initial release for commercial reasons, it has been twice restored. It was released on DVD and Blu-ray in North America by The Criterion Collection in February 2010.
Tarzan and the Slave Girl is a 1950 American adventure film directed by Lee Sholem and starring Lex Barker as Tarzan, Vanessa Brown as Jane, and Robert Alda as big game hunter Neil. The fourteenth film of the Tarzan film series that began with 1932's Tarzan the Ape Man, the plot involves a lost civilization in Africa, a strange illness, and an evil counselor manipulating a prince into kidnapping large numbers of local women.
For Love or Money is a 1963 romantic comedy film distributed by Universal International, produced by Robert Arthur, directed by Michael Gordon, and starring Kirk Douglas, Mitzi Gaynor, and Gig Young. It was written by Larry Markes and Michael Morris, and released on August 7, 1963. The supporting cast features Thelma Ritter, Julie Newmar and William Bendix.
My Blue Heaven is a 1950 American drama musical film directed by Henry Koster and starring Betty Grable and Dan Dailey.
The Farmer Takes a Wife is a 1953 Technicolor musical comedy film starring Betty Grable and Dale Robertson. The picture is a remake of the 1935 film of the same name which starred Janet Gaynor and Henry Fonda. Grable and Dale Robertson first appeared together in the movie Call Me Mister (1951).
Take Care of My Little Girl is a 1951 drama film directed by Jean Negulesco and starring Jeanne Crain, Dale Robertson, Mitzi Gaynor and Jean Peters.
Call Me Mister is a 1951 American Technicolor musical film released by Twentieth Century-Fox. The feature was directed by Lloyd Bacon and re-written from the 1946 Broadway play version by Albert E. Lewin and Burt Styler with music by Harold Rome that featured cast members from the US armed forces.
The Park Theatre (est.1879) was a playhouse in Boston, Massachusetts, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It later became the State cinema. Located on Washington Street, near Boylston Street, the building existed until 1990.
Maria Forescu was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian opera singer and film actress. During the silent and talkies era of the German cinema, she appeared in several movies as a supporting actress. When Adolf Hitler came to power, Forescu, like other Jews of that period, was barred from her profession. Living undercover during the later years of World War II, she survived the Holocaust and died in 1947 in East Berlin.
The I Don't Care Girl is a 1953 Technicolor film starring Mitzi Gaynor. It is a biography of entertainer Eva Tanguay.
The Silver Whip is a 1953 American Western film directed by Harmon Jones and starring Dale Robertson, Rory Calhoun and Robert Wagner.