- published: 09 Jul 2014
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42nd Street is a 1933 American Warner Bros. musical film directed by Lloyd Bacon with choreography by Busby Berkeley. The songs were written by Harry Warren (music) and Al Dubin (lyrics), and the script was written by Rian James and James Seymour, with Whitney Bolton (uncredited), from the novel by Bradford Ropes.
The film is a backstage musical, and was very successful at the box office. 42nd Street was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1934, and in 1998 it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2006 this film ranked 13th on the American Film Institute's list of best musicals.
It is 1932, during the early days of the Depression, and Broadway producers Jones (Robert McWade) and Barry (Ned Sparks) put on Pretty Lady, a musical starring beautiful Dorothy Brock (Bebe Daniels). Brock is involved with industrialist Abner Dillon (Guy Kibbee), who is the show's "angel" (financial backer). But while she is busy keeping Dillon both hooked and at arm's length, she still secretly meets her old vaudeville partner and lover, the out-of-work Pat Denning (George Brent).
Julian Marsh ('Warner Baxter' (qv)), a successful Broadway director, produces a new show, in spite of his poor health. The money comes from a rich older man, who is in love with the star of the show, Dorothy Brock. But Dorothy ('Bebe Daniels' (qv)) doesn't respond to his love, because she's still in love with her old partner. On the night before the premiere, Dorothy breaks her ankle, and Peggy Sawyer ('Ruby Keeler' (qv)), one of the chorus girls, tries to take over Dorothy's part.
Keywords: 42nd-street-manhattan-new-york-city, actor, actress, backstage, based-on-novel, breaking-a-leg, broadway-manhattan-new-york-city, broken-ankle, busby-berkeley, cameos
Jerry: It seems that little Loraine's hit the bottle again.::Mac Elroy: Yah, the peroxide bottle.
Loraine: You remember Anne Lowell?::Andy Lee: Not Anytime Annie? Say, who could forget 'er? She only said "No" once, and THEN she didn't hear the question!
Dorothy Brock: Now go out there and be so swell that you'll make me hate you!
Julian Marsh: Sawyer, you listen to me, and you listen hard. Two hundred people, two hundred jobs, two hundred thousand dollars, five weeks of grind and blood and sweat depend upon you. It's the lives of all these people who've worked with you. You've got to go on, and you've got to give and give and give. They've got to like you. Got to. Do you understand? You can't fall down. You can't because your future's in it, my future and everything all of us have is staked on you. All right, now I'm through, but you keep your feet on the ground and your head on those shoulders of yours and go out, and Sawyer, you're going out a youngster but you've got to come back a star!
Slim Murphy: Hey got a match?::Pat Denning: Yep... why I guess so... yeah.::Slim Murphy: Don't happen to know a guy named Pat Denning do ya?::Pat Denning: Why yes.::Slim Murphy: We got a message for him. This guy Pat Denning's a pretty wise mug but he ain't wise enough and if he don't lay off that Dorothy Brock dame, it's gonna be just too bad... for Denning, get me?::Pat Denning: Alright I'll tell him.::Slim Murphy: Yeah well... [punches Pat in the mouth and Pat falls down] that's so ya don't forget.::Mug with Murphy: Yeah [He and Slim kick Pat then run off]::Peggy Sawyer: Ohhhhh Pat... Pat... Pat... who were they?::Pat Denning: Friends... with good advice.
Ann Lowell: [singing] Matrimony is baloney::Loraine: She'll be wanting alimony in a year or so;::Ann Lowell, Loraine: Still they go and shuffle, shuffle off to Buffalo.::Ann Lowell: When she knows as much as we know, she'll be on her way to Reno,::Loraine: While he still has dough; she'll give him the shuffle::Ann Lowell, Loraine: When they're back from Buffalo.::Ann Lowell: I'll bet that she's the farmer's daughter::Loraine: And he's that well-known traveling man;::Ann Lowell: He once stopped down at the farm house,::Loraine: That's how the whole affair began!::Ann Lowell: He did right by little Nelly, with a shotgun at his bel... tummy, How could he say "No?"::Ann Lowell, Loraine: He just had to shuffle, shuffle off to Buffalo.
Ann Lowell: [to chorus girl] It must have been hard on your mother, not having any children.
Billy Lawler: [to Peggy Sawyer] Hey, I've been for you ever since you walked in on me in my BVD's.
Peggy Sawyer: Why, Jim, they didn't tell me you were here.::Peggy Sawyer: It was GRAND of you to come!
Ann Lowell: *hiccups* Excuse me. It's the tight shoes.