When Broadway Went to Hollywood

by Ethan Mordden

Overview

When films like The Jazz Singer started to integrate synchronized music, in the late 1920s many ambitious songwriting pioneers of the Great White Way - George and Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers, and Lorenz Hart, among many others - were enticed westward by Hollywood studios' promises of national exposure and top dollar success. But what happened when writers native to the business of Broadway ran into the very different business of Hollywood? Their movies had their producer despots, their stacking of writing teams on a single project, their use of five or six songs per story where Broadway fit in a dozen, and it seemed as if everyone in Hollywood was uncomfortable with characters bursting into song on the street, in your living room, or in "a cottage small by a waterfall."

Did the movies give theater writers a chance to expand their art, or did mass marketing ruin the musical's quintessential charm? Is it possible to trace the history of the musical through both stage and screen manifestations, or did Broadway and Hollywood give rise to two wholly irreconcilable art forms? And, finally, did any New York writer or writing team create a film musical as enthralling and timeless as their work for the stage?

In When Broadway Went to Hollywood, writer and celebrated steward of musical theatre Ethan Mordden directs his unmistakable wit and whimsy to these challenging questions and more, charting the volatile and galvanizing influence of Broadway on Hollywood (and vice versa) throughout the twentieth century. Along the way, he takes us behind the scenes of the great Hollywood musicals you've seen and loved (The Wizard of Oz, Gigi, The Sound of Music, Chicago, West Side Story, The Music Man, Grease) as well as some of the outrageous flops you probably haven't. The first book to tell the story of how Broadway affected the Hollywood musical, When Broadway Goes to Hollywood is sure to thrill theatre buffs and movie lovers alike.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199395408
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	12/01/2016
Pages:	270
Product dimensions:	9.30(w) x 6.40(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Ethan Mordden is a recognized expert on the American musical theatre and the author of Anything Goes: A History of American Musical Theatre, Make Believe: The Broadway Musical in the 1920s, Beautiful Mornin: The Broadway Musical in the 1940s, Coming Up Roses: The Broadway Musical in the 1950s and Sondheim: An Opinionated Guide, all published by Oxford University Press. His writing has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and The New Yorker, and his numerous books include friendly introductions to opera and film as well as five collections of short stories chronicling gay life in New York City. He lives in Manhattan.

Table of Contents

Introduction
1. The First Hollywood Musicals
2. De Sylva, Brown, and Henderson
3. Irving Berlin
4. George and Ira Gershwin
5. Rodgers and Hart
6. Jerome Kern
7. Cole Porter
8. Operetta
9. Johnny Mercer, Frank Loesser, and Harold Arlen
10. Direct from Broadway
11. Rodgers and Hammerstein and Lerner and Loewe
12. The Last Hollywood Musicals
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

01/16/2017
Mordden (On Sondheim: An Opinionated Guide), a noted authority on the American musical, explores the melding of Broadway and Hollywood in this informative and enlightening survey. Mordden is quick to clarify that his main focus is on Broadway-identified songwriters in Hollywood, following such notable men as Jerome Kern, Johnny Mercer, Frank Loesser, and George and Ira Gershwin. To set the stage, he offers a brief history of early Hollywood musicals, beginning with The Jazz Singer starring Al Jolson, and going on to Maurice Chevalier in The Love Parade and Whoopee! with Eddie Cantor. Dividing the book into chapters devoted to specific songwriters, he surveys the roles of Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, Rodgers and Hart, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe, and others in the development of the Hollywood musical. He touches upon Berlin’s snapshots of American life in songs such as “How Do You Do It, Mabel, on Twenty Dollars a Week?” and Gershwin and Porter’s contributions to lesser-known musicals such as, respectively, Delicious (1931) and Born to Dance (1936). Mordden’s examination is fact-packed and sometimes intimidatingly dense, though aficionados will delight in the level of detail. This authoritative and illuminating book is an informed look at a pivotal slice of film and theater history. (Dec.)

Publishers Weekly

"It takes an expert to measure Broadway's influence on Hollywood and vice versa, but American author Ethan Mordden has the knowledge and inimitable wit to do so... Mordden takes us behind the scenes of the great Hollywood musicals we have loved for years and discusses the impact of Broadway musicals on the movie industry." — Lisa Kaaki, Arab News

"Mordden, the doyen of American musical history who previously has published such seminal titles as Anything Goes; Broadway Babies; Sondheim, and his six-volume, decade-by-decade examination of the Broadway musical (1920s-60s), now adds to an impressive oeuvre with this trenchant analysis of the alternately symbiotic, contentious, cooperative, and antagonistic historical relationship between Broadway and Hollywood musicals...Mordden is an informative and entertaining musical history tour guide, and this latest work is further validation of his stature." —Library Journal

"Packed with fascinating information, this is an impressive labor of love that should appeal to all Broadway fans." —Kirkus Reviews

When Broadway Went to Hollywood is by Ethan Mordden, our most incisive (and wittiest) musical theater historian, who's been at it for more than 40 years ... You'll find yourself having a love-hate affair with Tinsel Town's powers that be, and that alone makes this a fascinating read."—Overture

"Along with supplying strong opinions, Mr.Mordden offers welcome insight...[His] vivid prose exhibits two traits also found in the best musicals: energy and vivacity."—Wall Street Journal

From the Publisher

09/01/2016
Mordden, the doyen of American musical history who previously has published such seminal titles as Anything Goes; Broadway Babies; Sondheim, and his six-volume, decade-by-decade examination of the Broadway musical (1920s–60s), now adds to an impressive oeuvre with this trenchant analysis of the alternately symbiotic, contentious, cooperative, and antagonistic historical relationship between Broadway and Hollywood musicals. "This is a book," writes Mordden in the introduction, "about the work of primarily Broadway-identified songwriters in Hollywood." Beginning with Tin Pan Alley, New York City was the locus of popular songwriting talent, and individual chapters are devoted to all the usual suspects: Irving Berlin, George and Ira Gershwin, Rodgers and Hart, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, Johnny Mercer, Frank Loesser, Harold Arlen, and, of course, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, along with Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe. Additional sections are given to the role of operetta and both first and last Hollywood musicals. VERDICT Mordden is an informative and entertaining musical history tour guide, and this latest work is further validation of his stature.—Barry X. Miller, Austin P.L., TX

Library Journal

Sept. 7, 2016
What happens when Broadway’s musicals try to go Hollywood?Mordden (On Sondheim: An Opinionated Guide, 2015, etc.) is probably the authority on the American musical and the perfect person to write about the important role of American songwriters and composers who looked west to ply their trade in Hollywood. As the author makes clear, these plans didn’t always work out. Hollywood had its mogul, control-freak producers who didn’t necessarily appreciate musicals, forced too many writers to work on a film, frequently cast the wrong people, and were fond of eliminating way too many songs in order to make a “better” movie. When silent films became talking films, they were able to add music and songs, little by little. The Jazz Singer showed it could be done. Irving Berlin’s great songs in films made audiences happy, but they still remained “Berlin-catalogue films” rather than true musicals. Realizing they needed the quality and prestige of the Broadway songwriters, Hollywood started hiring. The Gershwin brothers, George and Ira, brought consummate artistry to these new films. Top Hat, Shall We Dance, and Porgy and Bess showed what could be achieved, almost—Berlin was rarely involved in “planning or executing a project.” Then came Rodgers and Hart, whose Love Me Tonight is one of the great Hollywood musicals, perhaps the “greatest of all.” Here the songwriters’ art merged beautifully with “cinema’s ability to mash time and space together.” Jerome Kern’s Show Boat has both “epic” story and music. In 1962, Hollywood filmed with “respect” to Broadway by keeping Robert Preston for The Music Man. The pace picks up as Mordden describes a series of good film musicals, from Gypsy to The King and I to The Sound of Music. He’s not, however, much impressed by the many bio-musicals made about these songwriters. De-Lovely, about Cole Porter, is an “excrescence.” Packed with fascinating information, this is an impressive labor of love that should appeal to all Broadway fans.

Kirkus Review