De-Lovely

Cole Porter (1891-1964), an American composer and songwriter, is the centerpiece of the film, De-Lovely (2004). The film begins when he meets Linda, who would become his wife. Their relationship is at the center of the story, as well as Porter’s love songs sung throughout the film. Although the complicated nature of the relationship takes center stage, the film can be viewed as a moving snapshot of the first half of the twentieth century, when film made inroads that would dwarf the stage.

The message is clear: quality (e.g. clever humor) was be sacrificed, or “dumbed down,” to be attractive to the much larger movie-market. In other words, entertainment would have to become virtual eye-candy to be attractive to the ordinary American. In the film, Porter’s “Be a Clown” is meant as a swipe at J.B. Meyer even as the eye-candy visuals were deployed to tickle his ribs so he would be oblivious to the insult being leveled at his industry, and thus himself.

Linda Porter is more direct at the film’s party at the set, likening Hollywood to being deep down in an ocean—suggestive of the bisexual activities of Cole having found ready outlets in L.A.—rather than being in warm and sunny southern California. No opening after-party on Broadway would take place literally on a stage. How low class that would be!

Lastly, after watching a private screening of Night and Day (1946), in which Cary Grant is implausibly cast to play Cole Porter, neither Cole nor Linda is impressed. Looking at the attempt to capture Cole’s life in film, the couple could be concluding, moreover, that the ascendancy of film would result in a new decadence—a new low—in American entertainment.

Had they been around, the Porters would have stayed home rather than see the slew of disaster sans narrative films, such as Earthquake (1974), The Day After Tomorrow (2004), and San Andreas (2015).  An interesting question is how Cole Porter viewed the decline in the number of Hollywood musicals beginning in the 1950s as the studio system started to come apart. He likely did not appreciate the dollar argument wherein what is produced should be what will maximize revenue, even if Porter benefitted financially from higher ticket sales of his films. It seems to me that the film medium is not to blame, for the film, Amadeus (1984), shows the existence of low theatre in the eighteenth century, before cinema would come into being.

Both theatre and film can go to the most base in terms of humor and narrative to titillate certain market-segments, while producing truly astonishing quality. Hence, films like Dumb and Dumber (1994) have not been made with an eye to getting an Academy Award, whereas films like The Iron Lady (2011) and Lincoln (2012) likely were. Astonishingly, actors like Meryl Streep can play in both camps, such as in starring in films like The Iron Lady and The Devil Wears Prada (2006) and yet also films like Mamma Mia! (2008) and Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again (2018). I am not saying that the latter films cannot or should not be taken to be entertaining; rather, I am pointing to the sheer distance between such films and those that receive best picture and acting nominations at the Academy of Motion Pictures. The existence of films such as Dumb and Dumber does not negate the high art of the films that are nominated (and win) Academy awards.

So Ends an Era: Classic Hollywood Cinema (1930-1950)

With the deaths of Shirley Temple on February 10, 2014, and of Mickey Rooney (Joe Yule) two months later, the world lost its two last major (on-screen) living connections to the classic Hollywood cinema of the 1930s and 1940s. The similarly-clustered deaths of Ed McManon, Farah Fawcett, and Michael Jackson during the summer of 2009 may have given people the impression that the celebrity world of the 1970s had become history in the new century.  

"Mickey Rooney" as "Andrew Hardy," flanked by his on-screen parents. Together, these three characters give us a glimpse of family life in a bygone era. Even in the 1940s, Andy Hardy's father may have been viewed as representing still another era, further back and on its way out. (Image Source: Wikipedia)

Lest we lament too much the loss of these worlds, as per the dictum of historians that history is a world lost to us, we can find solace in the actors’ immortality (and perhaps immorality) on screen. However, in the fullness of time, by which is not meant eternity (i.e., the absence of time as a factor or element), even films as illustrious or cinematically significant as Citizen Kane, Gone with the Wind, His Girl Friday, The Wizard of Oz, Philadelphia Story, Dracula, and even Mickey Rooney’s Andrew Hardy series of films will find themselves representing a decreasing percentage of films of note—assuming cinema or some continued evolution thereof goes on. As great as some ancient plays like Antigone are, the vast majority of Westerners today have never heard of the work (not to mention having seen it). Even more recent plays, such Shakespeare’s, are not exactly block-busters at movie theatres.

To be sure, cinema (and “the lower house,” television) has eclipsed plays as a form of story-telling. However, another technological innovation may displace our privileged mode sometime in the future. Virtual reality, for example, may completely transform not only how we watch movies, but also film-making itself (e.g., reversing the tendency of shorter shots and scenes so not to disorient the immersed viewer). Although the old “black and whites” can be colored and even restored, adapting them so the viewer is in a scene would hardly be possible without materially altering the original.

Aside from the decreasing proportion phenomenon relegating classic Hollywood gems, who’s to say how much play they will get even two hundred years from 2014, not to mention in 2500 years.  Even our artifacts that we reckon will “live on” forever (even if global warming has rid the planet of any humans to view the classics) will very likely come to their own “clustered deaths.” We humans have much difficulty coming to terms with the finiteness of our own world and ourselves within a mere slice of history. As Joe Yule remarked as Mickey Rooney in 2001, “Mickey Rooney is not great. Mickey Rooney was fortunate to have been an infinitesimal part of motion pictures and show business.”[1] En effet, motion pictures can be viewed as an infinitesimal phenomenon from the standpoint of the totality of history.

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[1]Donna Freydkin, “Mickey Rooney Dead at 93” USA Today, April 7, 2014.