Based on the DVD supplements, it appears MGM cut one of Powell's numbers--"I'd Rather Dance". It must be one of the great Hollywood mysteries of all time how, considering all the stretches of tedium in this movie and the fact Powell is the only good thing in the whole enterprise, a studio would delete one of her dances.
Since Powell is relegated to a supporting Girl Friday/Matchmaker role, the film rests on the shoulders of Robert Young and Ann Sothern, whose roles are so painfully vile and obnoxious you expect them to be murdered by one of their long-suffering friends at any moment, and then Charlie Chan to show up. In their defense, one doubts that Hepburn & Tracy , or for that matter Lunt & Fontanne, could have made this work either.
And oh, that script. The courtroom scenes...the fights between Sothern and Young...the clunky way musical numbers are tossed in (particularly "The Last Time I Saw Paris", for which an entire incongruous "banquet" scene is set up for no reason whatsoever)...Red Skelton falling down 4 or 5 times...one practically yearns for a simple, low-budget Columbia musical.
If you can make it all the way to the end, Busby Berkeley, The Beery Brothers, and Eleanor Powell totally turn it out with Gershwin's "Fascinating Rhythm," which is a triumphant piece of staging, and actually a wonderful version of the song as well.
Since Powell is relegated to a supporting Girl Friday/Matchmaker role, the film rests on the shoulders of Robert Young and Ann Sothern, whose roles are so painfully vile and obnoxious you expect them to be murdered by one of their long-suffering friends at any moment, and then Charlie Chan to show up. In their defense, one doubts that Hepburn & Tracy , or for that matter Lunt & Fontanne, could have made this work either.
And oh, that script. The courtroom scenes...the fights between Sothern and Young...the clunky way musical numbers are tossed in (particularly "The Last Time I Saw Paris", for which an entire incongruous "banquet" scene is set up for no reason whatsoever)...Red Skelton falling down 4 or 5 times...one practically yearns for a simple, low-budget Columbia musical.
If you can make it all the way to the end, Busby Berkeley, The Beery Brothers, and Eleanor Powell totally turn it out with Gershwin's "Fascinating Rhythm," which is a triumphant piece of staging, and actually a wonderful version of the song as well.