Girl Crazy (1943)

User Rating:

7.1/10   

Directors:

Norman Taurog
Busby Berkeley

Writers:

Guy Bolton (musical play) and
Jack McGowan (musical play) ...

Release Date:

26 November 1943 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Musical | Romance

Tagline:

LOVE OR LUNACY? It's the wild cry of a "girl-crazy" cowboy...but one clear-eyed daughter of the west ropes and ties him!

Plot:

Rich kid Danny Churchill (Rooney) has a taste for wine, women and song, but not for higher education...

Plot Keywords:

College | Dean | Male Female Relationship | Party | Radio Broadcasting

Cast

Mickey Rooney	...	Danny Churchill, Jr.
Judy Garland	...	Ginger Gray
Gil Stratton	...	Bud Livermore
Robert E. Strickland	...	Henry Lathrop
Rags Ragland	...	'Rags' (as 'Rags' Ragland)
June Allyson	...	Specialty Singer
Nancy Walker	...	Polly Williams
Guy Kibbee	...	Dean Phineas Armour
Frances Rafferty	...	Marjorie Tait
Henry O'Neill	...	Mr. Danny Churchill, Sr.
Howard Freeman	...	Governor Tait
Tommy Dorsey	...	Himself - Bandleader Tommy Dorsey
Tommy Dorsey Orchestra	...	Themselves - Tommy Dorsey's Orchestra
Six Hits and a Miss	...	Themselves - Vocalists
The Music Maids	...	Themselves - Vocalists

Also Known As:

When the Girls Meet the Boys (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

99 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Certification:

Finland:S | Sweden:Btl | USA:Approved (PCA #9139) | USA:Passed (National Board of Review) | Australia:G

Filming Locations:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios - 10202 W. Washington Blvd., Culver City, California, USA

Company:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Trivia:

Judy Garland's character's name, Ginger Gray, is a tribute to Ginger Rogers, who played the part on Broadway when the character was named Molly Gray. Ginger Rogers wrote that one night onstage in the play, her costar Allen Kearns accidentally said: "Ginger, I love you" instead of "Molly". The mistake got such a huge laugh from the audience that they decided to continue to do that in subsequent performances, pretending it was a mistake. (Source: "Ginger: My Story". New York: Harper-Collins, 1991)

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: When Ginger arrives at the college and sees Danny get put onto a horse by some of the students to ride off to a campfire, there seems to be a trainer squatted behind an abandoned carriage cuing the horses.

Quotes:

Polly Williams: Hi ya Church, hows your steeple?
Danny Churchill, Jr.: So long Polly, watch your crackers!

Movie Connections:

Featured in "American Masters: George Gershwin Remembered" (1987)

Soundtrack:

Embraceable You

'puttin' on a show' with Gershwin

This Gershwin musical, first staged in 1930 (and filmed, not altogether successfully from a musical point of view, by RKO in 1932) gets another movie version, this time tailored for the talents of MGM's two top young stars, Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney.

The original story gets ditched and in place we get the usual 'kids putting on a show' stuff that Judy and Mickey did in all their collaborations during the 1930s/40s. The songs are done very well - Judy sings 'But Not For Me' and it is absolutely stunning, the way she is photographed during this sequence really complementing the beautiful melody of the song. 'Embraceable You', an unforgivable omission from the '32 version (it was filmed but then scrapped on the wisdom of David Selznick) is back. So Judy is great, while Mickey does the same bubbly act as always but he certainly had talent.

Perhaps one day we'll see a version which does justice to both the original plot as staged *and* the score. Neither the '32 or '43 versions quite got there - but both are worth your time, if only for quite different reasons.