This is notable for the only time Edward Everett Horton sings and dances on screen. A woman (Ginger Rogers) mistakes a flirt (Fred Astaire) for her lawyer's co-respondent. [2] It also features Alice Brady, Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore, and Erik Rhodes. As you might guess, the story revolves around a divorce, which might be a gay one (in the 1930s definition of the word, of course), and, as so often in this series, mistaken identities. [14], The Gay Divorcee was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1934. The Gay Divorcee book. The first of the Fred Astaire–Ginger Rogers vehicles (they had been featured performers in Flying Down to Rio the year before), it was a huge hit and established the formula that would carry Astaire… The Gay Divorcee is a fizzy romantic musical with some incredibly witty lines said by incredibly witty people, but the musical smothers the romance and narrative, leaving me to think I was watching a compilation of Fred and Ginger’s greatest hits. The Gay Divorcee Synopsis. The censors even crashed down on the stage's original title "The Gay Divorce". Richard Jewel, "RKO Film Grosses: 1931–1951", "Ginger Rogers & Fred Astaire 2: The Gay Divorcee (1934)", "Talkin' Broadway Regional News & Reviews: San Francisco – "Gay Divorce" – 4/29/07", "Earliest Videos/TV Episodes/Feature Films/Short Films/Documentaries/Video Games/Mini-Series/TV Movies/TV Specials With Fred Astaire And Ginger Rogers", http://www.afi.com/members/catalog/DetailView.aspx?s=&Movie=7108, https://www.oldcarsweekly.com/news/ginger-rogers-1929-duesenberg-stars-at-2012-amelia-island-concours, "The 7th Academy Awards (1935) Nominees and Winners", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Gay_Divorcee&oldid=1008767288, Films that won the Best Original Song Academy Award, Short description is different from Wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, Music (Song) – "The Continental" (Won) – the first winner of this award; it won against ", This page was last edited on 24 February 2021, at 23:27. It was based on the Broadway musical Gay Divorce, written by Dwight Taylor, which had been adapted into a musical by Kenn… The Gay Divorcee is similar to these films: Top Hat, Follow the Fleet, Carefree (film) and more. [1], New York Times critic Andre Sennwald (November 16, 1934) said of the film: "Like the carefree team of Rogers and Astaire, The Gay Divorcee is gay in its mood and smart in its approach. It was based on the Broadway musical Gay Divorce, written by Dwight Taylor, which had been adapted into a musical by Kenneth S. Webb and Samuel Hoffenstein[3] from an unproduced play by J. Hartley Manners. The Divorcee is a 1930 American pre-Code drama film written by Nick Grindé, John Meehan, and Zelda Sears, based on the 1929 novel Ex-Wife by Ursula Parrott.It was directed by Robert Z. Leonard, who was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director.The film was also nominated for Best Picture, and won Best Actress for its star Norma Shearer. What a great pair the studio that would become defunct in a matter of years had on their hands!In 1933, the pair had proven themselves as second leads in "Flying Down to Rio", a musical heavily relying on special effects and little else. A psychiatrist falls in love with the woman he's supposed to be nudging into marriage with someone else. The movie won three Academy nominations and the first Oscar for Best Song: "The Continental", a twenty-two minute production number. Films similar to or like The Gay Divorcee. After Alyce goes to London to meet a beau... See full summary », Mimi Glossop wants a divorce so her Aunt Hortense hires a professional to play the correspondent in apparent infidelity. Written by In 1934, a year after accidentally (or not) becoming a pair of stars in Flying Down to Rio, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers were re-teamed for the first proper "Fred & Ginger movie," The Gay Divorcee. Holy cow, that blonde is 17-year old Betty Grable, all-but soliciting inept American lawyer Egbert (Edward Everett Horton), at an English resort, cueing a novelty number to the song by Mack Gordon and Harry Revel, plus a weak explanation for pal Fred Astaire, in The Gay Divorcee, 1934. -Costumes designed by Walter Plunkett Before, Ginger had "42nd Street" to her name, while Fred had the famous screen test analysis of "Can't sing. The Gay Divorcee is a 1934 American musical film directed by Mark Sandrich and starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Tiny roles go to William Austin (as Rogers' blustering geologist hubby), and Lilian Miles (an Alice Faye lookalike who gets to reprise 'The Continental' all to herself). John Wick 4 Needs a Solid Story Before the Director Can Start Thinking About John Wick 5, Everything Coming To Netflix, Hulu, Disney Plus, Prime And HBO Max This Weekend, HBO Max in August: Here’s Everything Coming and Going, Is there any record of the color of Ginger Roger's Continental dress? Directed by Mark Sandrich.Written by George Marion Jr., Dorothy Yost, and Edward Kaufman, based on the 1932 musical Gay Divorce by Dwight Taylor. The Gay Divorcee $2.99 $7.99 Available at a lower price from other sellers that may not offer free Prime shipping. Was this review helpful to you? 28 of 32 people found this review helpful. [12], Exteriors set in what was supposed to be the English countryside were shot in Clear Lake, California. Gay Divorcee, The. That was 1934’s “The Gay Divorcee,” helmed by Sandrich, who went on to direct Rogers and Astaire in some of their best-loved features, including 1935’s “Top Hat.” Sandrich was… Review by Kieron Moore ★★ 2 [10], Dance routines from the film, specifically "Night and Day" and the scene where Astaire dances on the table, were taken from Astaire's performances in the original play, The Gay Divorce. While they are in Mimi's bedroom, Tonetti arrives, revealing the truth, and holds them "prisoner" to suit the plan. But Egbert forgets to arrange for private detectives to "catch" the couple. Read 16 reviews from the world's largest community for readers. [9], After the success of Astaire and Rogers' first feature, Flying Down to Rio, RKO's head of production, Pandro S. Berman, purchased the screen rights to Dwight Taylor's Broadway hit Gay Divorce with another Astaire and Rogers matchup in mind. The latter is performed by a young Betty Grable. For subsidiary humor, there are Alice Brady as the talkative aunt; Edward Everett Horton as the confused lawyer .. and Erik Rhodes ... as the excitable correspondent, who takes the correct pride in his craftsmanship and objects to outside interference. Other great numbers in there include "Looking for a needle in a haystack", "Don't Let it Bother You" and "Let's K-nock- K-nees". Three members of the play's original cast repeated their stage roles: Astaire, Rhodes, and Eric Blore.[5]. The story of the dancing team who taught the world to two-step. History proved them wrong, and ‘The Gay Divorce’ is the movie that made Astaire-Rogers the most famous dancing team in film history.” Variety … By coincidence, Guy Holden (Fred Astaire), an American dancer and friend of Egbert's, who briefly met Mimi on his arrival in England, and who is now besotted with her, also arrives at the hotel, only to be mistaken by Mimi for the co-respondent she has been waiting for. The Gay Divorcees is a band of real-life queers who got gay married and gay divorced, led by composer Ethan Philbrick, who came together during a pandemic to write songs about getting into and out of state-sanctioned intimacy in the 21st century. Robert Benchley, H. W. Hanemann, and Stanley Rauh made uncredited contributions to the dialogue. This is one of the forgotten musicals of the time which has it all.Rating: 8/10. Gay Divorce (Original, Musical, Comedy, Broadway) opened in New York City Nov 29, 1932 and played through Jul 1, 1933. All of them plus the Continental, help to make the new Music Hall show the source of a good deal of innocent merriment." [10], The car driven by Ginger Rogers was her own, a 1929 Duesenberg Model J, and it still exists, and has been displayed at least once, at the Amelia Island Car show, Concours d'Elegance. The whole thing is irresistible, spectacular and unforgettable. The Gay Divorcee movie reviews & Metacritic score: An American woman travels to England to seek a divorce from her absentee husband, where she meets - and falls for - … Title: [10], The title from the musical – Gay Divorce – was dropped "as too frivolous toward marriage by the censors" and modified to Divorcee. Without a doubt, high comedy and immense creativity make up for it. Under the guidance of her domineering and much-married Aunt Hortense (Alice Brady), she consults incompetent and bumbling lawyer Egbert Fitzgerald (Edward Everett Horton), once a fiancé of her aunt. He was definitely one of the best supporting comedians of the 1930s and 1940s, in other Astaire and Rogers musicals, and movies like "Lost Horizon", "Holiday", "Here Comes Mr Jordan" and "Arsenic and Old Lace".Only one song was retained for the filmic version of "The Gay Divorcee". San Francisco '' is the entire story with the title the Gay Divorcee is a 1934 Screwball Comedy musical starring... 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