The Extras - Warner Archive February 2022 Releases

Episode Date: January 31, 2022

Warner Bros executive George Feltenstein takes us through the February 2022 releases from the Warner Archive.  The month kicks off with the February 8th Blu-ray release of “Gold Diggers of 1933” starring Dick Powell, Joan Blondell, Aline Macmahon, Ruby Keeler, Warren Williams, and directed by Mervyn Leroy.   On February 15th, the immensely popular 1948 Technicolor version of “The Three Musketeers” starring Gene Kelly and Lana Turner, is released for the first time on Blu-ray.  Also releasing that day is the DVD of the popular TV series Legacies season 3.  And finally, George reviews the Blu-ray of the 1943 wartime thriller "Edge of Darkness," starring Errol Flynn and Ann Sheridan and directed by Lewis Milestone.George provides background on all of the titles and insights into the restoration process for the classic films. Warner Archive Store on Amazon Support the podcast by shopping with our Amazon Affiliate linkDisclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.The Extras Facebook pageThe Extras Twitter Warner Archive & Warner Bros Catalog GroupOtaku Media produces podcasts, behind-the-scenes extras, and media that connect creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals. www.otakumedia.tv

Hi, I'm film historian and author John Fricke. I've written books about Judy Garland and the Wizard of Oz movie, and you're listening to The Extras. Hello and welcome to The Extras, where we take you behind the scenes of your favorite TV shows, movies, and animation, and their release on digital, DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K, or your favorite streaming site. I'm Tim Allard, your host, and today, George Feltenstein from Warner Brothers joins the show to take us through the February 2022 releases from the Warner Archive.

But George, before we jump into the first film we're going to be talking about, I was just curious how the New Year is going so far for the Warner Archive. I was just curious how the new year is going so far for the Warner Archive. Well, new year is very strong because we're working on a bunch of projects for the first part of the year that are not plentiful in number, but are plentiful in terms of the amount of work that's going into them. So it's making things very interesting. And next month, we're going to be talking about two very complex restoration projects. And we don't have anything too complex to talk about today, but they're very exciting releases, as far as I'm concerned, all new to Blu-ray and on the film side. And we

have a third season of a very cult favorite television series. So that puts us in a good position. I always am shocked by like how fast January goes. And here we're already looking at February. And part of that's kind of coming off of the holidays and everything. But it feels like we just talked about the January and some of the plans for 2022 and fans who didn't have a chance to listen to the January episode. We want to check that out. Well, why don't we go ahead and dive into the February releases that we have? We're starting February with a quintessential Warner Brothers classic from 1933. This is Gold Diggers of 1933. put into production very quickly as response to the huge success of 42nd Street, which was really a groundbreaking film for Warner Brothers and for the musical genre in the sense that in the early

sound era, which was only a few years before, there were so many musicals made, and most of them were terrible, that audiences got tired of musicals. And films were made around 1930 and 31, where the studio ended up cutting out the musical numbers, or most of them, before the film was released because they didn't want people to think it was a musical. And they took Broadway musicals, made films of them, and only included maybe one song or two songs. Or in many cases, they made them just as straight dramas or comedies without any music because the musical had been just like poison almost.

like poison almost. So for a couple of years in the early 30s, you really didn't see very many musicals after sound had initiated with an overwhelming amount. It was like a smorgasbord of too many. And they were all suffering from this problem of being not very good. And suddenly, 1932, Busby Berkeley, who had been working at the Samuel Goldman studio, was hired by Warner Brothers to do the musical numbers for 42nd Street, which was based on a very successful book that had been written by a Broadway chorus performer. So it was like someone you are there kind of thing, writing from what he knew.

an enormous hit, and it really doesn't have any songs in it until the show portion of the film, which is at the very end. So it really was a comedy drama for, I'd say, two-thirds of its content. And then at the end, you see the big production numbers from the show. And that was when Busby Berkeley did his now famous, spectacular geometric choreography. And it wasn't as much the dancing that was the choreography. It was the staging and the kaleidoscopic effects. And that was revolutionary. And between that and Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers making their first film together at RKO, the genre was back. So Warner Brothers said, okay, 42nd Street is a huge hit. We have two new big stars in Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler. What are we going to do and what can we do quickly? And they decided to do a remake of a remake because there was originally a play called The Gold Diggers

and it was about young lady performers on Broadway who were chorus girls who were looking for rich men to marry. And it's, you know, an old chestnut of a story. I think the first film was made in 1923 and it was silent. And when sound came along, they did a remake with songs called Gold Diggers of Broadway. It was released in 1929 and it was filmed partially in two color technicolor, and it launched a couple of songs that became popular, like Tiptoe Through the Tulips, and it doesn't exist today. The film is basically a lost film, although segments of it survive, and the audio survives through the Vitaphone discs. But the film itself does not exist in its entirety. Little fragments have popped up over the last couple of decades. diminishes with each year because these were all nitrate films and nitrate deteriorates and decomposes over time. So they decided to remake the Gold members from 42nd Street and added some performers that

weren't in 42nd Street, including Warren William, who was not a musical performer, but he had a major leading role in the story. And also the lovely Joan Blondell, who was in a lot of the Busby Berkeley films and many comedies and dramas at Warner Brothers in the early 30s. She was a staple performer and she had a long career. She was in the movie Grease as the waitress. So a lot of people know Joan Blondell.

I think she passed away in the 80s, but she had a very long career. But she was a very young, very attractive leading lady and sometimes supporting lady. And she was in Gold Diggers of 1933. The film begins with a production number, We're in the Money, which was written for the film by Harry Warren and Al Dubin, who had written the score for 42nd Street. And Ginger Rogers is singing,

We're in the Money, and it was the height of the Depression. is singing, We're in the Money, and it was the height of the Depression. And this was, these films were primarily responsible for helping people shake the blues of the Depression. And it was like, and when we see the landlord, we're going to look that guy right in the eye, you know, that was the attitude of these films. And this was also made before the production code. So while 42nd Street didn't really have any spicy content that would now, of course, be considered PG, but at the time was a little racy. Gold Diggers of 1933 is a little more on the racy side, and it's very, very enjoyable.

And it was directed by Mervyn LeRoy, and Busby Berkeley directed the musical numbers. And the musical numbers come, like 42nd Street, pretty much, at the end of the movie. The difference between the two films is 42nd Street didn't open up with a big musical number. Gold Diggers in 1933, as soon as the titles are over, bang, you're into Wearing the Money. But the other big Busby Berkeley production numbers that are in the film include Petten in the Park. And that's one of the songs that's a little bit naughty, shall we say. And one of my personal treasures is I have

a Japanese recording made in 1933 of Petten in the Park in Japanese, that the song actually became so popular that they recorded it. They liked American culture very much in Japan before the war and after, you know, it was the people liked what they liked, you know, the politics and the people are always separated usually. And in any case, someone once gave me a recording of Petten in the Park in Japanese recorded in 1933. And it sounds just, you know, the orchestra sounds exactly like an American orchestra, but it's great that the song became, you know, so popular. And then there's another number that's very famous, The Shadow Waltz, and it's a very long number, and it's one of the highlights of the number

is when they basically turn off the lights and the women are dancing with neon violins that make geometric shapes. And the last number in the Remember My Forgotten Man, which is a depression plea by Joan Blondell for war veterans. You know, World War I had ended 15 years before. But just as today we have veterans that have PTSD, hey, we have veterans that have PTSD. They show people on bread lines waiting for food. And they show widows who don't have fathers for their children because of the war. And it's an amazing number. It's the kind of thing, like when I was in film school,

they showed Gold Diggers of 1933 in a class to use as an example of how basically this was a very typical Warner Brothers, let's be the proletariat people's studio and deal with these issues of people, you know, dealing with not being able to get a job or, you know, still suffering from the after effects of the war. And that's how the film ends. The film ends with that production number. At this point next year, it will have its 90th anniversary. And it's still very much edgy and fun entertainment. And best of all, now it's on Blu-ray. It was on DVD in 2006.

It was on DVD in 2006, and we wanted to remaster for Blu-ray because even though we had a high-definition master, it wasn't up to Blu-ray standards. with Warner Brothers cartoons that use some of the songs that were in Gold Diggers of 1933, like We're in the Money and Pet in the Park. The reason why Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies are called what they are, The original purpose of them was to popularize with these animated cartoons songs the studio owned and had in their new movies. And what's really cool is not only do we have these vintage cartoons to enliven the disc, but we have a pretty substantial making of featurette that goes into the background of the making of Gold Diggers of 33. As a result, it's a really terrific disc. Well, next on the schedule, you have a 1943 film. You want to tell us about Edge of Darkness? Stay with us. We'll be right back. Hi, this is Tim Millard, host of The Extras Podcast. And I wanted to let you know that we have a new private Facebook group

for fans of the Warner Archive and Warner Brothers catalog physical media releases. So if that interests you, you can find the link on our Facebook page or look for the link in the podcast show notes. page or look for the link in the podcast show notes. Edge of Darkness is one of the many films that Errol was no division within the country, nor was there any division within the industry. Everybody united to be part of the war effort. And Errol Flynn made a thriller and it has phenomenal acting from many great actors aside from the stars, Errol Flynn and Ann Sheridan. And it's directed by Lewis Milestone, who had directed the Oscar winning All Quiet on the Western Front in 1930

with its pacifist anti-war message. And 13 years later, he was doing a fine job directing Edge of Darkness with a very pro, I don't want to say pro-war, pro, I don't want to say pro-war, but pro-allies fighting a, you know, a fight for survival story that was very well received by critics and audiences alike. And this is not about American soldiers. This actually takes place in Norway, and it's about the Norwegians being overtaken by the Nazis and how the Norwegians fought back. You have kind of the the irony of Errol Flynn, who most people think he was British or from New Zealand. He was actually from Tasmania. And some would say he was the Tasmanian devil when it came to his exploits and nightlife, but he was very committed to the war effort. And he plays a leading figure in this group of Norwegians who fight back against the Nazis who are trying to invade their otherwise peaceful country. And it's a really terrific film.

And it is from a brand new master. And it's a beautiful Blu-ray. And it not only shows Errol Flynn in the leading role, but it gives a really meaty role to Anne Sheridan as the leading lady, where just as in this country, the women of America fought on the home front by taking over the jobs the men did because the men all had to go to fight. Well, in Europe, the women not only did things like that, but they also fought and defended because they had the soldiers at their footsteps, the enemy soldiers. And Anne Sheridan is really wonderful in this. And Errol Flynn and Anne Sheridan worked together many times, but I think this is possibly their best teaming.

And that's up for debate, you know, but the screenplay was also written by Robert Rawson, who was a very famous screenwriter who won Oscars and nominated for many. He had. Basically, you could say this is a very there's nothing untoward about this film, but it's very adult. untoward about this film, but it's very adult. It's very, there's nothing that's, like some of the older war films, you go back and look at them and you think, you know, that's a little corny or cheesy or that's not believable. There's nothing like that in this movie. This is a very powerful, strong film that has a strong following even today. And you have to realize this film is almost 80 years old, but it really gives you a sense of what was going on at the time.

And you also have some great stage actors, or I should say actresses, Dame Judith Anderson, before she became she was acting, I believe, until the 1980s as a very elderly woman. But she's got a great part in this. And she was terrific in so many films. People remember her as Mrs. Danvers in Rebecca Hitchcock's Rebecca. She's just a phenomenal actress. She's got a great role in this film, as does Ruth Gordon, who's best known to contemporary audiences as being in Rosemary's Baby and she was in Where's Papa

and Harold and Maude. A lot of people think of her as that. She was an actress on the stage in the 30s, and she really didn't make too many movies as an actress in the earlier years of her life. But she and her husband, Garson Kanan, wrote screenplays together. And most famously, Adam's Rib with Spencer Tracy and Catherine Hepburn was written by Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanan. So just a real incredible group of talents brought together here. And the evil Nazi is played by Helmut Gdantin. And he's terrific.

And Walter Houston is terrific. And I can't say enough good things about this film because, frankly, there's a lot there. Walter Houston, Nancy Coleman, just a tremendous cast. And this is what the warner factory turned out you know they would turn out 52 films a year and um i also have to mention that the score is by franz waxman franz waxman was one of the great Hollywood Golden Age composers, and like so many others of his ilk, was a refugee who left Germany because of the Nazis. And his first, I think his first scoring job in the U.S. was for The Bride of Frankenstein.

If it wasn't his first, it was one of his earliest. He started at Universal, went to MGM, and then came to Warner Brothers. So you had this incredible group of musicians writing scores, Max Steiner, Eric Wolfgang, Korngold, and Franz Waxman, all writing amazing scores for the films at Warner Brothers. We could have a whole Extras podcast just talking about each one of those people. But his music here is really quite wonderful. And I can't say enough good things about this film. I also want to mention that it doesn't have a complete Warner Night at the Movies, but we do have some wartime cartoons

in HD as well as a short subject from 1943 also in HD. So it really makes a terrific Blu-ray, and we're very proud of it. The last of our three February Blu-rays takes you ahead in about five years, and it takes you across the mountains to the other side of the valley to Culver City and MGM. And it's 1948. And the film is The Three Musketeers, which has been oft filmed. And given that the story has been in the public domain, even when this movie was made, the story was in the public domain. There had been Three Musketeers films with Douglas Fairbanks in the silent era. There was a 1935 RKO film. There was a comedy version with Don Amici and the Ritz brothers at 20th Century Fox in 1939. But in 1948,

MGM decided to pull out all the stops and make a lavish, swashbuckling, fun Three Musketeers in Technicolor. So you've got an all-star cast in this film. So you had Gene Kelly playing D'Artagnan, and his lovely leading lady was none other than Lana Turner. And also appearing were Van Heflin and Angela Lansbury and Frank Morgan and Vincent Price, Kenan Wynn. And it was absolutely superb. And George Sidney was the director. And George Sidney is usually known as a director of musicals. He directed Gene Kelly in Anchors Away a few years before. And he later directed Showboat, Kiss Me Kate, and even Elvis Presley and Ann-Margret in Viva Las Vegas. But he also knew his way around a swashbuckler or two. He directed this and then years later directed Scaramouche in 1953, which was a huge office blockbuster. And to see all these stars performing in Technicolor

and it being just a great deal of fun, you also get a tremendous classic that has stood the test of time. And because the film is in color, it was reissued several times and it holds up wonderfully. But Gene Kelly's athleticism as a dancer made him a perfect swashbuckling swordsman. And the sword fight scenes are exciting. The comedy is good. The screenplay is good. It's really a winner all the way around. It was produced by Pandro Berman, who had produced all the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers movies at RKO in the 30s, and then went on to produce several award-winning films at MGM. And it's just a superb movie. And we have a Tom and Jerry cartoon to add a little bit of a cherry on top of the sundae in HD, The Two Mouseketeers, which is with Tom and Jerry taking place around the same time. The films are not of the same era. The cartoon, I think, was made a couple of years later. But we thought it would be fun to add that to the package. And it makes for a great disc. And most importantly, this is restored off the original Technicolor camera negatives.

So it looks lustrous. And it's really terrific. we're very very proud of it and then last but not least our our last release of the month is not a blu-ray but is a dvd it is season three of legacies which is a cw show that was a spin-ff from the Vampire Diaries as well as the originals. And it's held up the legacy of those two hit shows very well and continues on the CW to this day. And it continues the story of the twins, Lizzie and Josie, and their various amorous adventures, as well as the Vampire Diaries originals sensibility. And the fans of those shows have supported these shows, this series, I should say. And that's why we're bringing season three to DVD. And that wraps up our February. So it's not a lot of releases, but each one has a lot of punch.

And we're very excited about it. Well, George, thanks for coming on the show again to give a review of all the February releases. It sounds like a nice variety of different genres and should have something for everybody. so much different content and given the extent of our library, that is the goal of the Warner Archive is to have something for everyone. So I hope we can do this again to talk about what we have in store for March. Thanks again to Warner Brothers executive George Feltenstein for coming on the show to take us through the February 2022 releases from the Warner Archive. For those of you interested in listening to more episodes on Warner Archive releases, you can find links on the website at www.theextras.tv, as well as a listing of all of

George's episodes. Also follow the show on Facebook or Twitter at TheExtrasTV or Instagram at TheExtras.tv to stay up to date on the latest episodes and for exclusive images and behind the scenes information about the episodes and upcoming guests. And if you're enjoying the show, please subscribe and leave us a review at iTunes, Spotify, or your favorite podcast provider. That will ensure you don't miss any of your favorite guests. Until next time, you've been listening to The Extras with Tim Millard. Stay slightly obsessed. The Extras is a production of Otaku Media, producers of podcasts,

behind thescenes extras, and media that connects creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals at www.otakumedia.tv or look for the link in the show notes.