I was about 20 minutes into writing my post last night when I lost my internet connection – naturally, I was working directly in the reply box. 
I was too disheartened to start again immediately. Have no fear, I’m in notepad now.
kunilou – I’m with you on Kathryn Grayson and Howard Keel. They’re both way too stagy for my taste (unlike, say, my idol Fred, who was a monument of naturalism – but I digress). It kind of works in this film, which is all about staginess, but Howard Keel always makes me think of Jon Lovitz doing Master Thespian.
Voyager, Fenris – I was intrigued by your reference to the original lyrics ffor “Brush Up Your Shakespeare” and found the following link. Heh. That Cole Porter – what a rascal!
amarinth – disagree about the “show within a show” costumes – I like 'em. De gustibus. I do, however, totally agree about “I Hate Men” – the song itself doesn’t work, let alone Ms. Grayson’s performance of it.
Everyone – agree that it would be way cool to see the 3-D version.
Other thoughts:
As I said the other day, I don’t like that the two best numbers are jammed into what is effectively an intro to the movie. “So in Love” is just an amazing song (it’s on the Caetano Veloso CD I keep talking about, and I always stop and listen to it when it comes on). I was expecting it to be reprised later in the movie – in part because I had a mental image of who I thought was Howard Keel standing on stage in a candy-colored costume singing it in something I’ve seen recently. Then I realized it wasn’t from a compilation movie (I mentioned elsewhere watching That’s Dancing recently), but from De-Lovely. That was a relief, I thought I was totally losing my mind. Anyway, it’s a gorgeous song, and I can’t believe they just blew it off with what is an almost off-hand presentation at the very top of the movie.
On Ann Miller – she’s phenomenal. That thing she does of her toe vibrating at a million miles a minute are called nerve taps, and they are really, really hard to do at the speed and control she does them. I think she’s great – I love her ability to sell a song and dance. And, no, I do realize she’s not exactly all about naturalism either – but her gusto is delightful.
I was intrigued by Tommy Rall. (Totally OT – too bad he never became a big star, becasue RALL would be a very useful crossword entry) Here is his IMDb bio. I’d thought I’d never seen him before – I think I can be excused for not having noticed him as one of the Seven Brothers for whom there were Seven Brides. Makes sense that his main training was in ballet – what a dancer!
A wonderful choice, ThatDuckIsEvil – I really enjoyed it, once I found a copy. (Neither of the two local branches of the library I visit regularly had it, nor did my usual video store – had to go to my backup video store. I was a little surprised.) As I mentioned in an earlier post, I saw about half of the PBS broadcast of the recent stage revival on TV a few months ago – unfortunately, I had to go out in the middle of it, I’m wishing now I’d taped it. I’d like to watch that again and compare the way the two divvy up the songs, etc.
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