Oh, for a Man!

Jeanette MacDonald opens the film with the finale from Tristan And Isolde. Thankfully, she has been well recorded [early Fox films were rife with spoiled sound in spite of the fact Fox held the sound-on-film patents]. Charles Clark's cinematography weaves complex shadows into the foreground and background, his camera freed from the "meat locker" booth. The performance ends and backstage dialog begins. MacDonald is the snippy diva, she performs confidently and speaks clearly. Hey! there's Bela Lugosi could this get any better? Sadly, no,

The proceedings quickly fall apart, first with a miscast William Davidson as Kerry Stokes. This actor can be convincing as a police detective, grilling a suspect into a confession. But when he uses the same delivery, trying to romance Jeanette "what I ought to do is crush you in my arms and smother you with kisses"! I almost fell off my chair with laughter. That is some clunky dialog. But the saddest thing is that it was set up by a gorgeous close-up of Jeanette. It gets worse.

The plot thickens (congeals) with a burglar in the personage of Reginald Denny. He breaks into Jeanette's bedchamber to rob her jewels. When she protests his chloroform because she's an opera singer, he recognizes the diva, compliments her performance that evening, and speaks in the most ridiculous Irish accent you have ever heard. [That settles it, I'll sit on the floor so I won't fall again]. The writing reminded me of what I used to type when I was 10. Jeanette then decides to make this thief her protege! OK!

The writers are Phillip Klein and Lynn Stalling. Now Lynn would go onto earn credits for Bob Hope's THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES and CAT AND THE CANARY. Can't blame her, hmmm, Phillip Klein went on to write CHANDU THE MAGICIAN and a couple Charlie Chan films, aha! Mr. Klein's career climaxed with DANTE'S INFERNO, let's blame him. Anyhow, I'm obviously trying to be mean because there is so much good work in the film I was compelled to sit through Denny's insufferable performance and more horrible writing. I can only recommend this film for MacDonald and Lugosi fans on a completory quest.

1930's "Oh, For a Man!" is, for an early talkie musical, such an atrocity that only fans of Jeanette MacDonald, Marjorie White, or naturally Bela Lugosi may find solace in it. The slapdash plot centers on opera singer Carlotta Manson (Jeanette), tiring of the daily grind, who finds excitement after professional thief Barney McGann (Reginald Denny) enters her boudoir after dark, and actually sings for his supper! (or something like that). Wanting to promote his singing career, Carlotta decides to call upon Senor Frescatti (Bela Lugosi), her opera director/impresario, who can only watch disapprovingly at the painful squawk in his presence. Soon she decides to marry the talentless scamp, but her class of people aren't exactly the same as his. He meets former lover Totsy Franklin (Marjorie White), now married to boxer Pug Morini, alias 'The Walloping Wop' (Warren Hymer), and runs off with them, leaving his wife in despondent tears (the ending isn't any better). As bad as it sounds, not even good for laughs, but Jeanette's beauty is ravishing. Still, once Marjorie White enters, we are introduced to her captivating vivacity, a diminutive blonde dynamo who graced several early talkies, including three more opposite Lugosi, "Women of All Nations," "The Black Camel," and "Broadminded." As for Bela, he's only in it for around five minutes (just two scenes), making his exit at 26 minutes; notable primarily as the last film he completed before starting work on his hard fought role in "Dracula."

This film would seem to have very little to recommend it except for the sparkling energetic performance by Jeanette MacDonald. But that is enough. If you only remember MacDonald from the sometimes stultifying MGM musicals with Nelson Eddy, you are in for a surprise. Jeanette is alive and bright and rather seductive in the peignoirs, flimsy negligees and low cut gowns she wears and she no longer has the slightly zaftig European look that Lubitsch preferred at Paramount. She has a very natural sexiness that comes through even though the print I viewed on youtube is of very poor quality. I'm sure she was a turn-on for male viewers in 1930 which is what Fox wanted when they signed her. Remember this was the "pre-code" era which she as much as anyone else was responsible for (she was already tagged "the lingerie queen") so this is what audiences expected and this is what they got.

As a result of the Paramount musicals she previously appeared in, MacDonald was typed as singer so in this she is cast as an opera singer and opens the film singing "The Liebestod" from Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde" and later on she sings once more. But this not a musical; it is strictly light comedy held together by MacDonald. The plot can only be called ridiculous. She (inexplicably) falls in love with a burglar (Reginald Denny ) and convinces him to marry her but he agrees only on the condition that she will give up her career. Soon he tires of the arrangement and leaves her and (apparently) goes back to being a burglar while she resumes her career as an opera singer. But of course it is not over. It ends as viewers probably already imagined it will.

MacDonald did three films at Fox between her two stints at Paramount that preceded her eventual stardom at MGM. These three are largely forgotten now but were well received and were money makers at the time for Fox. It was the depth of the depression and all the studios but MGM were effectively bankrupt. Seen in this context, films like "Oh, for a Man" were what Fox needed, what MacDonald needed to prolong her career and what the country needed. And viewed today, it is surprisingly refreshing and shows what MacDonald was capable of.

It took a long time, but I think I finally found the worst movie Jeanette MacDonald ever made. And to think William Fox actually got her services on loan from Paramount for Oh, For A Man.

What's fascinating here is that there are elements from some really classic films that were later used far better. Jeanette is a bored opera diva who wakes up to find Reginald Denny robbing her home. Just like Greta Garbo in Grand Hotel finding John Barrymore doing the same. And of course they take to each other, especially Jeanette to Denny because he's going to provide something that she hasn't been getting regular in her life.

She even hears him sing a note or two and she finds talent there, I assure you that you won't. Just like Orson Welles finding that operatic talent in Dorothy Comingore in Citizen Kane. In the end though she just settles for sex from Denny.

Naturally though Denny is bored with his life. I can't go any further because that would spoil an unbelievable ending. Both Jeanette and Denny overact outrageously, I'm not sure anyone was directing them. You'll also find Alison Skipworth as her maid and confidante. There's one scene where Denny asks Alison Skipworth if she could imagine herself with Denny. There's a thought to turn over in your mind. Bela Lugosi also has a small role as a music impresario.

Jeanette sings two songs, an aria from Tristan And Isolde and a forgettable ballad, I'm Just Nuts About You. I can't believe she did such classic work at her studio of Paramount and later MGM and such total garbage when being loaned out.

Jeanette MacDonald is an opera diva, and she fits all the characteristics: moody, selfish, hard-working, and sorry for herself. When burglar Reginald Denny -- with the oddest, most erratic Irish accent on record -- breaks in, she's charmed. At first she tries to make him an opera singer, but that's no go, so they get married and go on an endless vacation in Europe; it turns out all she wanted was a man with thick lips to kiss her and thick boots to kick her.

But while she's happy, Denny is not. A man has to work, and he likes to be around colleagues, and he gets moody, so it's a rocky relationship.

It's certainly an odd pre-code movie, with hints of masochism and real affection, and Miss MacDonald is a believably sexual creature, dressed in sheer silk. Alison Skipworth, as usual, has all the best lines as Miss MacDonald's factotum, and Marjorie White has a small but amusing role as what Denny calls "Americas Sweetheart."