Actually, pretty much the very reverse of trash, I know, but I'm in a FredandGinger mood, so indulge me.
Roberta is just about my favorite of their pictures - not the best, necessarily, or the most lavish, but just the one that somehow gets its right. It's startling to be reminded by the title card that they didn't even lead the bill, that honor going to Miss Irene Dunne as a White Russian princess who gets to wear one of the all-time great tiaras and sing "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes."
This trailer, sadly, is saved from total fabulosity by the sad absence of the title character, the marvelous Helen Westley as Roberta herself, not to mention the toothsome Randolph Scott. Still, there is that tiara, and Fred, and Ginger. Enjoy.
I think Irene's tiara was screwed on too tight. Is that her real voice? Surely not. All I can think of is how she sounds in My Favorite Wife .
ReplyDeleteNope, that's her - she sings in several '30s pictures, including, of course, Show Boat. Her own favorite of her singing roles was apparently in High, Wide, and Handsome, which in retrospect is really hard to believe isn't a porn title but instead a Jerome Kern spectacular.
ReplyDeleteThat kind of trilling soprano sounds dated, I suppose, but I find her far preferable to, say, the egregious Kathryn Grayson or even the inevitable Jeannette.
Her speaking voice really was delightful, though. I miss diction like that...