Lawrence Mervil Tibbet [sic] (1896-1960) was one of the great American opera stars, and also one of the most glamorous. He combined a deep baritone voice, of the quality required by a leading singer at New York’s Metropolitan Opera, with good looks and acting ability. These attributes made it inevitable that, with the advent of sound, Hollywood would come calling. Tibbett had already performed many of the great operatic roles, and developed a successful radio and recording career, when he signed a contract with MGM in 1930.
Tibbett’s career in films did not last long. He starred in four Metro musicals, made a couple of pictures for Fox, and then returned full-time to the stage. But his Hollywood career was by no means a failure. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his debut performance in The Rogue Song, something achieved by few actors. Unfortunately, The Rogue Song, MGM’s first all-Technicolor musical, is now a lost film.
Following this success, Tibbett did not embarrass himself in his other assignments, New Moon, The Prodigal and The Cuban Love Song (in which he duetted with himself).
By the end of his career, Tibbett had been a leading man at the Met for 27 seasons and established himself in the operatic pantheon.
[The Rogue Song is a lost film. The following is a summary based on a few extant segments and the soundtrack, which has survived.]
The Russian Empire in 1910 [Beyond the Dawn]. Yegor is the chief of a bandit group known as the Robbing Larks, and they are celebrating a successful raid. They go to the inn of Ossman to trade stolen goods for gold.
Yegor (Laurence Tibbett), surrounded by his men
Two of Yegor’s henchmen are Ali-Bek and Murza Bek. The latter claims to have saved Yegor’s father from mountain lions by slapping them to death.
Ossman the innkeeper tells Yegor that he has two female guests: an Imperial Princess and a Serene Countess. Princess Vera and Countess Tatiana hear the bandits singing in the room below. Tatiana has previously seen Yegor from the window and tells their servant Petrovna to bring to them “the tall, strong one who sings”. [The Rogue Song].
Meeting Vera and Tatiana, Yegor denies the Robbing Larks are thieves because they pay for what they take with a song. Yegor tells them he is from a line of bandits [Love Comes Like Bird On the Wing]. Tatiana offers to pay for the song, but Yegor says all he wants is the young lady’s hat with a funny little feather on it. Vera refuses and goes to bed, advising Tatiana to send Yegor on his way. Tatiana flirts with Yegor and gives him a string of pearls. To her annoyance, Yegor then says good night and leaves.
Yegor asks Princess Vera (Catherine Dale Owen) for her hat
Ossman subsequently tells Tatiana she will never be able to find the bandits’ hideout, so she decides instead to wait until Yegor tries to dispose of the pearls, when she will get her revenge. Ossman agrees to signal the captain of Cossacks so that Yegor can be arrested.
Murza-Bek tries to show Ali-Bek how to close a door properly, causing snow from the roof to fall on him.
Yegor climbs in through Vera’s window. He tells her he has come for her hat, then leaves.
Murza-Bek falls into a barrel of ice water after Ali-Bek tries to help him mount his horse.
Yegor visits his mother and his sister Nadja. He gives his mother the pearls, which he tells her came from a countess, and gives the hat to Nadja. He tells his sister the hat came from the daughter of a Russian prince, and she replies that she wants nothing to do with princes. Yegor deduces that Nadja is in love. She says she “hates” someone, but will say no more. Yegor promises to bring her a Parisian nightdress from the thieves’ market.
Ossman is at the thieves’ market with a Cossack captain. He has been pointing out thieves to be hanged, but it is Yegor the captain wants. Yegor arrives at the market and leaves Murza-Bek and Ali-Bek in charge of his horse. [The Narrative].
Vera warns Yegor that the Cossacks are there to arrest him for stealing Tatiana’s pearls. She knows he did not steal them. Yegor sends Vera to a room to wait for him while he completes some business.
The captain questions Murza-Bek and Ali-Bek about Yegor’s horse and they deny knowledge of everything. He orders their arrest and they flee.
Yegor tells Vera about his mother and sister, the only women he allows in his house. He has always avoided other women but he tells Vera he could love her [The White Dove].
Ali-Bek and Murzak-Bek buy cheese, but are chased by insects. When Murzak-Bek tries to swat a bee, he accidentally slaps their mule, which runs away.
Ossman is found dead. A note (?) says “Yegor punishes his betrayers”.
Vera asks Yegor if he is running away and he replies that his head stays on his body, the better to kiss her.
The Cossacks pursue Yegor on horseback, but he loses them and heads for home. He finds his mother grieving, and Nadja bleeding from self-inflicted dagger wounds. She has been raped by Prince Serge.
Yegor’s sister Nadja (Florence Lake) commits suicide after being raped
Yegor searches for Serge. One of his men tells him Tatiana is holding a ball that evening and Serge is bound to be there. Yegor breaks into Tatiana’s room and finds her there. He returns the necklace and offers to sing at the ball. [Swan Ballet]. After a ballet is performed, Tatiana announces to her guests that they are to be entertained by a singing bandit.
Vera is introduced to Princess Alexandra, and in turn introduces her brother, Prince Serge. Vera is shocked when Yegor walks onto the stage. Yegor sings a song telling Nadja’s story [Once in the Georgian Hills]. As he sings, his anger increases towards the man who seduced Nadja. Yegor follows Serge from the room and chases him.
[Intermission].
Yegor confronts Serge, and strangles him. Vera enters and finds Serge dead. She will not listen to Yegor’s explanation. Vera screams and Yegor flees, taking her with him. He tells her she will stay with him in a place her world can never find. She has shown no pity for Nadja, so she will work as a servant.
Later, Yegor mocks Vera, but then sings to her [When I’m Looking at You], revealing that he still loves her.
The bandits cross the desert, and Ali-Bek attempts to shave Murzak-Bek.
Ali-Bek(Stan Laurel), about to get Murza-Bek (Oliver Hardy) into another fine mess
Yegor is unable to break Vera’s spirit. Yegor’s mother tells him no good will come of what he is doing to a woman he still loves.
Vera attempts to seduce Hassan, Yegor’s right hand man. Yegor sees what she is doing and warns her to stop. During a terrible storm, Yegor carries Vera to safety. Vera tells Yegor that she does not hate him, because only the living can hate. Yegor pleads with her not to be so unhappy, and offers to take her to a lake in the mountains that she used to visit as a child.
Vera persuades Hassan to help her escape, on the understanding that no harm shall come to Yegor. At the mountain lake, Yegor is captured, causing Hassan to kill himself. Yegor is whipped in public [The Lash; When I’m Looking at You ; The Narrative].
The public whipping of Yegor
Vera goes to Yegor in his cell and asks him to forgive her. He says there is nothing to forgive and that they are even now.
A tree concealing Ali-Bek and Murzak-Bek collapses, dumping them into the lake.
Vera has Yegor released and says goodbye to him. They express the hope that, at some future time, they can be together. Yegor rides towards the sunset [When I’m Looking at You].
Murzak-Bek tells the bandits that Yegor is dead and he is now their leader. The bandits laugh, then hear Yegor singing [The Rogue Song]. Ali-Bek and Murzak-Bek resume their normal duties.
Paul Neal (1896-1969) began working in Douglas Shearer’s sound department at MGM in 1929, and went on to record and mix sound for a variety of studios. He worked with a range of important filmmakers, including John Ford (The Whole Town’s Talking, 1935), Frank Borzage (History is Made at Night, 1937), William Wyler (Wuthering Heights, 1939) and Henry Hathaway (The Dark Corner, 1946).
Neal recorded sound on five Metro musicals: Montana Moon, The Rogue Song, The Cuban Love Song, Dancing Lady and The Cat and the Fiddle.
Harry Bernard (1878-1940) was a member of the Mack Sennett comedy stable and a regular collaborator with Laurel and Hardy for Hal Roach. It was in this capacity that he made appearances in The Rogue Song, The Devil’s Brother and The Bohemian Girl. Bernard can also be spotted as a baseball spectator in They Learned About Women.
Wells Crosby Root (1900-1993) was a writer, teacher and author of Writing the Script: A Practical Guide for Films and Television (1980). In the 1950s and early 60s he wrote episodes for virtually every TV western series (and there were a lot of them).
For MGM Wells adapted the story that formed the basis of Chasing Rainbows and came up with the idea for The Rogue Song. He is cited as the co-author, with Bess Meredyth of a work called The Southerner, which was adapted into The Prodigal. What is certain is that he and Meredyth are credited with dialogue continuity.
Dimitri Zinovievich Tiomkin ((1894-1979) was one of the most celebrated Hollywood composers of all time. He was nominated for Oscars 22 times, and won on four occasions: The High and the Mighty (1954), High Noon (winning for both Best Score and Best Song), and The Old Man and the Sea (1958).
Tiomkin’s contributions to MGM’s musicals were easrly in his career and more modest. He wrote ballet music for Devil-May-Care and The Rogue Song, in both of which the choreography was by Tiomkin’s wife, Albertina Rasch. He also collaborated with Raymond B Egan on the song ‘Blue Daughter of Heaven’ for Lord Byron of Broadway.
Percival Davis (1887-1941) was a prolific lyricist and librettist for the West End and Broadway. His many stage musicals and revues included The Bing Boys are Here and Mr Cinders (1928), from which ‘If You were the Only Girl in the World’ and ‘Spread a Little Happiness’ became standards.
Like many other songwriters, Grey was invited to Hollywood in 1929, where he worked on the early sound masterpiece, The Love Parade (1929) at Paramount.
At MGM he wrote regularly with Herbert Stothart in the 1930s, contributing numbers to Devil-May-Care,Montana Moon, The Rogue Song, In Gay Madrid, The Florodora Girl, Call of the Flesh, New Moon and Madam Satan.
Grey’s lyrics for ‘Like Monday Follows Sunday’ featured in Everything I Have is Yours and Hit the Deck was based on his stage musical from 1927.
As late as 2010 The Guardian was still perpetuating the myth that Clifford Grey was also an Olympic bobsleigher and winner of a gold medal. This arises from a confusion with athlete Clifford ‘Tippi’ Gray (1892-1968), who also dabbled in songwriting.
Herbert Pope Stothart (1885-1949) is a composer whose name is less familiar today than, say, Dimitri Tiomkin or Max Steiner, but in Hollywood’s golden age he was ranked alongside them for his work at MGM.
Stothart had a successful career writing stage musicals, most notably Rose-Marie, but was invited to join Metro in 1929. He signed a contract and stayed there for the rest of his life.
Scores by Stothart were prominent in some of the studio’s most important pictures of the 1930s and 40s. These included Queen Christina (1933), Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), Camille (1936), The Good Earth (1937), Pride and Prejudice (1940), Mrs Miniver (1942), They Were Expendable (1945) and The Yearling (1946). In all, Stothart wrote over 100 scores.
Stothart worked on many of MGM’s musicals. He and Clifford Grey wrote the songs for Devil-May-Care and contributed numbers to Montana Moon, The Rogue Song, In Gay Madrid, The Florodora Girl, Call of the Flesh, New Moon and Madam Satan.
He worked with other lyricists on A Lady’s Morals, The Cuban Love Song, Here Comes the Band, Maytime, The Firefly (composing ‘The Donkey Serenade’), Broadway Serenade, Balalaika, The Chocolate Soldier and I Married an Angel.
Stothart was the musical director on some of these films and also on The Cat and the Fiddle, Lubitsch’s The Merry Widow, The Night is Young, Naughty Marietta, Reckless, San Francisco, Rosalie, The Girl of the Golden West, Sweethearts, The Wizard of Oz (picking up an Oscar), New Moon, Bitter Sweet, Rio Rita, Thousands Cheer, Ziegfeld Girl, Cairo, Thousands Cheer, Kismet, The Unfinished Dance. Musical direction usually involved writing incidental music.
And, of course, Metro produced two versions of Stothart’s greatest stage success, Rose-Marie, and he worked on the first version.
