"Ya Got Trouble, Right Here In River City"
For a man who was primarily a director on stage, Morton DaCosta certainly knew how to fill the screen. Fill it he did with The Music Man, a festival of song and dance and heart warming nostalgia.
How could it be anything else. The original Broadway show was composer Meredith Willson's tribute to the idyllic childhood he had growing up in Mason City, Iowa. The town of River City and the characters therein are taken from Willson's memories. What memories they were.
We are fortunate indeed to preserve one of the great Broadway performances of all time, that of Robert Preston in The Music Man. With all due respect to Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby, both of whom were mentioned for the lead, I cannot imagine ANYONE else as Professor Harold Hill. This man truly made Harold Hill his own part, the same way Yul Brynner did with King Mongkut of Siam. Other than Preston, only the Barbershop Singing Quartet the Buffalo Bills, and Pert Kelton as Mrs. Paroo made it to the screen.
Preston who got his start at Paramount during the late Thirties, played second leads in A films and usually died in them. He made a career decision in the Fifties to go back to the stage and got the role of a lifetime in The Music Man. The original Broadway production ran from 1957 to 1961 for 1341 performances.
Only an actor of rare charisma could have played Harold Hill. If you have a less than mesmerizing Hill your production will fall flat. The character is a lot like Starbuck in The Rainmaker, the conman, the outrageous swindler who brings joy to people even as he's fleecing them. Possibly Burt Lancaster could have done it, but who knows if Lancaster could have sung.
Shirley Jones who got to the screen just in time to play the female leads in three Broadway classics, The Music Man, Oklahoma, and Carousel. Having won an Oscar two years earlier for Elmer Gantry, Jones brought a little box office herself to the production. She got to sing a couple of great ballads Goodnight My Someone and Till There Was You. The latter was the big hit of the show and on record, Anita Bryant's copy sold the most.
Morton DaCosta cast the rest of the film well with such luminaries as Paul Ford, Buddy Hackett, and Hermione Gingold. It was worth the price of a ticket just to hear her say "Balzac." Meredith Willson did some gentle kidding of his hometown as to what passed for culture in the place of his upbringing.
Young Timmy Everett played the role of Preston's young protégé Tommy Djilas. A really talented dancer, Everett was lost to the world of entertainment way too soon.
As I said DaCosta really fills the screen with The Music Man. Nothing shows that better than the production number of 76 Trombones that was sung twice in the film, the second time in an even bigger finale. That number was what really put The Music Man over on Broadway. But the way the entire screen is used, almost as eye filling as the children of Israel leaving Egypt in The Ten Commandments, you can't imagine how it was ever done on stage. But it was and by the same fellow.
I doubt Mason City, Iowa was as idyllic in those pre-World War I years, but step back a little in time and watch The Music Man. Maybe it wasn't as idyllic, but it sure seems a lot more simple.
How could it be anything else. The original Broadway show was composer Meredith Willson's tribute to the idyllic childhood he had growing up in Mason City, Iowa. The town of River City and the characters therein are taken from Willson's memories. What memories they were.
We are fortunate indeed to preserve one of the great Broadway performances of all time, that of Robert Preston in The Music Man. With all due respect to Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby, both of whom were mentioned for the lead, I cannot imagine ANYONE else as Professor Harold Hill. This man truly made Harold Hill his own part, the same way Yul Brynner did with King Mongkut of Siam. Other than Preston, only the Barbershop Singing Quartet the Buffalo Bills, and Pert Kelton as Mrs. Paroo made it to the screen.
Preston who got his start at Paramount during the late Thirties, played second leads in A films and usually died in them. He made a career decision in the Fifties to go back to the stage and got the role of a lifetime in The Music Man. The original Broadway production ran from 1957 to 1961 for 1341 performances.
Only an actor of rare charisma could have played Harold Hill. If you have a less than mesmerizing Hill your production will fall flat. The character is a lot like Starbuck in The Rainmaker, the conman, the outrageous swindler who brings joy to people even as he's fleecing them. Possibly Burt Lancaster could have done it, but who knows if Lancaster could have sung.
Shirley Jones who got to the screen just in time to play the female leads in three Broadway classics, The Music Man, Oklahoma, and Carousel. Having won an Oscar two years earlier for Elmer Gantry, Jones brought a little box office herself to the production. She got to sing a couple of great ballads Goodnight My Someone and Till There Was You. The latter was the big hit of the show and on record, Anita Bryant's copy sold the most.
Morton DaCosta cast the rest of the film well with such luminaries as Paul Ford, Buddy Hackett, and Hermione Gingold. It was worth the price of a ticket just to hear her say "Balzac." Meredith Willson did some gentle kidding of his hometown as to what passed for culture in the place of his upbringing.
Young Timmy Everett played the role of Preston's young protégé Tommy Djilas. A really talented dancer, Everett was lost to the world of entertainment way too soon.
As I said DaCosta really fills the screen with The Music Man. Nothing shows that better than the production number of 76 Trombones that was sung twice in the film, the second time in an even bigger finale. That number was what really put The Music Man over on Broadway. But the way the entire screen is used, almost as eye filling as the children of Israel leaving Egypt in The Ten Commandments, you can't imagine how it was ever done on stage. But it was and by the same fellow.
I doubt Mason City, Iowa was as idyllic in those pre-World War I years, but step back a little in time and watch The Music Man. Maybe it wasn't as idyllic, but it sure seems a lot more simple.
- bkoganbing
- Jan 12, 2007