Tap

One of the things I'm liking about going to school is the library. It's not a very big library, not like the Eastern library or the Gonzaga library but it has a a set of the complete works of Palastrina which is very surprising. The best part for me is that it has a collection of obscure musicals. It's a small colection but they have some of my favorites and some I'd never seen. So weekends have taken on a whole new meaning too. Friday means I check out a musical to watch on Saturday night.
There was this era of movie musicals that might be the golden era. When Judy Garland and Fred Astair and Ginger Rogers and Gene Kelly and all those classic stars were singing and tapping and doing both at the same time. There are some real duds from that era too. We watched some that dragged so much in the second act and were so depressing that we didn't finish them. But we have found some real gems too.

This is all Heidi's fault, by the way. She posted this amazing video of Gene Kelly tap dancing in roller skates (yes. I'm serious) and I watched it one Friday morning before I went to school. It totally made my day. I don't know why watching people tap dance makes me happy but it does. David likes it too. On my way home I looked at the DVD's in the library and low and behold, the musical from which the song was taken was sitting on the shelf.

It is called It's Always Fair Weather and it was really fun. These three guys were friends during WWII and they swear (to their favorite bar tender) that in ten years they will return from their various life paths and still be as close friends as ever. So they don't see each other for ten years and when they get back to their old favorite pub they find out that they all changed into exactly the sort of people who can't stand each other. The plot doesn't get much more interesting than that, they all kind of reflect on who they wanted to be when they met again and why they didn't become those people. They are set up to appear together on a TV show. None of them know they are going to be on the show together and by show time they have decided that they hate each other, or maybe just themselves. There were a whole bunch of great dance numbers and lots of silliness and a musical fight scene. I love fight scenes in musicals cause they're choreographed like dances and they usually involve lots of furniture smashing. It ended happily which is important for me; I like movies that are uplifting. The roller skate number was the highlight but the rest of it was well worth watching
too.

The other movie I really enjoyed was Three Little Words staring Fred Astair and Red Skelton. It was about a career of a song writing team and their friendship. I love musicals about friendship. Astair's character wants to be a magician but that seems to be the one corner of show business he can't get into with any success. Skelton's character likes baseball. He's just funny. They spend a lot of the movies harassing each other about their childish hobbies. They harass each other about a lot of things actually. But they mean a lot more to each other then they will admit. Lots of songs, lots of dance (it's Fred Astair after all) lots of comedy (Red Selton is hilarious). Both of these are really simple in story and message there are not a lot of show real brilliance as far as music goes; they are not masterpieces, but on a weekend when you just need to relax they were perfect.
See also Summer Stock.