Lady of Burlesque dvd movie.|
Lady of Burlesque cheap dvd videos, dvd movies for sale |
 |
List Price: $7.98 Our Price: $7.98 Features • Black & White • DVD-Video • NTSC In Theaters : 01 May, 1943 |
| [ + Zoom ] [ Buy Now ] | DVD : Usually ships in 24 hours |
|
|
| ♥♥♥♥♥ | Gypsy's guided tour of the burly-Q show |
| In 1941, Simon & Schuster published a mystery novel called "The G-String Murders." On the title page was the name of author Gypsy Rose Lee. Yes, the very same Gypsy Rose Lee who is "Baby Rose" in that musical based on her early life, "Gypsy." The book is set in a burlesque theater densely populated by comics, strippers, stage crew, hangers on and one serial killer. The several crimes were eventually solved by a stripper who was coincidentally named "Gypsy Rose Lee." By the standards of the time, it was a good, solid story in a racy setting. The book was a best seller.
In fact, Gyps did not write the book, although her autobiography published many years later and her successful stint as a talk show host on Bay Area television certainly suggest she had the gift of gab for it, if not the inclination. The book was actually written by Craig Rice, a well-known and popular hard-boiled mystery writer of the day. Gyps provided the hook, the background, a few anecdotes and some dialogue. Rice put it all together, exchanging writer's credit for the payday the book generated. (By the way, "Craig Rice" was also a false creation. In those days, literary detectives were hard drinking, hard-boiled and surrounded by hard-hearted dames. Only men could write about such he-men, no ladies need apply. That being the case, or so a vastly knowledgeable mystery book specialist informed me many years ago when I first inquired about the true authorship of the book, a certain lady created "Craig Rice" to play on an equal footing with the boys. In the end, she outshone all but the very best.) In 1943, the book was toned down a bit to be filmed as "Lady of Burlesque." Sadly, Gypsy Rose Lee was not cast to portray the fictional "Gypsy Rose Lee." That was a shame, because Gyps was funny, gorgeous, sexy and she brought an instinctive hauteur and class to her down-and-dirty art form. She was a hoot! In Gyps' place was cast Barbara Stanwick, who was funny, gorgeous, sexy and who brought a much more earthy persona to the film than Gypsy would have done. Since everyone knew that Barbara wasn't Gypsy, her character was renamed to "Dixie Daisy" and her position in the hierarchy of theatrical stars lowered by several steps from that of the actual Gypsy Rose Lee. Dixie Daisy is the headliner of a big-time burlesque review that plays at an old near-Broadway theater in New York that once had known the heady glory of being an opera house. She is a stripper, but she also has the lead in the review's big singing and dancing production number. In addition to that, she is the wise-cracking dame with the ever-running motor in the skits of the comics. Michael O'Shea is cast as the Top Banana among the comics, Bitt Brannigan, and a very young Pinky Lee (no relation) as his Second Banana. When the comic skits actually appear on stage, though, it instantly becomes clear that Pinky, a real-life burlesque comedian, is a natural-born Top Banana, while O'Shea, funny hat, baggy pants and all, just fades into the painted scenery. Sadly, the comics perform material created for the movie rather than such classic skits as "Floogle Street" or "Slowly I Turned." Off stage, Bitt Brannigan is the hard-edged, generally unreliable, vaguely comic, vaguely heroic love interest for Dixie. Watching O'Shea, who was competent but never rose to the top rung in Hollywood, it struck me that he was so obviously doing a Bob Hope impression that I could only wonder whether the part was originally intended for Hope. Hope and Stanwick, now that would have been something to see! Certainly, Top Banana Hope would never have faded into the scenery for the likes of a mere Pinky Lee. There is another excellent Second Banana in the cast. She is Iris Adrian as Gee Gee Graham, Dixie's pal and sidekick. Iris was a short, brassy, blowsy, bosomy, wise-cracking blonde whose name was largely unknown to the general public, but whose face and voice would have been instantly recognizable. In movies, radio and television, she could be counted on to appear whenever Abbott and Costello or Jack Benny or Bob Hope needed a reliably astringent dame. Stanwick is terrific and as red hot as the old Production Code would allow. (Even so, I wish Gyps had got the part.) "Lady of Burlesque" is not a great picture but it is as entertaining as all get out and a true credit to the old studio system. That's worth five stars as far as I'm concerned. |
|
|