Singin in the Rain is the first musical I ever saw and I immediately fell in love with it. This is by far one of the best musicals to come out of this genre.
Singing in the Rain was released in 1952. Starring Gene Kelly, Donald O'Connor, and introducing Debbie Reynolds. This is a tremendous cast full of great talent. Singin in the Rain depicts the natural progression from silent movies to "talkies."
This is a movie, within a movie. and there are archetypal characters in Singin in the Rain. The first archetypal character is the leading man Don Lockwood played by Kelly, second, is the leading lady Lina Lamont played by Jean Hagen, third, the faithful sidekick, Cosmo Brown, played by O'Connor and lastly the up and coming talent, Kathy Selden, played by Reynolds.
The plot to this movie begins with the latest success of Lockwood and Lamont in The Royal Rascal. Shortly after the release of The Royal Rascal, it is reported that the first talking picture, The Jazz Singer is the new sensation in films. All studios must adapt and move forward with the new trend of talking films, there's only one problem, the star Lina Lamont has a horrible voice.
"Lamont and Lockwood: They talk!": http://www.anyclip.com/movies/singin-in-the-rain/making-talking-pictures/#!quotes/
Even after diction coaching, Lina still sounds awful. And with some other issues in the movie The Dueling Cavalier, a whole new story must be written. After commiserating together, Cosmo has a wonderful idea to substitute Kathy's voice for Lina's.
All the studio needs now is an actress who can speak well, enter Kathy Selden. Kathy Selden is a young actress with a beautiful singing voice. After seeing how awful Lina is and how this movie could potentially ruin Don's career, Kathy agrees to dub her voice.
Dubbing has been done for years. I was surprised to learn a few years ago that, Audrey Hepburn, Deborah Kerr, and Natalie Wood were all dubbed by the same person, Marni Nixon. As a fan of these actresses, it is such a disappointment to learn that those wonderful voices weren't their own. It is very common is Hollywood to get someone to dub the songs, because the star power is the most important element to any successful film then, now, and forever.
A classic scene that is shown almost always is Gene Kelly singing in the rain. That has to be one of my favorite scenes. He's so happy and carefree. Seems like everything is coming up roses for Don Lockwood.
Don's friend Cosmo also has a memorable scene in Singin in the Rain. O'Connor is a comedic dancer and his comedy and skill are shown off in a scene to cheer up Don. It's hard not to laugh in this fantastic scene and the completely improvised dance O'Connor put together.
In a diction scene, where all the actors must speak "in round tones," Don and Cosmo put on a performance for the voice coach. It's fun to watch two skilled dancers, dance in synchronicity. This scene really shows off what Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor can do as dancers.
What makes this a successful musical besides its great singing and dancing, but great plot. This movie takes a critical point in film history and makes a storyline out of it. Can you imagine having an awful voice like Lina's, no thank you.
No comments:
Post a Comment