Leo Herbert White (1873-1948) was born in Germany, raised in England and emigrated to America. His stage career had begun in the UK, but he made his first screen appearance in 1911.
White worked as an actor and occasional director in silent comedy, including many collaborations with Charles Chaplin, with whom he worked for the last time on The Great Dictator (1940).
By the end of his career White had contributed to almost 500 films, eight of which were MGM musicals (all uncredited). He started out in The Florodora Girl, followed by Call of the Flesh, The Devil’s Brother, Broadway to Hollywood, Stage Mother and The Cat and the Fiddle. He was one of the hirsute Russian aviators in A Night at the Opera, and bowed out with Broadway Melody of 1938.
Mary Jane Irving (1913-83) made over sixty screen appearances, despite retiring when she was 25. This was owing to the fact that she made her debut at the age of 3 and had a busy career as a child actor. In her twenties, she also worked as Janet Gaynor’s stand-in.
Irving was 16 when she played Lawrence Gray’s sister in The Florodora Girl. A year or so later, she was one of the students in Student Tour.
British actor William Claud Michael Palmer (1888-1970) made a career largely out of playing what Bertie Wooster would have called a silly ass. He was the quintessential Algy in a number of Bulldog Drummond films, having first played the character in the West End. He also appeared as the surprisingly English Duke Otto von Liebenheim in Lubitsch’s Monte Carlo(193
Immediately before working with Lubitsch, Allister was Lord Rumblesham, the unlikely friend of Lawrence Gray in The Florodora. He then waited twenty-three years for his second appearance in an MGM musical, as Paul in Kiss Me Kate.
In a varied career, Ilka Chase (1905-72) acted on stage and screen, presented radio and television shows, and found time to write a novel, two volumes of autobiography and several travel books.
Chase’s film career was not prestigious in itself, but involved some high-quality films. For example, she played Bette Davis’s sister-in-law in Now Voyager (1942), the catalyst for the Davis character’s transformation.
Ilka Chase’s only Metro musical was The Florodora Girl, playing Fanny, one of the central character’s cynical but loyal friends.
For lovers of screwball comedy, Walter Leland Catlett (1889-1960) will always be the befuddled Constable Slocum who throws almost the entire cast of Bringing Up Baby (1937) into his jail. He also has immortality as the voice of J Worthington Foulfellow, the villainous fox, in Pinocchio (1940).
But Catlett had a successful career on the stage in musical comedies before making Second Youth in 1924, the first of over 160 screen credits. He was a comic performer of exceptional ability. Howard Hawks asked him to coach Katharine Hepburn in playing comedy, contributing in no small part to her outstanding performance in Bringing Up Baby. But Catlett’s brief appearance in the closing minutes of A Tale of Two Cities (1935) shows that, like all great comic actors, he could play straight when he needed to.
Catlett only appeared in one MGM musical, when he played the hero’s friend De Boer in The Florodora Girl.
* The opening of this song is very similar to ‘Don’t Wake Me Up, I’m Dreaming’ (1910) by Herbert Ingraham and Beth Slater Whitson, but the lyrics are different and more relevant to the film. It may be that the filmmakers took the Edwardian original and tweaked it. If so, the lyrics are probably by Clifford Grey.
Jack Vibart, “the fastest young blood in town,” leaves the Florodora show with his friend Lord Rumblesham.
The six Florodora Girls
In their dressing room, the chorus girls discuss Jack and his reputation. Daisy Dell is the only one from the original Florodora sextet not to have bagged a millionaire; all she has is little Georgie Smith from the cigar store. Daisy does not want to land a man just for his money. Her friends Fanny and Maude encourage Daisy to play the game, which means playing hard to get. “When a man is fascinated, the first thing he wants to do is buy you something expensive”.
To her surprise, Daisy receives an invitation to supper from Jack. Her friends force her to refuse: if he is serious, he will come back. Daisy watches Jack smile fondly as his flowers are returned to him [Don’t Wake Me Up, I’m Dreaming].
All the girls meet their stage door johnnies, leaving Daisy alone. Georgie arrives to take Daisy for a tandem ride, and she makes him stop at the saloon to collect her father [My Mother Was a Lady].
The next day, the performers from the show and their followers are at a beach party. While Daisy is swimming, she sees Jack and pretends to be drowning. Jack ‘saves’ her and carries her back to shore, where considerable efforts are made to revive her. [Pass the Beer and Pretzels; In the Good Old Summertime; A Hot Time in the Old Town; Little Annie Rooney; Obadiah (Swing Me Just a Little Bit Higher); On the Banks of the Wabash, Far Away].
Daisy (Marion Davies) has been ‘saved from drowning’ by Jack (Lawrence Gray)
Fanny and Maude continue to be cynical about Jack’s intentions and remind Daisy to make sure she gets a gift from him. When Jack comes over, Fanny and Maude refuse to leave the couple alone. They tell Jack that Daisy has dozens of beaux. Finally, Daisy and Jack go for a walk and sit together on a swing. They swing high and a rope breaks, sending them flying into the bushes.
Fanny and Maude attend a big college football game, but do not tell Daisy that Jack had invited her. They tell Jack that Daisy is at the Vanderbilt party, but then she arrives with Georgie on the tandem.
Georgie points out Harry Fontaine, the big gambler, who is one of his customers. Jack tells Fanny and Maude that Fontaine is one of the biggest crooks in racing. Daisy waves to Jack, but he acknowledges her frostily. Fontaine gets Georgie drunk and then approaches Daisy. The crowd surges and Daisy ends up on Fontaine’s arm. Jack sees Fontaine making advances, and goes over to take Daisy away.
On the ride home Daisy tells Jack that her friends had not passed on his invitation to the game. She explains that they have been trying to teach her how to fascinate a rich man. After she tells him the truth about herself, Jack declares that now he will be the one who has designs on her. Jack’s mother passes in another carriage and wonders who Daisy can be. Jack is reluctant to tell Daisy who the girl riding with his mother was.
At home, Mrs Vibart questions Jack, who says Daisy is “just one of the Florodora sextet”. She asks Jack when he is going to stop philandering and marry Constance. He says he will marry her in June, and assures her that a man in his position could never take a girl like Daisy seriously.
The next day Jack arrives to collect Daisy in his horseless carriage and takes her for tea [You’re My Kind of a Girl]. Jack gives Daisy a bracelet and tries to persuade her to let him find her an apartment where he can stay over. Daisy is offended, gives back the bracelet and slaps him.
Some time later, Rumblesham calls backstage to see Daisy. He invites her to Mrs Commodore Carraway’s ball. Fanny and Maude persuade her to go and dress her up in a costume from the show.
Daisy and Lord Rumblesham (Claude Allister) at Mrs Commodore Carraway’s Ball
Daisy is approached by Jack at the ball, but she refuses to talk to him. Rumblesham tells Daisy that Jack has been engaged to Constance for a long time. Daisy runs away and Jack follows her. He apologizes to her for his behaviour, and tells her that, while originally he had been playing with her, he now realizes that he loves her. His mother wants him to marry Constance for her money, but when his horse Firebird wins the sweepstake tomorrow, he will have enough money to ignore his mother and set himself up in business.
But Fontaine has got to Firebird’s jockey and the horse does not win. Jack loses everything. At a party to mark Daisy and Jack’s engagement, he asks Rumblesham not to tell Daisy what has happened.
Mrs Vibart sends a carriage for Daisy and tells her that Jack lost their entire fortune at the races. She and her daughters can only be saved from ruin if Jack marries Constance. Daisy agrees to give up Jack.
The other Florodora girls assume the engagement is off because Daisy will not marry a poor man. Daisy has asked Fontaine to take her to a slumming ball on the Bowery. She does not enjoy being with Fontaine, but pretends to be when Jack enters. Jack asks her to come away with him, but she tells him they are through because she is not fool enough to take him when he is broke. Jack leaves and Fontaine comforts her.
Four months later, Fanny and Maude tell Daisy they are engaged. Jack has gone into the horseless carriage business and made a fortune, so he has not married Constance. [Tell Me Pretty Maiden]. Jack tries to speak to Daisy and absentmindedly walks onto the stage with her. He says he loves her and asks her to marry him. When she refuses, Jack picks her up and carries her outside, where the waiting Mrs Vibart says “My dear, this time, we have come for you”.
