When I saw that Vincente Minnelli was the director here, I thought, well Skelton at least got a little more support here with Eleanor Powell and a lot of staging. While there is a story, it not only was done before, but the film still does not make a comfortable fit for Red. Skelton would not hit his stride until television.
This is a war time production, obvious from the themes. Amazing to me is the unlisted cameos. For example, Butterfly McQueen is in this one, along with a fairly large group of unaccredited folks. Butterfly walks a poodle near Skelton when he is sitting defeated in a park.
The plot has Skelton chasing a show girl, as a pants presser chasing her by going to every one of her live shows. Meanwhile, a member of the cast of the show is planning to blow up the theater. The plot is not as important as the music and dancing it turns out with Red doing some comic relief.
You gotta love Powell and Lena Horne who are great. This is Vincente Minnelli working with a mixed race cast before the war is over. This same year he is directing an all black cast in "Cabin In The Sky" and it appears he literally borrows some of the cast from that picture to make cameos lat in this picture.
As a fan of Red, am glad I finally caught this one. So far, the scripts for Red in his films are lacking and this one is not an exception. At least here, he got an A-List Director and cast along with Jimmy Dorseys Orchestra.
This is a war time production, obvious from the themes. Amazing to me is the unlisted cameos. For example, Butterfly McQueen is in this one, along with a fairly large group of unaccredited folks. Butterfly walks a poodle near Skelton when he is sitting defeated in a park.
The plot has Skelton chasing a show girl, as a pants presser chasing her by going to every one of her live shows. Meanwhile, a member of the cast of the show is planning to blow up the theater. The plot is not as important as the music and dancing it turns out with Red doing some comic relief.
You gotta love Powell and Lena Horne who are great. This is Vincente Minnelli working with a mixed race cast before the war is over. This same year he is directing an all black cast in "Cabin In The Sky" and it appears he literally borrows some of the cast from that picture to make cameos lat in this picture.
As a fan of Red, am glad I finally caught this one. So far, the scripts for Red in his films are lacking and this one is not an exception. At least here, he got an A-List Director and cast along with Jimmy Dorseys Orchestra.