He's Got Rhythm: The Life and Career of Gene Kelly (Screen Classics)

by Cynthia Brideson

  Though Gene had lost the chance to work with Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music, another job came his way that involved Julie. The project was yet another television special, this time for NBC-TV. Recorded on March 23, 1965 (only weeks after The Sound of Music’s release), it aired on November 28, 1965, in full color. Both Julie and Gene had strong associations with umbrellas (Julie because of Mary Poppins, 1964, and Gene because of Singin’ in the Rain). Thus, it was fitting that Julie made her entrance onto the television screen by appearing to float onstage using an umbrella. She sang a medley from My Fair Lady, whereupon Gene joined her, umbrella in hand, and crooned “Singin’ in the Rain.” They concluded by doing an old-fashioned tap routine together.

  The program, entitled The Julie Andrews Show (indicative of Julie’s rise to fame and Gene’s decline), merited rapturous reviews. A journalist for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette called it a “pleasing, uncluttered hour of song,” with the dance numbers between Julie and Gene “the major winners.”54 The special won two Emmy awards (Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Variety or Music and Individual Achievements in Electronic Production—Video Tape Editing).

  The Julie Andrews Show was the last significant project in which Gene was involved for two years. He spent the bulk of his time with Jeanne and his two babies. He referred to playing with the children in the backyard as his daily workout—one far superior to any he could get at a gym. To reflect his pride as a family man, Gene had a vanity plate made for his Chrysler sedan: DADDY. The plate on the Kellys’ other car, a station wagon, read, MOMMY.55 “Even if the [jobs] didn’t come in fast enough—well, I could afford to wait and just potter around the house,” a contented Gene reflected in 1973. “This is where it’s at for me!”56

  20

  Looking for Enchantment

  “I’m at an age now when I’m willing to work only when something unusual comes along,” Gene said in 1972.1 Such was his attitude during the entirety of his marriage to Jeanne Coyne. As soon as they wed, Gene vowed to be a family man first and an entertainer second; work would have to be unusual to separate him from his wife and children. Yet, the bulk of Gene’s work between 1964 and 1967 was indeed ordinary. His television programs were merely nostalgic glimpses into Hollywood’s golden era. As the 1960s progressed, however, Gene’s assignments rose in prestige and by the end of the decade, Gene Kelly was once again a hot property. Documentarian Robert Trachtenberg observed: “People really are critical and dismissive of his [Gene’s] later years, and it is true that he was not a very good director on his own, but his intentions were good and he was trying, really trying, to get his vision across, to either publicize dance and particularly dance in America or try . . . directing comedies or westerns.”2

  The best of Gene’s television specials in the mid-1960s was entitled Gene Kelly in New York, New York. Harkening back to Gene’s landmark production On the Town, it was filmed on location in New York City and was designed as a musical tour of the wonderful town. The program also featured dancer/choreographer Gower Champion and two rising talents, British musical performer Tommy Steele and comedian Woody Allen. Woody wrote his own material for the show. His sketch with Gene is by far the production’s high spot. It revolved around Gene’s observation that if a person cannot hail a cab in New York, he or she can take the Sardi’s bus, a red double-decker like those in Britain. Stopping beside the bus, Gene strikes up a conversation with Woody, who climbs down from the top floor. Woody declares that the top floor is his apartment and it becomes quite crowded at times, but “it’s a great way to meet women.” Gene, with a straight face, asks: “Did anyone ever tell you you’re a little unusual?” “Yes. After I got out of the army. That’s what it says on my file: ‘this boy is a little unusual. Don’t let him fight for our country.’”3 Woody enjoyed working with Gene and has often spoken of his great love for Singin’ in the Rain.

  Gene was heavily involved in the television production, in which, as he had done so many times in the past, he filled multiple roles: performer, dancer, and choreographer. Those on the set saw both Gene the taskmaster and Gene the supporter. He was especially encouraging to Tommy Steele. Though he had once stated he disliked amateurs, he contradicted himself by taking extra time with the inexperienced dancer. Tommy was starstruck when he met Gene, later claiming it was like meeting the king of England. When Tommy confessed he could not tap-dance, Gene personally brought him to Capezio’s in Times Square and asked the shop to make “the Limey” some suitable shoes. For the next six weeks, he taught Tommy the essentials of tap dancing. In part because of Gene’s help, Tommy snagged plum roles, most notably as the leprechaun in Fred Astaire’s final picture, Finian’s Rainbow (1968). Upon viewing Tommy’s tapping skills, Fred Astaire allegedly joked: “The Irishman taught you that, didn’t he? He never could do it properly.”4 When Gene Kelly in New York, New York premiered on CBS-TV on February 14, 1966, reviews were enthusiastic and warm. A writer for the Chicago Tribune recorded: “Gene Kelly delivered his own valentine to Manhattan last night. . . . It was a sparkling hour-sized tribute which the whole nation could enjoy.”5

  Now that Gene had mastered the once-intimidating medium of television, he felt ready to bring more innovation to the small screen in the form of a children’s program. Since the end of World War II, Gene had spoken of his desire to produce child-friendly shows or movies. He planned to produce, star in, and direct a television special that would take its inspiration from the “Jack and the Beanstalk” fairytale. He tapped Sammy Cahn and Jimmy Van Heusen as songwriters for the program and Freed Unit alum Lennie Hayton as musical arranger. He also secured the services of William Hanna and Joe Barbera (who had done the animation in Anchors Aweigh and Invitation to the Dance) to do the cartoon segments of the show.

  “We haven’t changed the story much,” Gene explained. “[But we’ve] taken the fright out of the giant” and “changed the plot slightly so young Jack doesn’t steal coins from the giant,” an amoral concept in the dancer’s mind.6 Gene added a role for himself: Jeremy Keen, a peddler who accompanies Jack on his adventure. For a dash of romantic interest, Jeremy rescues Princess Serena, who is bound to a harp in the giant’s abode.

  As Jack, Gene chose an unknown actor, Bobby Riha. The boy had little experience, but Gene thought nothing of spending six weeks giving him dancing lessons. He also wanted Bobby to wear tights to enable free movement during the rehearsals. When Bobby pouted over this, Gene won him over by recounting tales of his own boyhood when he had been teased for dancing. “You don’t have to wear tights. Just wear loose fitting pants,” Gene compromised.7

  Because the bulk of the program was shot with only Gene and Bobby before a blue screen, Gene used his storytelling talent to help Bobby envision the animated characters and backgrounds that the animators would draw in later. Less enjoyable for Gene were the sequences in which he and Bobby had to be fitted with harnesses and wires at the hips and lifted in the air. Gene was not at ease with heights. Bobby, on the other hand, relished it and often asked to be lifted up while he ate lunch. Gene ate safely at floor level. Bobby considered working with Gene the highlight of his career. Though he and Gene never had a disagreement on the set, Bobby almost made a misstep when he saw Gene without his toupee. He was about to comment when members of the crew warned him that Gene’s baldness was a sensitive subject. Bobby tactfully said nothing.

  On February 26, 1967, Jack and the Beanstalk made its premiere to receptive audiences and critics. A writer for Dance magazine noted that the mix of live action and cartoon exhibited “perfect technical follow-through” and concluded that “there is one personality which leaves its indelible imprimatur for all the public to see. That one, it need hardly be added, is Gene Kelly.”8 At the primetime Emmy Awards for 1967, Gene, as producer, took home the statuette bestowed upon Jack and the Beanstalk as Best Children’s Program.

  Gene, with renewed confidence from his success on television, felt ready to return to the big screen after a six-year absence in a film that wo
uld take him back to his beloved France.

  At the behest of French director Jacques Demy, Gene accepted a supporting role in a new musical, The Young Girls of Rochefort. Gene had been impressed with Demy’s pioneering work in The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) and the new life it had breathed into the art of cinedance. Demy’s films were like operas; they were essentially all song and dance with minimal dialogue interspersed. For his part, Demy had been so intent on having France’s favorite American in Paris appear in the film that he had postponed its production for two years, waiting for Gene to be free from other commitments. Though Gene was staunch in his opposition to projects that separated him from his family, he found the prospect of appearing in a French musical irresistible. Accepting the role in The Young Girls of Rochefort, he simultaneously agreed to direct a film for producer Frank McCarthy at Twentieth Century-Fox. An ultra-modern spoof on sex entitled A Guide for the Married Man, the picture was a chance for Gene to broaden his experience and challenge himself as a director.

  At fifty-five, Gene could have gone into permanent retirement, but this was not an option for a man as alert and energetic as he. Gene flew to France for the film’s six-week shoot in summer 1967. In The Young Girls of Rochefort, he added much-needed zest to the dancing segments of the picture. Those in which he did not appear, choreographed by Norman Maen, came across as stage bound, with dancers clustered before the camera rather than “besporting themselves through the town.”9

  The Young Girls of Rochefort tells the story of fraternal twin sisters Delphine and Solange Garnier, who find love in their hometown, the seaside village of Rochefort. Solange finds her ideal man in American concert pianist Andy Miller (Gene). Andy is visiting a friend in Rochefort when he discovers the manuscript of a masterful concerto that he learns has been composed by Solange. Delphine finds her match in an idealistic young artist/sailor whom she follows to Paris.

  Film historian Tony Thomas characterized the film as a “sincere homage to the Hollywood musical.”10 The production does indeed have similarities to the genre. Like An American in Paris, The Young Girls of Rochefort relies heavily on music, dance, and color to illustrate the characters’ personalities and moods. Using pastel hues of pink, yellow, blue, and white, Jacques Demy filmed the entire picture in the real town of Rochefort-sur-Mer. All of the actors’ outfits and even hairstyles match to some degree, varying only in color. The complementary colors and styles make the film a cohesive and exalting visual experience. Gene designed his own numbers; the most memorable one, “Andy Amoureux,” shows him dancing through the streets of Rochefort, interacting alternately with children and two sailors. The sequence is like a melding of “I Got Rhythm” from An American in Paris and “New York, New York” from On the Town.

  Gene later expressed that he felt the film could have been better had Demy engaged professional singers and dancers for the leading ladies. Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Dorléac were lovely but required dubbing. The dubbed singing of all the principals and the dubbed speaking voices of Gene and his costar George Chakiris (of West Side Story, 1961, fame) also detracted from the picture’s effectiveness. (Gene did voice a small bit of his own dialogue because of his proficiency in French.) “Dubbing puts a great strain on a musical. And they all made the mistake of assuming that it’s easy to learn to dance for a film because it looks so easy. It isn’t,” Gene explained. “It [the movie] was a good idea . . . but it missed.”11

  Almost a year after production closed, The Young Girls of Rochefort made its New York premiere on April 11, 1968. In spite of its flaws, it was a box office hit, grossing $8,008,429. Renata Adler of the New York Times was enthusiastic in her review: the “strange, off-beat movie . . . is in French (in which Kelly does admirably). . . . The whole movie [is] . . . fine, eccentric, pastel and dreamlike. . . . The cast is extremely solid and alive.”12 Gene still considered the film a disappointment. Biographer Clive Hirschhorn asserted that it was, in total, “effete” and “boring” and failed to give Gene’s film career the boost it sorely needed.13 However, whatever its faults, the film was an original, which could not be said for the Broadway musical adaptations that still glutted the screen.

  Gene regretted that the movie had taken away so much of his time with his family. Upon his return from France, he claimed that Timothy and Bridget looked “twenty years older. In six weeks they had changed enough for me to feel resentful that I had missed out on some vital part of their development and I made up my mind never to spend any time away from home unless I could take them with me. Twenty, or even ten years earlier I wouldn’t have given it a thought.”14 Gene kept Timothy and Bridget, even more than he had Kerry, completely sequestered from the prying eyes of the press. He became more guarded with himself as well. In 1976, Gene explained, “The public don’t know me at all. My life is a quest for privacy but I know I can never have it except in the quiet and seclusion of this home.”15

  As family oriented as Gene was, his next directorial project, A Guide for the Married Man, was hardly kid friendly. The picture was to star Walter Matthau as Paul, whose friend Ed recommends that he should cheat on his wife (without getting caught, of course) in order to maintain his happy marriage. The friend’s instructions on how to cheat are illustrated through a series of vignettes enacted by a flurry of celebrities including Jack Benny, Art Carney, Lucille Ball, Phil Silvers, and Joey Bishop. In the end, Ed is caught cheating while Paul flees home without committing adultery. He embraces his wife, realizing he never wanted to betray her to begin with.

  Producer Frank McCarthy explained that Gene’s good taste as well as his popularity made him an ideal choice as director. He was the only man in show business McCarthy thought could convince enough celebrities to make cameos in the film. Gene directed the film with innovation in mind; he did not want to re-create a romantic comedy in the style of the 1950s. A critic for Time magazine wrote that under Gene’s direction the film was “one of the niftiest comedies to come out of Hollywood in years. Deftly alternating fast and slow motion, blackouts, flashbacks and stop action . . . Kelly in effect has choreographed the film along the lines of a fast-paced modern dance.”16 In a nightclub sequence, he choreographed moves for a tribal go-go dancer and was not too self-conscious to demonstrate the steps to the girl himself.

  Gene was back in his element working on a substantial project. The writer for Time noted that “these days he prefers the checkered cap that goes with the director’s chair.”17 Gene may not have performed in the film, but he did manage to take on a role of sorts: in one scene, his voice can be heard coming from a television set.

  When A Guide for the Married Man premiered on May 26, 1967, it was a critical and commercial hit. Bosley Crowther of the New York Times called it “the broadest and funniest farce that has come from Hollywood since . . . last year.” More than once, he singled out Gene for praise. “He proves himself a swinger with this film . . . [and] has directed with speed and persistent wit.”18 The film, budgeted at $3.25 million, earned $5 million and firmly established Gene as capable of executing a commercially viable modern film.

  Twentieth Century-Fox had been on the verge of bankruptcy a mere three years before; now, with the success of The Sound of Music and smaller projects like A Guide for the Married Man, the studio was in the black and executives, exhibiting not a little hubris, set up production for three lavish musicals: Doctor Doolittle (1967), Star! (1968), and Hello, Dolly! (1969). The first two were unequivocal flops. And yet, the studio forged ahead with Hello, Dolly!, ultimately pouring over $25 million into its production. This one, executives were certain, would be a hit. After all, it was based on a Broadway musical that had been running for three years and showed no signs of slowing.

  In April 1968, Twentieth Century-Fox handed the multimillion-dollar production to Gene Kelly. Producer Ernest Lehman asked Gene to direct, and this time Gene accepted (perhaps remembering he had dismissed Lehman’s last offer, The Sound of Music, as “shit”). The producer felt that Gene had both the enth
usiasm and the confidence needed to direct the film.

  The Arthur Freed Unit at MGM may have been long disbanded, but it was alive and well at Twentieth Century-Fox, if only temporarily. Behind the scenes of Hello, Dolly! Gene enjoyed a sort of family reunion with his old colleagues. As costume designer was Irene Sharaff, who had created such memorable garb for the “American in Paris Ballet.” Roger Edens, Arthur Freed’s “right hand man,” served as associate producer while Lennie Hayton acted as musical arranger. Michael Kidd, who had costarred (and clashed) with Gene in It’s Always Fair Weather, was brought in as choreographer. Harry Stradling controlled the camerawork. Stradling had been responsible for many Freed films including The Pirate.

  Though surrounded by esteemed colleagues, Gene was not without doubt as to the merits of Hello, Dolly! Ernest Lehman aptly noted that Gene’s enthusiastic attitude was only “outward.” Gene admitted that he “knew it [Hello, Dolly!] was old-fashioned” and that it “probably wouldn’t have been my first choice.”19 When the film went into production in 1968, the stage show was still running to packed houses, which presented a unique challenge to the film producers. The picture could not be released until the production closed on Broadway or until June 1971, whichever came first. If the picture did sit on the shelf until 1971, it ran the risk of becoming even more dated.

  Hello, Dolly! was not a new story. Rather, it was a musicalized version of Thornton Wilder’s 1955 Broadway hit The Matchmaker. Both plays tell the story of Dolly Levi, a New York matchmaker who merrily arranges others’ lives. A widow, she is in love with a “half-a-millionaire,” Horace Vandergelder, a Yonkers merchant. She weaves a web of romantic complications around him, two clerks at his store, a fetching milliner, and her assistant. The story ends happily with all characters matched to the people they truly love. As the two clerks at the store were fledgling dancers Michael Crawford and Tommy Tune; Walter Matthau filled the role of Vandergelder. The picture was to be shot in part in Garrison, New York. Before arriving in the small town, Gene ensured that a street had been beautified and made to resemble the gingerbread-style facades distinctive of the early 1900s. Gene was not pleased at traveling east and being away from his family, but much of the film was shot at Twentieth Century-Fox and consequently did not keep him away for long.