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Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933) 7.9
Millionaire turned composer Dick Powell rescues unemployed Broadway people with a new play. Director:Mervyn LeRoy |
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Title: Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933)
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Cast
| Complete credited cast: | |||
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Warren William | ... |
Lawrence
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| Joan Blondell | ... |
Carol
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Aline MacMahon | ... |
Trixie
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| Ruby Keeler | ... |
Polly
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| Dick Powell | ... |
Brad
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Guy Kibbee | ... |
Peabody
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Ned Sparks | ... |
Barney
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| Ginger Rogers | ... |
Fay
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Plot Summary
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Storyline
Barney Hopkins is producing a new show on Broadway, but the day before it opens, the set and costumes are confiscated due to unpaid bills. Everybody is sitting in the street, and due to the Depression, there is no work for the three chorus girls Carol, Trixie and Polly. But they hear rumors that Barney is producing a new show. They talk to him, and he promises to give them work - when he finds a backer to produce the new show. Barney hears the tunes of the composer next door, Brad Roberts, Polly's friend. Brad joins them and agrees to back the show. On opening night Brad takes over for the juvenile lead, who is suffering from lumbago. Brad has been very publicity-shy, because he is a member of an upper-class wealthy Boston family. When his family hears what he is doing, his brother Lawrence and the family attorney Peabody come to New York, to end his relationship with Polly. But Lawrence mistakes Carol for Polly, who does not correct his mistake. Lawrence decides to separate Polly and... Written by Stephan Eichenberg <eichenbe@fak-cbg.tu-muenchen.de>
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Your dream of perfect beauty comes true! See more »Parents Guide:
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Details
Country:
USALanguage:
EnglishRelease Date:
27 May 1933 (USA) See more »Also Known As:
High Life See more »Filming Locations:
Warner Brothers Burbank Studios - 4000 Warner Boulevard, Burbank, California, USABox Office
Budget:
$433,000 (estimated)Company Credits
Show detailed
company contact information
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IMDbPro »
Technical Specs
Runtime:
| (Turner library print)Sound Mix:
MonoColor:
Black and WhiteAspect Ratio:
1.37 : 1
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Carol King: Your check, huh that's on exhibition over there on the wall. I figured you'd stop payment on it.
J. Lawrence Bradford: I'll take the necessary steps...
Carol King: You'll do what? Listen, you made a sap out of yourself and you tried your best to make a sap out of me. Now I never want to see you again, understand? And as for your check, well, you don't think I hold myself as cheaply as all that do you?
J. Lawrence Bradford: Cheaply? Ten thousand dollars?
Carol King: Well that's your estimate of me, not mine. That check is...
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(1933) (uncredited)
Music by Harry Warren
Lyrics by Al Dubin
Written for the movie but not used
See more »
Did You Know?
Trivia
The play "The Gold Diggers" by Avery Hopwood opened at the Lyceum Theatre in New York on 30 September 1919 and closed in June 1920 after 282 performances. The opening night cast included Ina Claire and Lilyan Tashman. See more »Goofs
At 1:18 into film Lawrence (Warren William) is on his bed with an ice pack, Peabody (Guy Kibbee) sitting next to him. Lawrence gets up and undoes the sash of his robe, but in the very next shot the sash is completely tied, as it had been before. See more »Quotes
J. Lawrence Bradford: I'll ask you to return my check, please.Carol King: Your check, huh that's on exhibition over there on the wall. I figured you'd stop payment on it.
J. Lawrence Bradford: I'll take the necessary steps...
Carol King: You'll do what? Listen, you made a sap out of yourself and you tried your best to make a sap out of me. Now I never want to see you again, understand? And as for your check, well, you don't think I hold myself as cheaply as all that do you?
J. Lawrence Bradford: Cheaply? Ten thousand dollars?
Carol King: Well that's your estimate of me, not mine. That check is...
See more »
Soundtracks
"Forgive Me for Loving You"(1933) (uncredited)
Music by Harry Warren
Lyrics by Al Dubin
Written for the movie but not used
See more »
This is the most perfect example of "history on the silver screen" that I can think of. When Ginger Rogers says, "It's the Depression, dearie" at the beginning to explain the chorus girls' bad luck, it's the key to the whole film. While the "Shadow Waltz" number was being filmed during an actual 1933 earthquake in L.A. a number of the girls toppled off the Art Deco "overpass" where they were swaying with their filmy hoop skirts and their neon violins short-circuited. The electrical hook-ups were also rather dangerous, especially if the neon bows came in contact with the girls' metallic wigs in that number. The culminating production number, "Remember My Forgotten Man," is the most significant historically and illustrates Warner Bros.' "New Deal" sensibilities. Warner Bros. was the only studio that "bought" the whole Roosevelt approach to economic recovery. The year before, under Hoover, WWI vets were not only neglected in terms of benefits but were run out of their shanty town near the Capitol building. Starving guys were camping on the edges of most communities who'd served in the Great War fifteen years before. Of course, why or how this number fits into such a '30s girlie-type musical revue is anyone's guess. Berkeley never looked for reality, just eye-popping surrealistic effects.
About ten years ago I found myself sitting next to Etta Moten Barnett at a Chicago NAACP banquet. I was flabbergasted. She was in her 90s yet still looked lovely. She's the singer who sang "Forgotten Man" in the window. She also sang "The Carioca" in Astaire and Rogers' first pairing, "Flying Down to Rio." She was quite gracious, though she did not have wonderful things to say about Hollywood of that era. The African Americans in both pictures were fed in a tent away from the general commissary area.
Ruby Keeler has a certain odd-ball appeal, like a homely puppy. She can't sing, she watches her leaden feet while she dances, and almost all her lines are read badly. Yes, she was married to Al Jolson, but that may have HURT her career more than anything. He was not exactly always likable. He was much older than Ruby and so full of himself.
This film is also a classic example of the PRE-CODE stuff that was slipping by---the leering "midget baby" (Billy Barty), the naked girls in silhouette changing into their "armor," the non-stop flashing of underwear or lack of underwear, Ginger Rogers having her large coin torn off by the sheriff's office mug so she's essentially standing there in panties, and so forth.
A good comparison of before and after the code would be to examine this picture and "Gold Diggers of 1935." The latter is so much more chaste, discreet, and less fascinating except for the numbers. There's not the lurid, horny aura of the Pre-Code pictures. And it's not quite as much naughty fun, either.