The Band Wagon

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The Band Wagon
The Band Wagon DVD cover
Directed by	Vincente Minnelli
Produced by	Arthur Freed
Starring	Fred Astaire Cyd Charisse Oscar Levant Nanette Fabray
Distributed by	MGM
Release date(s)	August 7, 1953 (U.S. release)
Running time	112 min.
Language	English
Budget	$2,169,120 (estimated)
IMDb profile

The Band Wagon, (1953) is a musical comedy film, released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, that tells the story of an aging musical star who wants to star in a Broadway play that will restart his career. But the play's director wants to make it a pretentious retelling of Faust, and brings in a prima ballerina who clashes with the show's star. It stars Fred Astaire, Cyd Charisse, Oscar Levant, Nanette Fabray and Jack Buchanan.

The film was written by Comden and Green and Alan Jay Lerner (uncredited), directed by Vincente Minnelli, and produced by Arthur Freed. The music was written by Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz for The Band Wagon (1931) which had a book by George S. Kaufman and starred Fred Astaire and his sister Adele on Broadway. It was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Costume Design, Color, Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture and Best Writing, Story and Screenplay (for Comden and Green).

The film popularized the song "That's Entertainment!", which became a standard. Other numbers in the film include "Dancing in the Dark", "I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plan," "Shine on Your Shoes," and "Triplets," which features Astaire, Fabray and Buchanan dancing on their knees, dressed in baby clothes. The film's most elaborate number is the "Girl Hunt Ballet," a spoof of Mickey Spillane hard-boiled detective novels, featuring Astaire and Charisse.

Charisse's singing was dubbed by India Adams.

One musical number shot for the film but dropped before release was a seductive dance routine featuring Charisse performing "Two-Faced Woman" (with vocal, as noted above, by India Adams). Adams' recording of the song was reused for the film Torch Song for a musical number featuring Joan Crawford. The retrospective That's Entertainment! III released the Charisse version to the public for the first time. This footage was not, however, included with the later DVD release of The Band Wagon itself.

Many critics rank The Band Wagon (along with Singin' in the Rain) as the finest of the MGM musicals, although it was only a modest box-office success. In 1995, The Band Wagon was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". The song "Dancing in the Dark" is considered part of the Great American Songbook. In 2006, this film ranked #17 on the American Film Institute's list of best musicals.

[edit] Musical numbers

in chronological order

Fabray with Fred Astaire (left) and Jack Buchanan in the classic "Triplets" sequence

1. "By Myself" — Fred Astaire
2. "Shine on Your Shoes" — Fred Astaire and Leroy Daniels
3. "That's Entertainment!" — Fred Astaire, Nanette Fabray, Oscar Levant and Jack Buchanan
4. "The Beggars Waltz" — danced by Cyd Charisse, James Mitchell and corps de ballet
5. "Dancing in the Dark" — Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse
6. "You and the Night and the Music" — sung by chorus, danced by Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse
7. "Something to Remember You By" — sung by chorus
8. "High and Low" — sung by chorus
9. "I Love Louisa" — Fred Astaire, Oscar Levant and Nanette Fabray
10. "New Sun in the Sky" — Cyd Charisse (sung by India Adams, dubbed)
11. "I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plan" — Fred Astaire and Jack Buchanan
12. "Triplets" — Fred Astaire, Jack Buchanan and Nanette Fabray
13. "Louisiana Hayride" — Nanette Fabray and chorus
14. "Girl Hunt ballet" — Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse

Source: ^[1]

[edit] Stage adaptation

This section contains information about an upcoming play or musical. The content is expected to change as more information becomes available and/or it has its official opening night.

A musical stage adaptation, titled "Dancing in the Dark," premiered at The Old Globe Theatre (San Diego) March 4-April 20, 2008, with plans to bring the show to Broadway. Gary Griffin directs, with a book by Douglas Carter Beane and choreography by Warren Carlyle. The cast includes Patrick Page as the "deliciously pretentious" director-actor-producer Jeffrey Cordova, Mara Davi playing Gabrielle Gerard and Scott Bakula as "song-and-dance man" Tony Hunter. ^{[2][3] [4][5]}

In the Variety review of the musical Bob Verini states: "There's no reason this reconstituted "Band Wagon" can't soar once it jettisons its extraneous and self-contradictory elements. But "Dancing" is some distance from finding its footing, despite finale's admonition to "Admit we're a hit and we'll go on from there." Not yet." ^[6]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• The Band Wagon at the Internet Movie Database
• Newsweek discussion transcript about The Band Wagon
• The Band Wagon (1931) at Internet Broadway Database