Sing, Baby, Sing

A lively musical comedy in which Adolphe Menjou draws upon troubled actor John Barrymore as his inspiration for Bruce Faraday, a Hollywood superstar with a liking for bay rum. Menjou has a lot of fun, and young Alice Faye is vivacious as the budding songstress whom the press mistakenly assume is Faraday's lover. The Ritz Brothers make their screen debut here, but Gregory Ratoff gets more laughs as Faye's bankrupt agent.

The rest of the movie is pleasant/mediocre, but Adolphe Menjou's parody of John Barrymore is fantastic. As daring as it is accurate, it makes one feel almost guilty at enjoying it so much (the movie was kicking a man when he was down in lampooning Barrymore's drunken antics and publicly disintegrating marriage). Menjou doesn't just copy Barrymore's mannerisms but has conveyed his essential noble but impish spirit, and the fun he is having is contagious--the scene in the hotel room ends on a moment of inspired hilarity, as truthful as it is loony.

This inspired impersonation had an ironic sequel: Four years later, Menjou played the Barrymore role in a remake (why?) of A Bill of Divorcement. That time he was not able to channel, in a serious way, the personality he had assumed so well in this film; it was a terrible performance.

Sing Baby Sing stars Alice Faye as a good singer and dancer who can't seem to get a break on the nightclub circuit. Plucky Alice is down, but not out and she's got a madcap agent in Gregory Ratoff looking for every kind of a conceivable break for her.

An encounter with aging ham matinee idol Adolphe Menjou gives Ratoff the idea that she should get some notoriety with an association with Menjou. It works all too well as Alice's known as a golddigger from coast to coast. Ratoff then has to fix what he's started and even gossip reporter Michael Whalen also is anxious to write a retraction because he kind of likes Alice.

There's far more to Sing Baby Sing than those I've mentioned. Look at the cast and you'll see Patsy Kelly, Ted Healy, Montagu Love, the Ritz Brothers and Tony Martin there. Enough to make you want to see this film.

Montagu Love is Menjou's business manager and watchdog. Not that he doesn't need one, but in this case Love is interfering with Faye's career as well. Healy sets him up beautifully at the Kansas City railroad station with a fake wife and kids in front of reporters. Aided and abetted by Patsy Kelly.

The Ritz Brothers made their feature film debut in Sing Baby Sing and they contribute their usual monkeyshines. Sing Baby Sing got one Oscar nomination for Best Song and it's for When Did You Leave Heaven which got Tony Martin his first Hollywood notices. He wound up marrying the leading lady as we know.

Menjou's burlesquing of John Barrymore was one of many outrageous ham handed parts that Menjou made a specialty of. As for Barrymore if his attitude was anything like it was in regard to The Royal Family Of Broadway and the role of Tony Cavendish there, he probably enjoyed this film more than anyone else.

80+ years later you'll enjoy it too.

While not a great film, 'Sing Baby Sing' regardless has many pleasures, more so than caveats. Not one of my favourites when it comes to musicals and films, but there are also a million things worse with which to spend your time with.

Getting the debits out of the way, the story is wafer-thin which would have been forgivable but it's also same-old-same-old and utter nonsense often. The Ritz Brothers' opening routine does go on too long, and while amazingly athletic it's not a sequence that burns in the memory forever and not as funny as it could have been. Ted Healy is wasted, with only his magic trick properly registering, due to the Ritz Brothers, Patsy Kelly and Gregory Ratoff having more to do and in the case of Kelly and Ratoff their material is broader.

Had mixed feelings on the Ritz Brothers in their film debut. They are admittedly incredibly athletic and there are some very funny moments, however they are used too much, a couple of their scenes go on too long and disrupt the story's flow and they do tend to try too hard, which also makes some of their slapstick comedy annoying and overdone.

On the other hand, Alice Faye is charm personified and sings sensually and beautifully in "You Turned the Tables on Me". Adolphe Menjou is also hilarious in a John Barrymore-inspired role, especially when quoting Shakespeare in a hospital. Kelly and Ratoff have broad comedy that could have been overplayed, bizarre or irritating, instead they have a ball with it and are lots of fun.

Tony Martin turns up in a somewhat randomly placed but quite touchingly pleasant scene with him singing the film's best song (and all of them, while not timeless, are lovely with no obvious misfires) "When Did You Leave Heaven", which was also unsurprisingly Oscar-nominated. Brisk pacing and direction, elegant production values and a script that is not only funny and the right side of sweet but properly allows all involved to have fun with it and not hide behind.

On the whole, 'Sing Baby Sing' may not be entirely heavenly, but it is also definitely not one to turn the tables on. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Adolphe Menjou stars with Alice Faye, Michael Whelan, Patsy Kelly, and the Ritz Brothers in "Sing, Baby, Sing" from 1936. At the end of the film, there is a short section introducing the Ritz Brothers as new talents.

This film was to be an early role for Tyrone Power in the Michael Whelan part - for some reason, Sidney Lanfield had him replaced with Whelan, a bigger name. Talk about getting the last laugh.

The film satirizes the romance between John Barrymore and Elaine Barrie, a college student who later became his wife. Menjou plays the drunken actor Bruce Farraday, who decides that pretty singer Joan Warren (Alice Faye) is Juliet to his Romeo during one of her performances.

Joan has lost her job and gone to an agent (Gregory Ratoff) who decides to get Joan some publicity by advertising Farraday's interest in her.

A lot of musical numbers, with the adorable Faye singing the title song and "You Turned the Tables on Me." Tony Martin sublimely sings "When Did You Leave Heaven?"

The Ritz Brothers are heavily featured, probably a bit too much. Some of their routines are quite good and some are silly.

Menjou does a terrific job, reciting Shakespeare in the hospital and becoming enamored of bay rum and drinking it from a hot water bottle through a straw. He thinks it's a drink from South America, but in reality, when he insists on a drink, Joan's agent finds a bottle of it in the hospital.

Not much to this, but it's enjoyable.