Slideshow
SUMMER STOCK
Special presentation
Sunday, November 19
7:50
Special pre-show presentation by film historians David Fantle and Tom Johnson on their latest book, C’mon, Get Happy: The Making of Summer Stock (University Press of Mississippi).
U.S., 1950
Directed by Charles Walters
Starring Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, Eddie Bracken, Phil Silvers, Gloria DeHaven
Screenplay by George Wells, Sy Gomberg
Approx. 108 min. 35mm.
Gloria de Haven arrives at the family farm, run by sister Judy Garland, with her full theater troupe and fiancé Gene Kelly in tow. As the performers rehearse in the barn and earn their keep by working the farm, Kelly and Garland (also engaged — to Hollywood’s go-to nebbish Eddie Bracken) begin to fall in love. Features Garland’s iconic “Get Happy” number, complete with fedora.
Reviews
“Garland and Kelly bring conviction to their love scenes and make them naïvely fresh. As a team, they balance each other’s talents: she joins her odd and undervalued cakewalker’s prance to his large-spirited hoofing, and he joins his odd, light, high voice to her sweet deep one. Their duet on ‘You Wonderful You’ has a plaintive richness that stays with one.”
– Pauline Kael
“‘Get Happy’ finds Miss Garland looking and performing her best.”
– Bosley Crowther, The New York Times