Dixiana

Forgive my Southern accent but this one darlin' is jes' plain awful. Typical of its time,1930--the early days of the talkie--this hodgepodge of comedy and drama is a Ziegfeld-style extravaganza that mixes bad melodrama and mediocre operetta songs with lots of very pretty girls in outrageous costumes. The plot, if you choose to call it that, is interrupted on occasion with feeble comic relief, mostly by the great team of Woolsey and Wheeler trying their best to make something out of little, and by a Dutch comic, Joseph Cawthorn, speaking in a Jewish accent. (He even calls his son, the Metropolitan Opera baritone Everett Marshall, a schlemiel.) On the plus side, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson dances for three minutes, and Max Steiner ("Gone With the Wind") did the orchestrations for which he received his first screen credit. The film was a big flop and lost RKO studios 300,000 dollars. Fortunately, W&W went on to do better things, and a few years later King Kong and Fred and Ginger came along to make up that loss.

This was the first movie I purchased with Bebe Daniels! It is pretty good considering when it was made! The jokes never stop and the inuendos are way ahead of their time! I was totally amused with the interaction between the prospective groom's father and stepmother in this film! As I said earlier, the double entendres were plentiful in that relationship! The comedy team of Wheeler and Woolsey were just downright hilarious and the tapdance sequence in technicolor (Bill Robinson, "Bojangles") was absolutely wonderful! Such a rare opportunity to see something like that! The Mardi Gras finale is also rare as it was cut from TV prints for a long time! That is in technicolor also! I ordered the DVD, so if anyone is interested, please email me and I can tell you where to find it online for a very reasonable price!

Back in 1930 RKO was like all the other studios, churning out musicals to please an audience hungry for the new rage of talking pictures. 'Dixiana' was meant to cash in on the success of 'Rio Rita', the Ziegfeld show that became a movie in 1929, and used many of the same cast - the lovely Bebe Daniels in the title role (very like Jeanette MacDonald in this), plus comic relief from Wheeler and Woolsey and pretty Dorothy Lee. The big mistake was in casting Met star Everett Marshall as the male lead; an opera singer with an excellent voice but no acting ability whatever.

Add to this mix Joseph Cawthorn and Jobyna Howland as Marshall's parents (Ms Howland goes to town with her over-acting!); plus Mr Bojangles in his debut film appearance (a 3 minute solo); and a two-strip Technicolor finale. The musical numbers are fine (mostly for Everett Marshall and Bebe Daniels; although there's a cute song for Bert Wheeler and Dorothy Lee about halfway into the film).

I've seen this film described as a 'prehistoric turkey', but I wouldn't put it down that much. It has its high points (the colour sequence looks great and is a hoot) and it is about as complete a restoration as you could ask for. And it is the only Wheeler and Woolsey currently on DVD; we need more of their mad movies commercially available. 'Dixiana' is patchy but it isn't prehistoric!

Wheeler and Woolsey musical comedy set in the pre-Civil War South is a mixed bag. The comedy duo are not the "stars" of the picture, rather that is Bebe Daniels. Wheeler and Woolsey are instead the comic relief and they do a good job of creating laughs. The plot concerns the pair attempting to make sure that the wedding of their sister goes off with out a hitch. Its a big scale musical of the kind they don't make any more.

The film is based on a Broadway show and while it is suitably spectacular at times it suffers from the problem many films of the time suffered from and that is an uncertainty of camera usage. Because of the sound equipment was noisy and large directors and studios were still struggling with how to shoot scenes or move a camera, here the camera is either moving nicely or painfully nailed down. Its a tough slog. Then again the film's operetta style music is really not my cup of tea.

If you like musicals its worth a try, especially if you're interested in the history of movie musicals.

(I do have to say that rarely have I ever felt a movie recreated a bygone era as well as this film does. Hollywood flourishes aside this film really does feel as if you're watching something from long ago in the deep south)

Dixiana is a film that stands alone among early sound film restorations. The Technicolor sequences which make up the final twenty minutes of this lavish extravaganza are absolutely beautiful to behold. This restoration was first shown on the TNT cable network in the spring of 1990. I believe that this is one of the few early talkies that one can see in the manner in which it was first presented in the theaters. The beauty of the restoration aside, there is much to admire in this operetta, which stars the lovely Bebe Daniels and Metropolitan Opera Star Everett Marshall. The music, by Harry Tierney is lovely and melodic. The dances are well-executed by Pearl Eaton. The gorgeous costumes were designed by Walter Plunkett, although the opening titles credit Max Ree with costumes and scenery. Dixiana was issued in the late summer of 1930, at a time when the public was tiring of musical films. The film supposedly lost $300,000 in it's initial release. I believe that Everett Marshall was chosen to play the male lead in this film due to the enormous success of an earlier MGM film,"The Rogue Song" which starred Metropolitan Opera Star Lawrence Tibbett and Catherine Dale Owen. This film only exsists in fragments and a Vitaphone soundtrack recording, so we have no accurate way to compare the two films. Dixiana seems to have something for everyone. You like vintage comedy? You can see Wheeler and Woolsey do their stuff with the charming Dorothy Lee, who co-starred in many of their films. You want hissable villains? There is Ralf Harolde who is just about as hissable as can be, seconded by Jobyna Howland as Marshall's dragon of a stepmother (married to stage comedian Joseph Cawthorn). You want glorious extravaganza? Check out the Technicolor finale, which includes Bill "Bojangles" Robinson in his feature film debut. All in all, Dixiana is a film which should please any fan of early talkies, as well as a few more people as well. Thanks for reading.