Irving Berlin’s White Christmas

The biggest box office success of 1954 arrives in a beautiful restoration.  White Christmas was once considered mainstream American gold, encapsulating everything great and grand about a prosperous, victorious nation basking in its glory. It has four million dollars’ worth of big stars, knockout Technicolor and music by ‘America’s songwriter’ Irving Berlin.

One would have to be pushing the 80 year mark to remember this one new in theaters. Paramount chose it to premiere VistaVision, its answer to the industry’s format reshuffle. Cinerama was impractical for most movies, and 3-D was rejected by audiences for several reasons. CinemaScope was the big winner, but for overall quality VistaVision was better. Running normal 35mm film sideways (exactly as in a still camera) produced superb large-format images. They were incredibly sharp and vivid after being ‘printed down’ to standard 35mm. White Christmas actually made its debut projected in un-adapted VistaVision, which must have been amazing to see.  ^*

We read that Irving Berlin initiated the movie, as he did the same year’s CinemaScope hit  There’s No Business Like Show Business. Both are Berlin song book musicals, and even share bits of tunes, like ‘Heat Wave’. One of the bigger show-biz deals of its year, White Christmas was planned to expand upon an earlier Berlin musical, the 1942 Holiday Inn with Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire.

The screenplay is a featherweight romantic drama that confects a sentimental misunderstanding to provide a third-act conflict. Every reel has a song or dance performance. Army captain Bob Wallace and private Phil Davis (Bing Crosby & Danny Kaye) perform for their fellow troops somewhere in France, and say goodbye to their beloved commanding officer, Major General Thomas F. Waverly (Dean Jagger). Phil saves Bob’s life during an air raid, forming a bond that leads to their song & dance show-biz partnering at the war’s end. Ten years later, they’re big-time celebrities in clubs and TV, and producing their own musical shows. The ‘zany’ Phil is forever pulling mischief on Bob. Finishing a Florida run of their revue ‘Playing Around’, Phil comes to the rescue of the performing Haynes sisters Betty and Judy (Rosemary Clooney & Vera-Ellen), helping them to escape a crooked landlord. The four end up on a northbound train, which doesn’t stop until it reaches the Haynes sister’s next job venue, in Vermont.

Phil’s plan to matchmake a romance between Bob and Betty is joined by another concern. Retired from service, General Waverly is now the owner of a Vermont Inn that is going bankrupt. Even though it is December, there is no snow and therefore no customers; the Inn must fold. The show biz quartet stays on, and Bob and Betty become an item, much to Phil and Judy’s satisfaction. Bob then comes to the Inn’s rescue with a special deal. New York columnist and TV star Ed Harrison (Johnny Grant) agrees to publicize Waverly’s Inn on TV, by letting Bob broadcast a plea for their pals in the old battalion to check into the Inn for a Christmas Eve show to honor the great General. But Bob’s romance is scuttled when Waverly’s desk clerk Emma (Mary Wickes) blabs some erroneous gossip. Thinking that Bob’s big event is an exploitative publicity scheme, Betty leaves for a job back in New York. Will everything end in tragedy?

Have a heart — don’t forget our needy World War II generals!

White Christmas is of course a string of songs glued together with a thin story, that culminates with Irving Berlin’s popular title tune. With its theme of separation, the song is strongly identified with the WW2 experience, to which the movie adds a theme of ‘doing right by our forgotten general.’  Yes, forgotten, impoverished ex-generals are a neglected minority, we’re sure. We’re all choked up about the WW2 experience, but the recently stalemated Korean ‘problem’ isn’t anybody’s idea of a happy memory. Although the sentiment for the general is transparent, the show achieves ‘professional sincerity’: Dean Jagger’s performance makes the good-guy commander decent and deserving.

Bing Crosby still croons like a dream, despite being rather long in the tooth. He was born in the same year as ‘the old man’ Jagger. Danny Kaye’s clowning is top grade, if an acquired taste. He was a major movie comedian, at this time second only to Martin & Lewis in the Paramount corral.

The leading ladies bring even more talent, and class. Vera-Ellen adds needed vitality to the dance numbers. Her first movies were with Danny Kaye, but she didn’t make very many, and was almost always in support of a male lead like Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire. The movie’s warmest personality, major recording star Rosemary Clooney, stands out in every duet and foursome combo. This may be her only really good film role, as even her starring part in  Red Garters didn’t fully come off. Clooney manages to be an excellent romantic partner for Bing Crosby, who was a full 25 years her senior.

The Bob Wallace – Phil Davis banter & antics feel like watered-down Hope & Crosby material. The mischievous Phil is forever doing ‘helpful’ things behind Bob’s back, like giving their train stateroom away to the girls. Since the four leads haven’t a real problem or character fault between them, the film’s romantic non-conflicts must be manufactured. Good intentions somehow require keeping secrets. Innocent misunderstandings R Us: the General must be kept in the dark about the big plans to make his snow-challenged snow resort into a success. Phil and Judy fake an engagement to goad Betty into accepting Bob’s advances.

Writers Frank and Panama reported that writing White Christmas was a deathly ordeal. They had to please the giant egos in a star lineup that kept changing, taking the story along with it. Irving Berlin wanted Fred Astaire to play opposite Crosby, to make the show a quasi-remake of Holiday Inn. But Astaire rejected the first script. Pro all-round entertainer Donald O’Connor was then cast to take Astaire’s place. The star of  Singin’ in the Rain was a dynamite choice — he and Vera-Ellen had danced together in the previous year’s  Call Me Madam.

O’Connor was currently contracted to Universal for the  Francis the Talking Mule series. He and Vera-Ellen went into White Christmas dance rehearsals, but not long before the planned shooting date, a cruelly ironic health problem arose. O’Connor came down with a malady called  Query Fever, which he caught from the &#%@*! mule.

That prompted the last-minute enlistment of Danny Kaye. Kaye could handle light dancing duties — he’s a superb personality dancer — but not the demanding numbers designed for Astaire and then O’Connor. More rewrites were required to change dialogue and song lyrics, replacing Dance Guy business with Funny Guy business. As Robert Alton’s choreography had all been worked out, top dancer John Brascia took over the big dance duets with Vera-Ellen. They’re terrific together, even though Brascia’s character ‘John’ has no more connection to the central story than do the dress extras. Bob and Phil’s revue troupe is more regimented than the army: when things get cozy after hours, the dance chorus and crew vanish, leaving the public areas of the Inn free for private cooing between Bob and Betty.

The behind the scenes realities clash with the movie’s depiction of big-time Show Business as a noble institution with warm hearts and high ethics. To honor his commanding officer, Bob puts aside all the deal-making and money-grubbing: ‘Ya gotta have heart.’ Yet the composer and stars of White Christmas all fought for every cent they could squeeze out of the project. Donald O’Connor may have been a simple loan out. We’re told that when he had to be replaced, the other key profit profit participants had to give up some points for Danny Kaye.

All those negotiations must have kept some agents and lawyers very busy.

An original soundtrack album didn’t happen for White Christmas, presumably because Crosby and Clooney were represented by different labels unwilling to collaborate. Vera-Ellen’s singing voice was dubbed by Trudy Stevens, who had previously provided a singing voice for Lizabeth Scott. Ms. Stevens may never have received screen credit for anything, and it does not look as if she ever received the late-career acknowledgement given Marni Nixon.

So tonight I’m gonna party like it’s 1935!

Paramount’s big October ’54 release boasted a new state-of-the-art format, with some warm and mellow songs, two of America’s best singers, and three or four dazzling dance numbers — all serving a story suited for the 1930s, with light comedy banter that nobody thought was very funny. It doesn’t matter, because the show serves up the secure & affirming vision that America wanted. Much of the generation that won the war and saved the world wasn’t yet 35 years old; the nation was in the hands of older people that subscribed to pre-war values. Teenagers were just being ‘invented.’ The power of Youth Culture wouldn’t fully kick in until the Beatles and the Summer of Love, a decade later.

One of my first memories (1956?) is sitting with older relatives in Sioux City Iowa watching The Lawrence Welk Show on a tiny B&W TV. When we see White Christmas now, I have to think that Lawrence Welk was striving to give his show the same appeal: no conflict, no challenge, just rosy-cheeked (white) entertainers giving forth with nostalgic tunes.

In the 1960s White Christmas became a holiday perennial on network TV, every December from 1964 to 1968. We must have watched it three years in a row, stretched by at least an hour by corporate commercial breaks. At age 12, I’d fall asleep before the finale, before the Santa Claus costumes and the snow arrived. It was a Great Movie because … everybody said so, it just was.  It doubtless prompted as many new color TV sales as the Rose Bowl Parade. We watched it on a 19-inch B&W set, and imagined the colors.

By now, most of the target audience for the movie passed on ten years ago. It can only have second-hand relevance for people of my age. To those born after 1955, it is as irrelevant as ancient history. Entertainment greats of the 20th century are quickly becoming obscure — just ask a non-film-freak college kid who Cary Grant was.

But those people who still care about movie history will find that White Christmas still has appeal. Danny Kaye’s antics are not to everyone’s liking, but his talent is undeniable; Bing Crosby is as subdued-mellow as always. Vera-Ellen is a bit leaner than in On the Town, but is even more of a powerhouse in her showcase dance numbers. It’s amusing to see her lingering mid-dance two-shot with none other than George Chakiris.  ←

Rosemary Clooney’s on-screen personality is what puts the movie over the top. Even in the artificial construct of ‘Betty,’ Clooney projects peace and sincerity in everything she does. She’s a showbiz pro, yet also feels like a beloved relative, someone we’d look forward to seeing at holiday time. Clooney made comparatively few films and wasn’t a regular on TV variety shows. Perhaps she found more happiness and satisfaction by staying out of the big-star rat race.