42ND STREET

What people tend to forget about "42nd Street" is that for a musical, certainly one as lauded as this one is, is that it's mostly devoid of musical numbers right up to the end when it lets loose with it's three big production numbers. Until then it could almost be seen as a documentary about putting on a show were it not for all the off-stage shenanigans between the players and, in their limited way, the cast are pretty near perfect.

Ruby Keeler still dances like a baby elephant but she has chutzpah to spare and acts like she really believes her own publicity. Dick Powell was always a charming juvenile, if a slightly mature one and Ginger Rogers displayed star quality even then and in too small a part. Warner Baxter may have cut the ham a tad thickly but he had a kind of wild, wide-eyed charisma nevertheless. Bebe Daniels and George Brent, in particular, are less convincing although the sight of Daniels hobbling in on crutches, ('Go out there and make me hate you'), is a camp delight. The production numbers of Busby Berkeley are a marvel in themselves. Lloyd Bacon is responsible for all the talky stuff that precedes them.