Show Boat
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Show Boat

Year:
Duration:
108 min
Genres:
Drama | Family | Musical | Romance
IMDB rate:
7
Director:
George Sidney
Awards:
Nominated for 2 Oscars. Another 1 win & 2 nominations
Details
Country: USA
Release Date: 1951-09-24
Filming Locations: Backlot, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios - 10202 W. Washington Blvd., Culver City, California, USA
Cast
Actor
Character
Kathryn Grayson
Magnolia Hawks
Ava Gardner
Julie LaVerne
Howard Keel
Gaylord Ravenal
Joe E. Brown
Cap'n Andy Hawks
Marge Champion
Ellie May Shipley
Gower Champion
Frank Schultz
Robert Sterling
Steven Baker
Agnes Moorehead
Parthy Hawks
Leif Erickson
Pete
William Warfield
Joe
Boyd Ackerman
Chorus Boy (uncredited)
Bette Arlen
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Mary Bezemes
Minor Role (uncredited)
Chet Brandenburg
Man at New Years Celebration (uncredited)
Carol Brewster
Girl (uncredited)
Peter Camlin
Croupier (uncredited)
Sue Casey
New Year's Eve Cutie (uncredited)
Chick Chandler
Trocadero Stage Assistant (uncredited)
Sheila Clark
Kim Ravenal - Age 4
John Crawford
Hotel Clerk (uncredited)
Frank Dae
Doctor (uncredited)
Nova Dale
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Roy Damron
Chorus Boy (uncredited)
Anne Dore
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Michael Dugan
Chorus Boy (uncredited)
Marietta Elliott
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Lisa Ferraday
Renee (uncredited)
Bess Flowers
Racetrack Spectator (uncredited)
George Ford
Chorus Boy (uncredited)
Robert Fortier
Chorus Boy (uncredited)
Dan Foster
Deckhand (uncredited)
Mary Jane French
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
William Hall
Bouncer (uncredited)
Len Hendry
Minor Role (uncredited)
Earle Hodgins
Riverboat Bartender (uncredited)
Shep Houghton
Specialty Dancer (uncredited)
Tom Irish
Bellboy (uncredited)
Claude Jaeger
Chorus Boy (uncredited)
Joyce Jameson
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Michael Jeffers
Poker Player (uncredited)
Adele Jergens
Cameo McQueen (uncredited)
Edward Keane
Hotel Manager (uncredited)
Helen Kimbell
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Marilyn Kinsley
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Fuzzy Knight
Trocadero Piano Player (uncredited)
Judy Landon
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
John Phillip Law
Extra (uncredited)
Norman Leavitt
George the Calliope Player (uncredited)
Meredith Leeds
New Year's Eve Cutie (uncredited)
George Lynn
Blackjack Dealer (uncredited)
Ian MacDonald
Drunken Sport (uncredited)
Alice Markham
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Alphonse Martell
Headwaiter (uncredited)
Owen McGiveney
Windy McClain
Louis Mercier
Dabney - Poker Player (uncredited)
Ida Moore
Little Old Lady (uncredited)
Anna Q. Nilsson
Seamstress (uncredited)
Emory Parnell
Jake Green
Gil Perkins
Player (uncredited)
James Pierce
Doorman (uncredited)
Tao Porchon
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Allan Ray
Elevator Operator (uncredited)
Charles Regan
Minor Role (uncredited)
Al Rhein
Minor Role (uncredited)
Mitchell Rhein
Show Spectator (uncredited)
Suzanne Ridgeway
Racetrack Spectator (uncredited)
Bert Roach
Drunk (uncredited)
Joseph Roach
Chorus Boy (uncredited)
Robert Robinson
Man at New Years Celebration (uncredited)
Jean Romaine
New Year's Eve Cutie (uncredited)
Harry Seymour
Riverboat Piano Player (uncredited)
George Sherwood
Trainer (uncredited)
Carl Sklover
Minor Role (uncredited)
Bob Stebbins
Bellhop (uncredited)
William Tannen
Man with Julie (uncredited)
Regis Toomey
Sheriff Ike Vallon
Dee Turnell
Minor Role (uncredited)
Mitzie Uehlien
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Annette Warren
Julie LaVerne
Frank Wilcox
Gambler Mark Hallson (uncredited)
Lyn Wilde
Chorus Girl (uncredited)
Frances E. Williams
Queenie
Marjorie Wood
Landlady
Did you know?
Trivia
When viewing the rough cut, Arthur Freed, George Sidney, and Roger Edens came away feeling that the picture was too slow. In the rough cut, the scenes of Ravenal and Magnolia becoming rich, before suddenly going broke, lasted much longer. Roger Edens cut the "rich" scenes to a mere three minutes which showed a montage of quick scenes without dialogue, set to an orchestral accompaniment of "You Are Love". In the final print of the film, this is immediately followed by the scene in which Magnolia and Ravenal, still wealthy, sing "Why Do I Love You?", and this does contain dialogue. The scenes that followed, showing the couple in poverty, were also drastically tightened before the film's release, though they also contained dialogue.
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Sheet music for this film listed all the main actors except for William Warfield and Leif Erickson, despite the fact that Warfield sings the musical's most famous song, "Ol' Man River".
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In the rough cut of the film, there was a sequence near the end, retained from the original Broadway show, in which a little old lady appeared reminiscing about Magnolia and Ravenal's romance. The two were supposed to listen to her monologue and then embrace. The old lady was subsequently edited out of the film entirely, because it was felt that her monologue slowed down the picture.
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Goofs
At one point, Magnolia (Kathryn Grayson) refers to Lady Southweight and Hamilton Barsdale as being characters in "Tempest and Sunshine", a melodrama adapted from a then-popular novel. There are no such characters in that play. In the scene in which Cap'n Andy (Joe E. Brown) introduces the show boat actors to the crowd, Julie (Ava Gardner) and Steve (Robert Sterling) make another reference to Hamilton, and Cap'n Andy then says: "You have to see the play tonight folks, to learn their secret - "Tempest and Sunshine", beautiful drama of tears and laughter".
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When the townspeople are rushing to see the show boat at the beginning, the camera crew's shadow is visible on the road.
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In some prints, Leif Erickson's name is misspelled (as Lief Erickson) in the opening credits.
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Quotes
Cap'n Andy Hawks: It's Saturday night again!
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Trocadero Stage Assistant: [referring to Julie] What's the matter with her?
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Julie: Where to, Sir Lancelot?
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Faq
Q
How much of this film was really shot in Mississippi?
A
Very little. Nearly all of the film was shot in Hollywood. The opening credits and the scenes of the crowd running toward the river, together with the shots of cotton fields and Southern mansions, were filmed in Mississippi, and in those scenes the real Mississippi River is shown. But all the scenes showing the boat from a distance, and the scenes in which the boat pulls up to or leaves the wharf were shot on the MGM backlot, with the lake used in the MGM Tarzan movies doubling as the Mississippi River. The scene in which Cap'n Andy introduces the show boat actors to the crowd, the scene in which Howard Keel sings "Where's The Mate For Me?" and the one in which he and Kathryn Grayson sing "Make Believe" were shot on that lake, as was the scene in which Ava Gardner sings "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man". The final scene of the film was also shot there, and "You Are Love" was filmed (rather obviously; the sunrise is very phony-looking) on a Hollywood soundstage rather than on the actual deck of the boat. The riverboat was never actually on the Mississippi, only on the MGM backlot, and that is also where William Warfield sings "Ol' Man River". The wharf is considerably more "prettied up" than would have been the case in real life. The wharf in the 1936 "Show Boat" more closely resembles what a wharf of that era would have looked like.The only shot of a real boat on the Mississippi is the exterior shot of a packet boat late at night towards the end. That is supposedly the boat on which Ravenal meets Julie. However, the interiors of all the boats shown in the film are actually studio sets.None of the Chicago scenes were really filmed there.The 1951 "Show Boat" is the only film version of the musical in which any part of it was actually filmed in Mississippi, although the 1929 part-talkie "Show Boat" wasn't filmed there either.
Q
What is the biggest difference between the original show and this film version of "Show Boat"?
A
The plot of the show covers a period of forty years, from the 1880's to the late 1920's (the show premiered on Broadway in 1927). This means that everyone who is in their 20's and 30's at the beginning is at least 60 in the final scene, and Kim, Magnolia's daughter, is a grown woman rather than a little girl. Cap'n Andy is supposedly in his 40's at the beginning of the story, and 82 at the end. This was the pattern also followed in the 1936 film version.In the 1951 film version, only about five or six years pass, and all the adults look pretty much the same age at the end as they did at the beginning. Kim remains a little girl about three or four years old. Cap'n Andy, played by the then sixty-year-old Joe E. Brown, looks sixty (or perhaps sixty-five) throughout the film.
Q
How different, overall, is this 1951 film from the original show as well as the 1936 film?
A
In some ways, very different. The basic plotline of the show is followed, but only in a general way. The biggest change in the storyline is that when Ravenal abandons Magnolia in the 1951 film, their daughter Kim has not been born yet. (In the stage version and the 1936 film Kim is already a little girl when Ravenal leaves, and a grown woman when he returns. In the 1951 film, Kim is a small child when Ravenal returns.) And unlike the stage or the 1936 film version, Ravenal actually does meet Julie in a crucial new scene near the end of the film. Another change is that the "miscegenation" scene, in which it is revealed that Julie (Ava Gardner) is part-black and therefore illegally married to her white husband (Robert Sterling), is given much less shock value than in the play or the 1936 film. This is mostly due to the fact that when Steve draws blood from Julie so that he and Julie can claim that Steve too is part-black , he pricks Julie's finger with what looks like a tiny sewing pin, rather than cutting the back of her hand with a threatening-looking pocket knife, and neither Julie nor any of the others watching react to this. The screenplay for this film version throws out nearly all of Oscar Hammerstein II's original dialogue, which had been kept in the 1936 film. Several new scenes and conversations not by Hammerstein have been added to this film, and the order of some of the songs has been shifted - for instance, "Ol' Man River" is first sung much later here than in the original show or the 1936 film, and "Life Upon the Wicked Stage", which was played but not sung or danced in the 1936 film, is here moved to the New Year's Eve sequence in Chicago rather than sung in Mississippi, as in the original show. It is also performed as a number on a stage, rather than "in character", as in the show. The "Cakewalk", from the Act I Finale, is danced by the black levee workers in both the stage version and the 1936 film version, while in this version it is danced first by Ellie and Frank (who are white), and later by Cap'n Andy and Kim (who are also white).The African-American chorus, which adds so much atmosphere in both the stage version and the 1936 film, does not sing or dance at all in this version, so that in this film those who would normally be members of that chorus are reduced to being simply extras. A "disembodied", offscreen chorus is heard singing instead.
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Photos from cast
Linda Christian
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