Jun
7

I’ll See You in My Dreams (1951)

Posted in 1951

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Hollywood’s tradition of composer biographies is a crowded (and heavily fictionalized) subgenre, but make room for I’ll See You in My Dreams, an enjoyably low-key account of the life of lyricist Gus Kahn. Danny Thomas, in one of his rare big-screen leads, plays the scrappy writer, and Doris Day plays wife (and sometime collaborator) Grace LeBoy Kahn. The film has the customary rise-and-fall of a showbiz career and marriage, with a couple of standard-issue conflicts thrown in: Kahn is tempted by the glitz of Broadway and the appeal of a shapely diva (Patrice Wymore), becomes depressed over a dip in his popularity, and is embarrassed by his wife’s decision-making (Grace comes across as the Yoko of the era-although the movie endorses her bossy approach). Director Michael Curtiz, who had a lot to do with Day’s early movie career, imparts an elegant look to the black-and-white interiors, and he fully embraces the cornpone twists of the story. Doris is Doris, and although Danny Thomas doesn’t prove himself a great movie presence here, his offhand style wears well. But there is one huge reason to watch the movie, and that’s the soundtrack, which brings home just how much Kahn was the lyric voice of the 1920s, the tunesmith for the F. Scott Fitzgerald age. When you realize that “Ain’t We Got Fun,” “My Buddy,” “Toot Toot Tootsie,” and “Yes Sir, That’s My Baby” were written by the same lyricist, you can see how Kahn owned the flapper era. The puckish highlight is a fun duet with Thomas and Day on “Makin’ Whoopee,” which proves that classic doesn’t need Michelle Pfeiffer to succeed.