Crooner | |
Director: | Lloyd Bacon |
Producer: | Lucien Hubbard |
Screenplay: | Charles Kenyon |
Story: | based on a story by Rian James |
Starring: | David Manners Ann Dvorak |
Music: | Vitaphone Orchestra conducted by Leo F. Forbstein |
Cinematography: | Robert Kurrle |
Editing: | Howard Bretherton |
Studio: | First National Pictures, Inc. |
Distributor: | First National Pictures |
Runtime: | 67 minutes |
Country: | United States |
Language: | English |
Crooner is a 1932 American pre-Code musical drama film directed by Lloyd Bacon and starring David Manners along with Ann Dvorak and Ken Murray. It concerns the abrupt rise and fall of a popular crooner, Teddy Taylor.[1]
A print is held by the Library of Congress.[2]
Teddy Taylor is the leader of Ted Taylor's Collegians. One night, his usual singer can't sing. He decides to try out singing. However, his voice can't be heard over the band. A dancer stops and jokes with him by handing him a megaphone. Taylor sings through it, and he is heard. The ladies are enamored with his soft voice while the men are disgusted. Taylor becomes a big star over night, but his ego becomes inflated. Things come to a head when Taylor loses his temper and punches a heckler in the audience, who he didn't realize was a cripple. Shunned, he loses his girlfriend, his band, his fame, and his dignity.
In the final scene, as a drunk and unhappy Peter Sturgis, who promoted Teddy Taylor into a singing star and gave up his fiancée Judy Mason to him, continues to drink heavily in a speakeasy, an announcer on the speakeasy's radio proclaims, "…And now, it is our great privilege to bring to you the new sensation of the air, Bang Busby, who will croon for you in his inimitable manner, 'Sweethearts Forever'". As the song, which had already been sung a number of times by Teddy Taylor, begins to be heard, Sturgis grabs a bottle and hurls it at the radio, breaking it.
+Uncredited (in order of appearance) | ||
Herman Bing | German-accented vaudevillian with dachshunds | |
Sumner Getchell | Teddy's band member | |
John Harron | Teddy's band member | |
Harry Stubbs | Stage manager who cuts performance of Teddy's band | |
Brick Holton [voice only] | Teddy Taylor's singing voice | |
Dennis O'Keefe | Man on dance floor | |
William Bailey | Man on dance floor | |
Leo White | Man on dance floor | |
Bert Moorhouse | Man on dance floor | |
Mary Treen | Woman who listens with pleasure to Teddy's singing | |
Harrison Greene | Man on dance floor | |
Lee Phelps | Man on dance floor | |
Emmett King | Man on dance floor | |
Wild Bill Elliott | Man on dance floor | |
Sheila Terry | Hatcheck girl telling Meyer how well Teddy sings | |
Hattie McDaniel | Women's room maid who admires Teddy's singing | |
Olaf Hytten | Nightclub patron impatient about having his hat checked | |
Rolfe Sedan | Waiter who comes to Judy's and Peter's table | |
Ruth Hall | Peter Sturgis' secretary | |
James Donlan | Man who shuts off radio upon hearing Teddy sing | |
John Larkin | Men's room attendant who comments on Teddy's singing | |
Luis Alberni | Tamborini, Teddy's singing coach | |
Allan Lane | Heckler on dance floor | |
George Magrill | Nightclub brawler |
Brick Holton provided Ted Taylor's singing voice.[3] Rudy Vallée was originally considered for the role of Taylor, but contracts prevented this.[4] [5]
"It hands a loud but quite amusing razz to all such radio performers," wrote a critic for Photoplay. "Ken Murray and Ann Dvorak help to make this bright and entertaining."[6]
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