The second one features scantily clad chorus girls comprising a human waterfall, followed by a geometric bathing beauties routine that predates Esther Williams by ten years. It does feature a very young Billy Barty in a funny bit, but pales in comparison to the other two numbers. Entitled 'The Honeymoon Hotel' it has a rather lame song between groom Powell and blushing bride Keeler on their wedding night in Jersey City. The first one is the weakest and the most dated. They run consecutively and, together, comprise the last thirty minutes of the movie. for the greener pastures of MGM) staged the three final musical numbers. The great Busby Berkeley (before leaving Warner Bros. Every time Cagney interrupts his dance rehearsals with different instructions, he humorously replies, "It can't be done, I tell ya, it can't be done." Frank McHugh adds some laughs as the exasperated stage director. She makes the magical, and seemingly effortless, transformation from a mousy, bespectacled stenographer to a dancing star, while he goes from being an overly eager kept-boy to a suave gentleman. Hoofer Ruby Keeler and tenor Dick Powell round out the supporting cast musically, having already teamed successfully together in 42nd Street earlier that same year. "Listen, Nan, send a new boy and girl on right away, and make sure they're not in love with each other." "Right." "Uh, get a couple already married." Or, another time she tells her phony rival for Cagney's affections, "As long as there are sidewalks, you've got a job." Cagney and his wisecracking, love-starved secretary, played by Joan Blondell, have the best lines.
Footlight parade full#
The scenes are short and peppy and full of snappy one-liners. In order to ensure secrecy on a make or break contract, he locks his entire cast and staff inside the rehearsal studio for seventy-two hours, while they feverishly work out three different and spectacular routines. All goes well enough at first, until his ideas start getting mysteriously ripped-off by the competition. When his livelihood is threatened by the arrival of talking pictures he comes up with the idea of doing live musical prologues before each movie. In it he plays Chester Kent a musical theater producer. Footlight Parade gave tough guy James Cagney an opportunity to show off his years of vaudeville training.
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