The Vagabond King (1930)

User Rating:

5.9/10   

Director:

Ludwig Berger

Writers:

Brian Hooker (operetta)
Herman J. Mankiewicz (screenplay)

Release Date:

17 February 1930 (USA)

Genre:

Musical | Romance

Tagline:

The most sensational move ever made in Motion Picture History!

Plot:

The story takes place in medieval France. Poet-rogue Francois Villon, sentenced to hang by King Louis XI for writing derogatory verses about him...

Plot Keywords:

Early Sound | Operetta | Swashbuckler | Two Strip Technicolor | Based On Novel

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar.

Cast

Dennis King	...	François Villon
Jeanette MacDonald	...	Katherine
O.P. Heggie	...	King Louis XI
Lillian Roth	...	Huguette
Warner Oland	...	Thibault
Arthur Stone	...	Oliver the barber
Tom Ricketts	...	The Astrologer (as Thomas Ricketts)
Lawford Davidson	...	Tristan
Christian J. Frank	...	Executioner
Elda Voelkel	...	Girl
Dorothy Davis	...	Brunette
Thora Waverly	...	Brunette
Cecile Cameron	...	Brunette
Jean Douglas	...	Blonde
Eugenia Woodbury	...	Blonde

Runtime:

104 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (2-strip Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.20 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

Only one complete color print of this film survived in Paramount's vault. Eventually it was turned over to UCLA, who preserved it in 1990.

Movie Connections:

Featured in "Broadway: The American Musical" (2004)

Soundtrack:

Some Day

Essential early sound film from Broadway

Considering the major names involved (in addition to the performers, it was an early screen adaptation from Herman J.

Mankiewicz!) in this fine reflection of the popular 1925 operetta, it's high time we had a good Technicolor restoration done and issued on DVD.

Jeanette MacDonald as the female lead is, perforce, secondary to the slightly "over the top" Dennis King recreating his starring Broadway role (511 performances at the Casino Theatre), but she gives a pure portrait of the King's niece much more honest and appealing than her later over blown "acting" in the Nelson Eddy screen operettas of the late 30's and 40's.

Lillian Roth's Huguette is more throaty than many familiar with the character's beautiful Rudolf Friml music may be used to, but her acting is impeccable and quite moving. Additionally, the chance to see 20th Century Fox's first major "Charlie Chan," Swedish actor Werner Oland, in another perspective entirely as Thibault, is not to be missed for any fan of Earl Derr Biggers' famous sleuth.

While, after the painful Hollywood custom, much of the rousing score has been sacrificed in the film's fast moving 104 minutes (only 100 surviving in the TV print I've seen), most of the best, "Some Day," "Only A Rose," "Huguette Waltz" and of course, "Song of the Vagabond" are here in fine form. Certainly preferable in this relatively faithful form than the bland 1956 remake. It's an exciting alternative to the fine (if music-less) 1938 Ronald Colman film drawn from The Vagabond King's source material: "If I Were King."