The Musicals of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Category: New Moon (1940)

  • Edwin B Willis

    Edwin Booth Willis (1893-1963) worked on the design of over 800 MGM pictures, in a career lasting a little over thirty years. He was nominated for Academy Awards 32 times, and won on eight occasions. In broad terms, Willis was an art director, but his specialism was set decoration and the bulk of his credits were in this capacity. 

    After working as an art director for Tiffany Pictures in the 1920s, Willis worked exclusively for Metro, obtaining three types of credit: Associate Art Director (AAD), Interior Decorations (ID) and Set Decorator (SD). He did early work as SD on Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925).

    Willis worked on some of the studio’s major critical and commercial successes, including Queen Christina (1933, for ID), The Thin Man (1934, as AAD), Anna Karenina (1935, as AAD, Fritz Lang’s Fury (1936, as AAD), Camille (1936, as AAD), The Good Earth (1937, as AAD), Captains Courageous (1937, as AAD), Boys’ Town (1938, as AAD), The Women (1939), Ninotchka (1939, as SD), The Shop Around the Corner (1940), Waterloo Bridge (1940), Pride and Prejudice (1940), The Philadelphia Story (1940), Blossoms in the Dust (1941, winning an Oscar), Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1941), Woman of the Year (1942), Mrs Miniver (1942), Lassie Come Home (1943), Madame Curie (1943), Gaslight (1944, winning an Oscar), John Ford’s They Were Expendable (1944), The Yearling (1946, winning an Oscar), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), State of the Union (1948), Act of Violence (1948), Intruder in the Dust (1949), Little Women (1949, winning an Oscar), The Asphalt Jungle (1950), The Red Badge of Courage (1951), The Bad and the Beautiful 1952, winning an Oscar), Julius Caesar (1953, winning an Oscar), Bad Day at  Black Rock (1955), Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956, winning an Oscar), Forbidden Planet (1956) and Lust for Life (1956).

    Willis had a particularly extensive collaboration with Vincente Minnelli, decorating most of his musical and non-musical pictures

    Edwin B Willis contributed to 153 musicals, around 70 per cent of MGM’s total output. It could be argued that this makes him the single most influential figure on the look of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer musical. The pictures were:

    Broadway to Hollywood

    Stage Mother (ID)

    Dancing Lady (ID)

    Going Hollywood (ID)

    The Cat and the Fiddle (ID)

    Hollywood Party (ID)

    Student Tour (AAD)

    The Merry Widow (AAD)

    The Night is Young (AAD/SD)

    Naughty Marietta (AAD)

    Reckless (AAD)

    Broadway Melody of 1936 (AAD)

    Here Comes the Band (AAD)

    A Night at the Opera (AAD)

    Rose Marie (AAD)

    The Great Ziegfeld (AAD)

    San Francisco (AAD)

    Born to Dance (AAD)

    Maytime (AAD)

    A Day at the Races (AAD)

    Broadway Melody of 1938 (AAD)

    The Firefly (AAD)

    Thoroughbreds Don’t Cry (AAD)

    Rosalie (AAD)

    Everybody Sing (AAD)

    The Girl of the Golden West (AAD)

    Listen, Darling (AAD)

    The Great Waltz (AAD)

    Sweethearts

    Honolulu

    Let Freedom Ring

    Ice Follies of 1939

    The Wizard of Oz

    Babes in Arms

    At the Circus

    Balalaika

    Broadway Melody of 1940

    New Moon

    Strike Up the Band

    Hullabaloo (Associate Set Decorator, uncredited)

    Bitter Sweet

    Little Nellie Kelly

    Go West

    Free and Easy

    Ziegfeld Girl

    The Big Store

    Lady Be Good

    The Chocolate Soldier

    Smilin’ Through

    Babes on Broadway

    Born to Sing

    Ship Ahoy

    Rio Rita

    I Married an Angel

    Cairo

    Panama Hattie

    For Me and My Gal

    Seven Sweethearts

    Cabin in the Sky

    Presenting Lily Mars

    Du Barry was a Lady

    Best Foot Forward

    Thousands Cheer

    Swing Fever

    Girl Crazy

    Broadway Rhythm

    Two Girls and a Sailor

    Meet the People

    Bathing Beauty

    Meet Me in St Louis

    Music for Millions

    Thrill of a Romance

    Anchors Aweigh

    Ziegfeld Follies

    Yolanda and the Thief

    The Harvey Girls

    Two Sister from Boston

    Easy to Wed

    Holiday in Mexico

    No Leave, No Love

    Till the Clouds Roll By

    It Happened in Brooklyn

    Living in a Big Way

    Fiesta

    The Unfinished Dance

    Good News

    Summer Holiday

    On an Island With You

    The Pirate

    Easter Parade

    A Date with Judy

    Luxury Liner

    The Kissing Bandit

    Words and Music

    Take Me Out to the Ball Game

    The Barkeleys of Broadway

    Neptune’s Daughter

    In the Good Old Summertime

    That Midnight Kiss

    On the Town

    Nancy Goes to Rio

    Annie Get Your Gun

    Three Little Words

    Duchess of Idaho

    The Toast of New Orleans

    Summer Stock

    Two Weeks with Love

    Pagan Love Song

    Grounds for Marriage

    Royal Wedding

    The Great Caruso

    Excuse My Dust

    Rich, Young and Pretty

    Show Boat

    An American in Paris (winning an Oscar)

    The Strip

    Texas Carnival

    The Belle of New York

    Singin’ in the Rain

    Skirts Ahoy

    Lovely to Look At

    The Merry Widow

    Because You’re Mine

    Everything I Have is Yours

    Lili

    I Love Melvin

    Small Town Girl

    Dangerous When Wet

    The Band Wagon

    Latin Lovers

    The Affairs of Dobie Gillis

    Torch Song

    Kiss Me Kate

    Easy to  Love

    Rose Marie

    The Student Prince

    Seven Brides for Seven Brothers

    Brigadoon

    Athena 

    Deep in My Heart

    Jupiter’s Darling

    Hit the Deck

    The Glass Slipper

    Interrupted Melody

    Love Me or Leave Me

    It’s Always Fair Weather

    Kismet

    Meet Me in Las Vegas

    High Society

    The Opposite Sex

    Ten Thousand Bedrooms

    Silk Stockings

    Les Girls

  • Edwin Maxwell

    Irish-born Edwin Maxwell (1886-1948) emigrated to America as a child and made his first stage appearance aged seven. This led to a long career in the theatre and on screen. He made one silent film, but began to concentrate on films in 1929. He never abandoned the stage, however, and toured the country in the 1940s in the road show version of Life With Father.

    Maxwell was a character actor, often credited, sometimes not. Some of his most notable roles included: the Chief of Detectives in Scarface (1932), the chief villain in Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933), the first Secretary of War in Duck Soup (1933), corrupt Will Vickery in Fury (1936), John T Stuart in Young Mr Lincoln (1939), the jeweller in Ninotchka (1939) and the inept state psychiatrist in His Girl Friday (1940).

    Edwin Maxwell appeared in four Metro musicals: Broadway to Hollywood, Hollywood Party, The Great Ziegfeld and the 1940 version of New Moon, his only credited role.

  • Nelson Eddy

    Nelson Ackerman Eddy (1901-67) was one of MGM’s first great musical stars. An operatic baritone, he appeared in fifteen musicals, playing the lead in all but the first three. In eight of them, he was partnered with Jeanette MacDonald.

    From a poor background, Eddy was a boy soprano who went on to have various jobs while indulging his love of music. He engaged in amateur productions, was noticed by the press and, by the age of 23, was working for the Philadelphia Civic Opera Company, and also sang with the Savoy Company. 

    Eddy spent some time in Europe, acquiring voice training, then returned to the USA and concentrated on concert performances. He was appearing in Los Angeles when Hollywood knocked on his door. He signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, but the studio did not initially know what to do with him. He made his debut in Handlebars (1933), a musical short, and sang without credit in Broadway to Hollywood. In the same year he appeared as himself in Dancing Lady and Student Tour.

    Then MGM struck gold.Just before his option with Metro ran out, he was teamed with MacDonald in Naughty Marietta. The picture made a sizeable profit and an Oscar nomination for Best Picture. This led to their re-teaming in Rose-Marie, Maytime, Girl of the Golden West, Sweethearts, New Moon, Bitter Sweet and I Married an Angel.

    In addition, Eddy starred in Rosalie, Let Freedom Ring, Balalaika and The Chocolate Soldier. He only appeared in a handful of films after leaving MGM, most notably The Phantom of the Opera (1943) at Universal. His last film was Northwest Frontier (1947), made at Republic and partnering him again with his Balalaika co-star, Ilona Massey. He continued to give live performances for the rest of his life, dying after a stroke experienced while on stage.

    Not even his best friends would pretend that Nelson Eddy could act; he was stiff, with a very limited range of line readings. But there is always something engaging about his performances, which always seem good-humoured and lacking in self-importance. This is especially the case in his films with Jeanette MacDonald, which constituted the Golden Age of MGM’s operetta cycle.

  • Paul Marquardt

    German-born Paul Alfred Marquardt (1889-1960) was a composer who worked for many years as an arranger at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and for other studios. Although rarely receiving an onscreen credit, Marquardt made a substantial contribution to MGM’s musical history.

    He orchestrated the music for many non-musical films, including Anna Karenina (1935), Fritz Lang’s Fury (1936), Captains Courageous (1937), The Women (1939), Northwest Passage (1940), Rebecca (1940),Frank Borzage’s The Mortal Storm (1940), Woman of the Year (1942), Mrs Miniver (1942), It’s a Wonderful Life (1946), Red River (1948), The Thing from Another World (1951), High Noon (1952) and Friendly Persuasion (1957). Marquardt also composed original scores in the 1930s, including for The Sign of the Cross and A Farewell to Arms (both 1933). He worked on well over 350 films between 1930 and 1957.

    The first of Marquardt’s 39 MGM musicals was The Cuban Love Song, collaborating with Charles Maxwell. This was followed by Dancing Lady, The Merry Widow, The Night is Young, Naughty Marietta, Reckless, Here Comes the Band, A Night at the Opera, The Great Ziegfeld, San Francisco. Maytime, A Day at the Races, The Firefly, Rosalie, Everybody Sing, The Girl of the Golden West, The Great Waltz, Sweethearts (in which he also appeared as a conductor), The Wizard of Oz (credited for orchestral and vocal arrangements), Babes in Arms, At the Circus, Balalaika, New Moon, Hullabaloo, Rio Rita, I Married an Angel, Seven Sweethearts, Presenting Lily Mars, Thousands Cheer, Ziegfeld Follies, Holiday in Mexico, Easter Parade, The Kissing Bandit, Take Me Out to the Ball Game, The Barkeleys of Broadway, That Midnight Kiss, Annie Get Your Gun, Royal Wedding and Show Boat.

  • W S Van Dyke II

    The reputation of Woodbridge Strong Van Dyke II (1889-1943) as ‘One-Shot Woody’ was what enabled him to direct over ninety films in twenty-five years, half of them during the sound era.

    Van Dyke’s mother was an actor, leading to his own early appearances on the stage as a child. Constantly on tour, he claimed to have attended schools in every state. 

    He undertook many jobs during his early years as an adult, before obtaining his first job in the film industry in 1915. He began pretty much at the top, as one of a number of assistant directors under D W Griffith on The Birth of a Nation (1915). Two years later, after having written a number of films, he directed his first feature, The Land of Long Shadows (1917), based on his own screenplay. 

    Van Dyke’s work in silent films was prolific, but undistinguished. It was as a director of sound pictures that he came into his own. He travelled to Tahiti in 1928 to make White Shadows in the South Seas, MGM’s first feature with recorded sound (music and sound effects). Two years later he shot Trader Horn (1931) mostly in Africa, with some dialogue scenes reshot in Hollywood. 

    Van Dyke went on to become a mainstay of MGM’s production schedule, reputedly Louis B Mayer’s favourite (because most efficient) director. He directed the first Johnny Weissmuller film as Tarzan the Ape Man (1932), The Thin Man (1934) and three of its sequels, and Marie Antoinette (1938). 

    He made nine musicals for MGM and, after The Cuban Love Song, all of them starred either Jeanette MacDonald, Nelson Eddy, or both of them together: Naughty Marietta,(which he also produced), Rose-Marie, San Francisco (also produced by Van Dyke), Rosalie, Sweethearts, Bitter Sweet, I Married and Angel and Cairo.

    Van Dyke was also used regularly to direct reshoots or new scenes for other directors’ pictures, and he did this for Broadway Melody of 1936 and the 1940 New Moon, again with MacDonald and Eddy.

    Woody Van Dyke was a Christian Scientist and, when he learned in 1943 that he was terminally ill, refused medical treatment and took his own life.

  • Harry Strang

    Harry R Strang (1892-1972) had the sort of career Hollywood was built on: thirty-six years and more than 500 appearances as a tough-guy  character actor.

    Strang trained at AADA and made his professional debut on the stage in 1910. His career in the theatre was interrupted by the First World War, in which he served with the marines. He then returned to the stage, working much of the time with stock companies.

    Harry Strang was one of the many stage actors who found work in Hollywood after the introduction of sound, and he was frequently cast in military roles that would have benefitted from his own wartime experience. His many appearances included parts in Hell’s Angels (1930), The Seas Beneath (1931, becoming part of John Ford’s Stock Company), What Price Hollywood? (1932), King Kong (1933), The Prisoner of Shark Island (1936), Gone With the Wind (1939), Saboteur (1942), Laura (1944), Detour (1945), The Lady from Shanghai (1945), White Heat (1949), Beyond a Reasonable Doubt (1956) and The Last Hurrah (1958).

    Strang was in five Metro musicals: The Cuban Love Song (as a marine sergeant), San Francisco, Born to Dance, New Moon and Thousands Cheer. 

    When you have made eight films with John Ford and also worked with Hawks, Capra, Lang and Welles, you can definitely say you have had a career. A very active career in small parts was lucrative enough for Strang to maintain two homes after he retired in 1965, where he could pursue life as an avid birdwatcher.

  • Nick Copeland

    Nicholas W Copeland (1894-1940) died aged 45, but still managed to notch up well over 100 screen appearances in a career lasting just twelve years.

    Copeland made a short at Fox in 1928, and followed this with his first feature, playing a henchman, at Warner Bros. He was usually uncredited, but showed up in some top-class pictures, including Twentieth Century and The Thin Man (both 1934), Theodora Goes Wild (1936), You Can’t Take It With You (1938) and Mr Smith Goes to Washington (1939).

    Copeland played parts in five MGM musicals. Flying High was followed by Student Tour, Reckless, Swiss Miss and New Moon (his final film).

    He had served in the First World War and was buried with military honours.

  • Oscar Hammerstein II

    Oscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein (1895-1960) was one of the biggest names in 20th-century musicals, both literally and metaphorically.

    Hammerstein and two of his main collaborators, Jerome Kern and Richard Rodgers, were key to the development of the integrated musical, whereby songs are woven into the plot rather than being simply musical interpolations. In the world of film musicals, there were attempts to achieve this as early as 1930, but it is undeniable that Hammerstein’s work as lyricist, librettist and producer were hugely influential.

    Oscar Hammerstein’s career can be divided into distinct halves. During the first part, he partnered with a variety of composers, including Kern (Show Boat, 1927), Rudolf Friml (Rose-Marie, 1924) and Sigmund Romberg (The Desert Song, 1926). Then, in 1943, he joined with Rodgers to produce Oklahoma!. This was the first in a series of seminal musicals, including Carousel (1945), South Pacific (1949) and The Sound of Music (1959), most of which were filmed (with varying degrees of success). 

    MGM did not adapt any of Hammerstein’s work with Rodgers, but did film The New Moon (written in 1927 with Romberg) twice, as it did with Rose-Marie. The studio made one of the several versions of Show Boat.  Hammerstein songs were also featured in The Night is Young , The Great Waltz and the Romberg biopic Deep in My Heart.

  • Sigmund Romberg

    Zsigmund Rosenberg (1887-1951) was a Hungarian-born composer and one of the most celebrated composers of operettas for the American stage.

    Romberg arrived in New York in 1909 and eventually found work playing the piano in cafes and restaurants. He published a few songs and came to the attention of the Shubert brothers, who commissioned him to write material for their Broadway revues. He wrote for a number of shows starring Al Jolson.

    In the 1920s, Romberg wrote three classic operettas in the Viennese style–The Student Prince (1924), The Desert Song (1926) and The New Moon (1928)–working with various lyricists, including Oscar Hammerstein II. He also wrote film scores and adapted his own work for the screen.

    MGM made two versions of New Moon (dropping the definite article) and also adapted Rosalie, Maytime and The Student Prince. He also contributed music to The Night is Young and The Girl of the Golden West.

    In 1954, Romberg was the subject of an MGM musical-biopic, Deep in My Heart, which drew extensively on his back catalogue.

  • Kenneth Gibson

    Bit player Kenneth Koch Gibson (1898-1972) spent a lot of time being paid to party. He was in fourteen MGM musicals, and in at least eight of them was a party guest or nightclub patron. 

    In a career stretching from 1921 to 1969, Gibson notched up approaching 300 screen appearances. He was actually the male lead in his first film, Big Town Ideas (1921), but by 1929 was generally uncredited. He became a regular bit player for Cecil B DeMille and Preston Sturges, and can be found in some excellent pictures, including This Gun for Hire (1942), The Big Sleep (1946), Sunset Boulevard (1950) and A Star is Born (1954).

    Gibson’s musicals at Metro were: Madam Satan, New Moon (1940), Yolanda and the Thief, Luxury Liner, The Barkeleys of Broadway, Duchess of Idaho, The Toast of New Orleans, Rich, Young and Pretty, Singin’ in the Rain, Small Town Girl, Interrupted Melody, It’s Always Fair Weather, I’ll Cry Tomorrow and Ten Thousand Bedrooms.

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