NFR Project: 'Show Boat' (1936)

 

NFR Project: ‘Show Boat’

Dir: James Whale

Scr: Oscar Hammerstein II

Pho: John J. Mescall

Ed: Bernard W. Burton, Ted Kent

Premiere: May 17, 1936

113 min.

The director James Whale’s favorite film of his was quite unlike his usual output. Best known as a horror director, Whale’s assured foray into an epic musical theater production is a great adaptation of a stage classic to film.

Show Boat started a revolution in musical theater. Until it premiered, musicals were scattershot affairs – loose collections of sketches and songs, or light-hearted fluff and farce, or operettas set in imaginary European kingdoms. With the creation of Show Boat, a musical with three-dimensional characters and a serious plot, the musical grew up.

It didn’t hurt that some of America’s most enduring ballads are studded throughout the work. “Bill,” “Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man of Mine,” “Make Believe,” “You Are Love,” and of course the iconic “Ol’ Man River – all are classics that continue to be performed today by jazz and cabaret artists. The songs all serve to advance the plot, and stand on their own as well, as all catchy tunes should.

The musical was adapted from a 1926 novel by the best-selling author Edna Ferber. It’s an epic story that plays out between 1887 and 1927, from the banks of the Mississippi to the theaters of New York City, encompassing the evolution of American music from old-time sentimental ballads through bluesy torch songs and on to jazzy standards. Kern had plenty of practice as a songsmith – he’d already been in the business for 20 years, and had cranked out 16 musicals between 1915 and 1920. Hammerstein was similarly experienced.

The story involves the steamboat Cotton Blossom, which serves as a floating, traveling theater along the banks of the Mississippi River. Its owners, Cap’n Andy and Parthy, have a daughter, Magnolia. When it revealed that the show’s leading lady, Julie, is of mixed race, she is forced to leave the show boat. Her role is taken over by Magnolia, who acts opposite the charming gambler Gaylord Ravenal.

Magnolia and Gaylord end up together and have a daughter, but, impoverished and ashamed, Gaylord leaves the two of them. Magnolia goes on to be a successful singer in a club thanks to the selfless sacrifice of Julie. Twenty years later, Magnolia and Gaylord are reunited at their daughter’s Broadway debut.

The musical was the first to deal with racism, and has been accused of a kind of racism itself. While the “n-word” is bandied about freely in the original script, later times have caused alternations to accommodate better sensibilities. It deals frankly with the scourges of the time: the segregation of black and white populations, the inability of a mixed-race person to be thought of as little better than an animal. No one had tried to seriously engage these thorny issues on stage before. Merely the act of having black and white performers on stage together was seen as the breaking of a taboo.

Whale recruited many of the show’s original performers to recreate their roles for the film. In particular, Charles Winninger’s definitive rendition of Cap’n Andy, Magnolia’s happy-go-lucky father is a treat. Though she is 20 years too old for the part, Irene Dunne does a meritable job as Magnolia, tenor Allan Jones proves himself to be a bit of an actor as Gaaylord Ravenal.

Of particular merit are the performances of Helen Morgan and Paul Robeson. Morgan, a well-known torch singer, was the original Julie, and her renditions of “Bill” and “Can’t Help . . .” are iconic – musically superior and heart-rending. And, of course, Robeson is purely and magnetically Robeson in the role he originated in the London production, a role no one else could play to satisfaction.

This became his signature song, one he would reprise with more hopeful lyrics throughout his career. It’s the best remembered song from a history-making production.

America’s systemic cultural racism of the time is on display here. The Black people in the film are depicted as simple-minded and none too ambitious; Magnolia does a blackface number that is interesting today only for its documentary value.

Yet Whale wrestles the cold, hard facts of segregation and racism, topics generally never covered in Hollywood film of the time. Show Boat represents the one-step-forward, two-steps-back struggle of Black people to be taken seriously as people.

The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: Swing Time.