Song is Born A (1948)

If not for a later title role that Danny Kaye really wanted to play (Hans Christian Andersen (1952)) this would have been the actor’s last performance in a Samuel Goldwyn film. It was the last that Kaye and co-star Virginia Mayo did as contract players for the producer. By the time Goldwyn made this film his creativity was waning even on the heels of arguably his greatest success the Academy Award Best Picture winner The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). For this comedy Goldwyn finally convinced Howard Hawks to work for ($25000/week) him again ironically to direct a remake of their last film together Ball of Fire (1941) which had co-starred Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck. It’s a Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs type story with Mayo as the comely street smart moll Honey Swanson who has to hide out from the law in the residence where seven single elderly (save Kaye) professors have been voluntarily sequestered for years to complete a “history of music” reference for their homely benefactor (Mary Field in both films). Harry Tugend (uncredited) did little with the Thomas Monroe-Billy Wilder story (Wilder/Charles Brackett screenplay) besides change the professors’ work from an encyclopedia (From A to Z) in the original to the music tome. Like most remakes it doesn’t have the charm of the original (nor the great supporting character actors either!).

Instead of the youngest professor Hobart Frisbee (Kaye) investigating the new slang (as Cooper’s character did) this time he’s interested in the newest music (e.g. jazz) that’s been developed during the nine years that the professors have been “shut-in” working on their book. During his investigation Frisbee meets Honey singing in a nightclub and several other famous music professionals of the day including Tommy Dorsey Louis Armstrong Lionel Hampton Charlie Barnet Page Cavanaugh and the Samba Kings (among others). Benny Goodman plays one of the professors (incognito until he’s asked to play the clarinet with the others). Honey initially brushes off Hobart until she learns that her gangster boyfriend Tony Crow (Steve Cochran) is wanted for murder and that she’s wanted for questioning. Using the card that he’d left with her Honey visits Hobart and is instantly “adopted” by the professors which include Twingle (Hugh Herbert) the only one who’s a widower Gerkikoff (Felix Bressart) Traumer (Ludwig Stössel) and Oddly (O.Z. Whitehead). She and the other musicians help the professors learn the latest rhythms. The romantically inexperienced Hobart falls in love with the sassy blonde Holly which eventually leads to a similar (yet slightly different) means to the same end as the first film. Esther Dale plays the professors’ housekeeper Miss Bragg. Paul Langton plays one of Crow’s heavies Sidney Blackmer the mobster’s lawyer.

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