1h 33min | Animation, Fantasy, Musical | 15 May 1956 | Color, FS
Director: Gene Kelly
Stars: Gene Kelly, Igor Youskevitch, Claire Sombert, Tamara Toumanova, Tommy Rall, Carol Haney.
Carol Haney ... assistant choreographer / assistant: Mr. Kelly
Gene Kelly ... choreographer
Filmed 19 August 1952 - 19 December 1952, hence the lack of widescreen. Singin' in the Rain ('52) was filmed in '51, and his next released musical was Brigadoon ('54), filmed '53/4.
In the Tap! Appendix for Gene Kelly; s/b also for Tommy Rall.
The 3 story/dance arcs, from the Soundtracks page (31 chapters, no menu, clearly not at 10min intervals as stated on disc menu):
The 3 story/dance arcs, from the Soundtracks page (31 chapters, no menu, clearly not at 10min intervals as stated on disc menu):
- Circus (ch2)
- Music by Jacques Ibert
- Performed by The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by John Hollingsworth
- Danced by Gene Kelly, Igor Youskevitch and Claire Sombert
- Ring Around The Rosy (ch11)
- Music by André Previn
- Conducted by André Previn
- Orchestrated by Wally Heglin (uncredited)
- Danced by (in ring order): Daphne Dale, Igor Youskevitch, Claude Bessy, Tommy Rall, Belita, Irving Davies, Diana Adams, Gene Kelly, Tamara Toumanova, and David Paltenghi
- Sinbad the Sailor (ch21)
- from "Scheherazade"
- Music by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
- Music Adapted by Roger Edens and Conrad Salinger (uncredited)
- Conducted by Johnny Green
- Orchestrated by Conrad Salinger and Robert Franklyn (uncredited)
- Danced by Carol Haney, Gene Kelly and David Kasday
This is all mime and dance; the only words are on title cards, and then just the title of the segment and the players.
I'm not sure that Carol Haney actually dances in Sinbad; she mimes the opening, but is seated. If she appears elsewhere (perhaps even rotoscoped within the animation), I didn't notice her.
Some of the music in Sinbad had me remembering the lyrics for Rahadlakum from Kismet ('55). Recall that Rimsky-Korsakov helped to finish the opera Prince Igor by Borodin, and Kismet took the music from there (Polovtsian Dances). So perhaps my favorite Borodin music is not by Borodin after all. Or, they were friends, worked together... RK's Scherezade was first performed in 1888; Borodin died in 1887, and Prince Igor was first performed in 1890. Ah, in this Wikipedia article, it states that RK helped orchestrate the Polovtsian dances in 1879. So either RK borrowed some phrases for Scherezade, or MGM did.
This film made me look up a timeline for dance on film, and full ballet begins on TV (as does opera, I think, but I haven't found that timeline yet). Highlights from the sound era:
- 1945 Kitty Doner and Pauline Koner begin a dance series on CBS called Choreotones
- 1948 Powell and Pressburger direct The Red Shoes (film)
- 1950 Nora Kaye and Igor Youskevitch perform Giselle, the first full-length ballet presented on television by CBS
- 1951 An American in Paris (film); The Tales of Hoffman (film, P&P)
- 1956 NBC broadcasts the Sadlers Wells Ballet in Sleeping Beauty
- 1956/7 This film is released. (Although IMDb says '56, I've seen at least 2 sources now that say '57)
- 1957 A Dancer’s World, directed by Peter Glushanok with Martha Graham, is produced by Nathan Kroll for Pittsburgh’s WGED-TV, an alternative venue to commercial television
- etc.
This film is nice, but I can understand why it did not propagate a rash of other pure dance films. It's not as amazing as the Powell & Pressburger dance films, and 1.5 hours for 3 disconnected tales doesn't feel like a movie, especially not during the age of TV. (The same can be said for anthology films, which are few and far between.)
MGM, dir. Kelly; 7
