The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle

The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle
March 29, 1939
RKO
Historical, Musical, Drama
DVD
C

Slow, corny, somewhat depressing movie that somehow ends up being proto-propaganda for U.S. involvement in World War II.  It's set 1911 to 1918 and patriotic Brit Vernon joins up when World War I breaks out.  (Astaire shows no trace of a British accent, although Vernon was nineteen when he emigrated to New York.  No New York accent either, for that matter.)  Before that, it's mostly a tale of the real-life celebrity dancers' rise and success.  Around the midpoint, when Edna May Oliver (Aunt March in Little Women) shows up, the movie sort of springs to life, and the montage sequence seems to have a better, livelier director.  Mostly though, Fred and more particularly Ginger are hamstrung by playing real roles, and ones they're not suited for.  (I really missed the sassy, brassy Ginger of Flying Down to Rio, as she played insecure, innocent Irene.)  I was getting so antsy that I started speculating on Walter Brennan as "Walter" having a threesome with the Castles.  (He does seem very taken with Vernon.)  Some of the dancing's pretty good of course, but you're not missing much if you skip this one.

William Worthington was in Duck Soup, Jean Stevens in Room Service, and Esther Muir was "Flo" in A Day at the Races, which also featured Max Lucke.  Leonid Kinskey, who plays the "bohemian" painter, was in Duck Soup as the agitator and would be in Casablanca as Sascha.  Kay Sutton appeared in Roberta, Brooks Benedict in Follow the Fleet.  Tiny Jones, who'd just done You Can't Cheat an Honest Man, shows how she got her nickname, here appearing as the small woman who goes through a revolving door.  Leyland Hodgson was also in Honest Man.  Donald "Jumping Butterballs" MacBride has a more leering, less angry role than in Room Service.  Douglas Walton was in Thank You, Jeeves!, and incidentally was Percy Bysshe Shelley in The Bride of Frankenstein.

Edmund Mortimer, George Irving, and Frank O'Connor were in previous movies of mine, and Mortimer would soon appear in At the Circus.  Rolfe Sedan would shortly be in The Wizard of Oz.  Jack Gargan would go on to The Bank Dick, Adrienne D'Ambricourt to Casablanca.  Eugene Borden plays a Frenchman in All About Eve as well as here.  Frank Faylen, who's an uncredited Adjutant here, would be much more memorable as not only Ernie in It's a Wonderful Life, but as Dobie Gillis's TV father.