Only two – ‘Moses Supposes’ and ‘Make ‘em Laugh’ – were written for Singin’. Of the 12 songs performed in Singin’ in the Rain, 9 appeared in earlier MGM musicals. Nor can we limit the definition to movies, like West Side Story, which feature original music (original, in this case, to the stage show on which the film is based). Backstage musicals, such as Gold Diggers of 1933, deal with the problem of characters spontaneously breaking into song or dance by locating their plot in the entertainment world. But distinctions are often not that clear. In ‘integrated’ musicals songs advance plot or develop a character in various degrees, while revues hardly have a plot. The question of the relationship between musical numbers and the surrounding plot (if there is any) is often complex. One cannot define musicals as movies in which characters sing and/or dance without any plot motivation. But most people would not call Casablanca a musical. ‘As Time Goes By’ and ‘La Marseillaise’ provide crucial thematic structure. Casablanca (1942), many people’s favourite movie, includes a good deal of diegetic music five different songs are performed in their entirety within the imaginary world of the film. To address this question, it’s worth asking another question: what is a musical? A few American films offer points of comparison. What makes Singin’ in the Rain different? Musicals are often cloying their plots challenge even the most devoted viewer’s capacity to suspend disbelief the music doesn’t always age well. Dramas, melodramas, and comedies dominate this and most comparable lists, along with representative thrillers and Westerns and the occasional science fiction or horror film. Indeed, while musicals were among the most popular forms of Hollywood entertainment during the 1930s, 40s and 50s, and the genre remains beloved among devoted cinephiles, musicals tend to be marginal in film surveys. Among the various top-10, -25, -100 lists on which this 1952 nostalgia fest has appeared the most emblematic (and most frequently cited) may be Sight & Sound’s 1982 poll of critics for the 10 best movies of all time: Singin’ came in fourth no other musicals made the list. Singin’ in the Rain holds a privileged place in the canon of American movies, comparable to the places held in the rock and roll canon by Elvis Presley and the Beatles. A coda reveals a billboard advertising Monumental Pictures’ next blockbuster, a Lockwood/Selden musical called Singin’ in the Rain. Singin’ in the Rain closes at the opening of The Dancing Cavalier. When their first effort, The Duelling Cavalier, flops, Don, Kathy, and Don’s sidekick Cosmo Brown decide to remake The Duelling Cavalier as a musical, with Kathy acting as a vocal double for Lina Lamont. Stunned by the monumental success of The Jazz Singer, Monumental Pictures bets that Lockwood and Lamont can make the transition to sound. After the premiere, Don meets and falls for Kathy Selden, a nightclub performer and aspiring actress. We also learn why Don despises his co-star, Lina Lamont. A montage shows us the real story: pool hall dancer beer hall fiddle player performer in low-rent vaudeville houses a film career that began when Don replaced a stunt-man injured on the job. On the red carpet, Don tells the adoring crowds about his training in the arts of high culture, framed by the motto, ‘Always dignity’. Singin’ in the Rain opens at the 1927 premiere of The Royal Rascal, a costume drama starring above-the-credit silent film stars Don Lockwood and Lina Lamont.
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