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Sound + Hollywood = Panic!
By 1928, chaos reigned in Hollywood. Most major studios had been caught unprepared by the overwhelming demand for talking films. The public knew what it wanted, and voted with its dollars. Critically acclaimed silent films were playing to near-empty theatres, while even the tackiest part-talkies were drawing crowds. Small town theatre owners watched locals drive off to the nearest city with a sound theatre. Silent film, the most popular form of entertainment the world had ever known, was suddenly yesterday's news, and no one in the industry was sure what lay ahead. MGM silent star William Haines later recalled –

"It was like the night of the Titanic all over again, with women grabbing the wrong children and Louis B. (Mayer) singing 'Nearer My God To Thee.'"
- as quoted in Bob Thomas, Thalberg: Life and Legend (New York: Doubleday, 1969), p. 146.

As theaters scrambled to install sound equipment, the studios raced to build soundproof facilities and come up with sound projects. Desperate executives purchased the rights to hundreds of existing plays and songs, and every major studio hired Broadway composers to write new screen musicals.

For all their enthusiasm, audiences were also caught off guard. In The Speed of Sound: Hollywood and the Talkie Revolution 1926-1930 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997), historian Scott Eyman tells us that moviegoers were so overwhelmed by the first "talkies" that they did not mind "that what was being recorded was of no real dramatic interest."

Top vaudeville stars filmed their acts for one-time pay-offs, inadvertently helping to speed the death of vaudeville. When "small time" theatres could offer "big time" performers on screen at a nickel a seat, why ask audiences to pay higher amounts for less impressive live talent? RKO studios took over the famed Orpheum circuit and turned it into a chain of movie theaters. The half century tradition of vaudeville was wiped out within four years.

Sound supplanted silent film completely by 1929. As a visual medium gave way to an audio-visual one, professionalism degenerated in an atmosphere of desperate improvisation. It was all too easy for inexperienced bozos with self-confidence to talk their way into production jobs. And the new technology involved serious drawbacks. Cameras and their motors had to be muffled in immobile booths, giving talkies a static appearance. Primitive recording techniques made many voices sound tinny.

Almost all of Hollywood's early sound films interpolated a few songs. Silent stars with thick accents or voices that could not overcome early recording techniques slipped into quick obscurity, and the public did not seem to mind one bit. In several cases, studio executives used sound as an excuse to dispose of "difficult" stars. Latin heart-throb Ramon Novarro had a fine voice, but he refused studio demands that he marry to cover up his homosexuality. Although his one musical was well-received, MGM sent him into semi-retirement.

Two films in particular provide contrasting illustrations of what Hollywood studios were doing with musical features. One is a mediocrity that achieved landmark status -- the other is a delight that few people today have ever heard of.

Oscar-Winning Clunker
Charles King and his clod-hopping chorines appear on this page from the souvenir program for Broadway Melody (1929).

Most early sound films were melodramas. In the summer of 1929, the manager of New York's Capitol Theater told MGM production chief Irving Thalberg that a decent romantic comedy would guarantee sell-out business. Thalberg promised to throw one together. He assembled a production team, shot the film in just 28 days and had it ready for release that October. The plot centered on the backstage tale of two sisters battling for over their shared passion for a song and dance man. The film turned out so well that MGM passed over the Capitol and opened Broadway Melody (MGM -1929) across Times Square at the company's own Astor Theater. Audiences and critics were delighted, and Thalberg was credited with bringing MGM the first in what would become a long line of musical triumphs.

MGM was the last major studio to switch to sound production, but it went first class all the way. The studio's sound team invented two vital technologies for this film – sound editing and pre-recorded soundtracks. When studio executives decided that the elaborate "Wedding of the Painted Doll" sequence should be re-shot, sound technician Douglas Shearer suggested they save some money by using the existing soundtrack. Since the use of pre-recorded sound allowed for more creative camera angles and better sound quality, it quickly became standard procedure for all musical films.

Broadway Melody cost about $379,000 to produce, and raked in a healthy $1.6 million in its initial release. Advertised as the first "All-Talking, All-Singing, All-Dancing" feature, it became the first sound film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. The score by Nacio Herb Brown and Arthur Freed included seven songs, including the title tune and "You Were Meant For Me."

Time has not been kind to Broadway Melody. In fact, I dare you to sit through it and stay awake. The talking stinks, the singing hurts and the dancing is lead-footed. However, most viewers in 1929 considered Broadway Melody a comparative miracle, with content and sound  technology superior to every "talkie" that had come before. Although Bessie Love (as one of the sisters) overacted, her work seemed refreshing and naturalistic compared to Al Jolson's histrionics. Whatever its flaws, Broadway Melody was the first all-out movie musical hit, and its success opened the way for the genre.

Forgotten Gem
The souvenir book for Love Parade includes this photo of Jeanette MacDonald and Maurice Chevalier performing "Anything to Please the Queen."

That same year, veteran silent screen director Ernst Lubitch put together an original screen operetta that still delights viewers. He knew that finding musical stars for this new medium was tricky. Broadway performers Fanny Brice (My Man 1928), and Helen Morgan (Applause 1929) landed in weak musical melodramas that even their legendary talents could not save. Worst of all, stage-based performance techniques seemed outsized on screen. Lubitch sought out singing newcomers whose personalities might respond well to the intimate scrutiny of the camera. He also found ways to get around clumsy equipment, achieving the same sexy but inoffensive sense of fun that marked his silent films.

As a result, the famed "Lubitch touch" is evident in Love Parade (Paramount 1929), a lighthearted operetta worthy of Broadway but custom tailored for the screen. Soprano Jeanette MacDonald plays the young queen of a fictional European country who summons home a scandalous playboy diplomat played by French cabaret star Maurice Chevalier. They fall in love and marry, but Chevalier must fight to become more than a puppet consort. Love and male chauvinism win out, with plenty of laughs along the way. Chevalier is charming and hilarious, and the lovely MacDonald makes a poised screen debut. The melodic and witty score includes the hit ballad "Dream Lover" and the playful duet "Anything to Please the Queen." A memorable sequence has Chevalier serenading the courtesans of Paris from a window with "Paree, Stay the Same" while his valet serenades the local housemaids and Chevalier's dog "woofs" the tune to the local poochettes.

Success breeds copycats – almost always inept ones. The 1930s would start off with an avalanche of bad screen musicals. When the public turned away from movie musicals in disgust, Hollywood redefined the genre so thoroughly that audiences took it to their hearts. "Come and meet those dancing feet . . ."

Next: Film 1930s