MAME

[Neil]

Overlooked in Mame is the wonderful performance by Joyce Van Patton.  As many times as I've seen Mame, it's only recently that I caught the shot of her in the background in the middle of the "Mame" song, storming off in defeat when even the gassy Mother Burnside is won over. 

I wish they had included a shot of Joyce/Sally after Beau dies, screaming as she reads the headline in  the "Peckerwood Gazette":  "Northerner Inherits Millions; Evicts Mother Burnside; Euthanizes Lightin' Rod"

[Neil]

Now penniless, Mother Burnside moves to Montebank seeking employment and is hired by the Upsons, replacing Bertha who one day got a little too "snotty" 

[Neil]

I only have 2 things left on my bucket list:

Play with a baby elephant and

Make "Mame" into a respected movie musical.   

Here's my attempt to liven up the leaden "It's Today".   You may notice that Lucy's face looks a little sharper than the original.  

 

[Freddie2]

Incredible! The Criterion Collection needs to release special Neil-ified versions of movies!

[Luvsbway]

What's the other track from?

[Neil]

My audio sources:

1. the original movie track transposed up a tone with a little reverb added  (and for the "Fellas, watch out" segment, it's up 2 tones)

2. The OBC version with as much of Angela's vocals as was possible to remove, which I had to take down 4 keys. 

3. The "It's Today" portion of the finale on the OBC.

4. A karaoke version (instrumental) version I found, which is most of the background instrumentals.

5. The opening background instruments are from the closing credits of the movie (that augment the "Light....The....Can...")

Combining 1 or 2 or 3 of the above in any given segment. 

Did anyone notice that Lucy looks a little more in-focus?  What was sad, in the end, is their overly soft-focusing Lucy backfired horribly.   To this day, there is not a piece written about the movie that doesn't mention it.  They certainly didn't invent soft-focus for Lucy's Mame, but there are several shots that are just so jarring. And they didn't need to be. 

If Criterion is willing, I'm available. 

And a couple of "Mame" 'bloopers' I'm noticing for the first time.   A minor one: when she's rolling the wheel of the skate while looking lustily at Robert Preston, when they cut to another angle, she's wheeling it in the opposite direction.

If Patrick came on December 1st (instead of Mame's November 31st),  are we to assume that she had Patrick for nearly a full year before Babcock took him away?   Because  if it all happened in that brief window,  1) the infamous stock crashed happened on Oct. 29th 1929, a month before Patrick arrived    and 2) in "We Need a Little Christmas", Patrick's solo line is "But Auntie Mame, it's one week TILL Thansgivings Day now", which would have been at least 2 weeks before he arrived  (and BTW in the OBC, the lyric is "one week PAST T'giving Day...")

[Mr. Wilson]

I happen to think Mame is one of the best old fashion musicals ever made.  Lucy was great in it but unfortunately 1974 wasn't the year for this film.  People were flocking to see Last Tango (ugh!) and The Exorcist.  Lucy's voice was okay and since the songs for Mame don't require a Julie Andrews voice Lucy did just fine.  I'm glad Angela Lansburied didn't get this film.  Miss Lansburied made only one good film and it was in a supporting role The Manchurian Candidate otherwise I don't care for her work especially that Murder, She Wrote crap which was just horrible.  Lucy is great as Mame and the film is a joyful and jubilant musical.  I'm glad she did it.

Edited October 2, 2017 by Mr. Wilson
spelling error

[Mot Morenzi]

2 hours ago, Mr. Wilson said:

I'm glad Angela Lansburied didn't get this film.  Miss Lansburied made only one good film and it was in a supporting role.

 You're absolutely entitled to your opinion, of course, but is the deliberate misspelling of her last name really necessary? Surely we can discuss our views of both Lucy and Angela without resorting to tactics like this. I think Lucy's talent can stand on its own merits without putting down her predecessor in a petty fashion. There have been enough flamewars about this movie already - let's try to keep things civil. 

[Neil]

An a sort-of-off-topic about Mame.  The cut number "That's How Young I Feel":   I've only seen Rudy Vallee on his 2 Lucy appearances, but.....

Did Rudy Vallee ever squeal?   And if so, was "a Rudy Vallee squeal" a "thing"?

It's hard to imagine working a squeal into "The Whippenpoof Song"  where he, as Ricky put it,   "cantando BAH BAH BAH"

And in response to "Mot", yes the flamers do have it in for Lucy in Mame, with a vitriol never, to my knowledge, aimed at any other star.   They take the most umbrage with her singing (though I think she'll sound better in my "NEW MAME", the Gitterman Version) and the soft-focus shots, which I've also cleaned up.   If people didn't know her actual age (noted in different sources as 61 to 64.  She was actually 61 at the time of filming), it wouldn't have been a big deal.  She looked great and moved like a woman 20 years younger, so she was not "too old" for the part.    Going through Mame for my edit, what I'm noticing most is the lack of musical underscoring on scenes that without it, have a tendency to fall flat. 

Personally, if I had one casting difference to make in any Broadway-to-Hollywood musical, it would be Ethel Merman instead of Roz Russell in "Gypsy".  And I do like Roz...and the dubbing was expertly done, but it's the one Merman Broadway role that really needed to be captured on film.   While not in the annals of "classic musicals", "Gypsy" is better received than "Mame". 

[Freddie2]

I always assumed that “The Squeal” referred to all the girls squealing because Rudy was just too much.

 

Sci Fi fans and Broadway fans can be the most fussy, anal retentive people sometimes. Even sports rivalries always seem to be all in good fun. 

[Neil]

17 hours ago, Freddie2 said:

I always assumed that “The Squeal” referred to all the girls squealing because Rudy was just too much.

 

Sci Fi fans and Broadway fans can be the most fussy, anal retentive people sometimes. Even sports rivalries always seem to be all in good fun. 

Well in 1970 Vallee was still packing them in to The Hairy Ape (or was it the Hungry Hippie?), putting a wig on backwards and singing updated version of "Whippenpoof Song"  ("We are hip little cats who have grooved our way...Bah....Bah....Bah") .  This episode is so outrageous it's one of my HL guilty pleasures. 

[Mot Morenzi]

On October 3, 2017 at 11:39 AM, Freddie2 said:

Sci Fi fans and Broadway fans can be the most fussy, anal retentive people sometimes. Even sports rivalries always seem to be all in good fun. 

You're absolutely right about that, and I regret taking part in such behavior in the past. I truly try to avoid that now and be reasonable in these types of discussions. It's fine to have personal preferences, but the endless comparisons and put-downs accomplish nothing. Take each performer and production on its own terms, I say. 

[Neil]

Coming soon!   The NEW movie version of  Mame.  Tighter, sharper and, I think, a better movie at 108 minutes instead of 132.  I'll probably have to upload to youtube in 2 sections...and am not sure they'll let me do it.   If not, I'll post the dropbox link.   Doesn't Lucy sound (and look) better?

Here's OUR official trailer.  I don't think the original shows the movie off to great advantage.  It's the only one I've ever seen.  I wonder if there was more than one. 

 

[Will]

I cannot wait for this.   This is my first Lucy movie I watched as a kid and is special to me

[HarryCarter]

Great work, Neil! This is a much more exciting trailer than the original. 

[Freddie2]

Incredible! I never realized how drab the narrator sounded till he was matched up with your energized editing.

[Neil]

Youtube slapped my hand with a plain and definite NO!  So I'm going to try it this way.  I've uploaded "Act 1" to my dropbox account and here's the link.  In theory by sending this link, anyone with it can view WITHOUT having to set up a dropbox account of their own by I'm not sure.   It CAN be viewed streamed from Dropbox but depending on the speed of your computer and internet, it might be a little choppy.  I always recommend downloading to your hard drive before watching.   It took a long time to upload, so I'm doing one act at a time.  Like one of those "count the differences"  puzzles with 2 pictures, I'd be interest to know what cuts and changes you notice. 

I agree that the narrator is among the least enthusiastic trailer voices ever. 

So try this link and let me know how (IF!) it works.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/i4ws9ct703k92hy/MAME movie Act 1.mp4?dl=0

[HarryCarter]

Great job, Neil! Thanks for all your hard work. You did an amazing job sharpening the soft focus shots. I didn't know it was possible to correct them. I also loved the underscoring you added to certain "hold for laughter" moments (like Vera's "someone's been sleeping in my dress" scene) that previously played too silent. 

[Brock]

This is so thrilling!

[Neil]

I'm doing some corrections on act 2.   If anyone has trouble downloading, there's some sort of cookie adjustment that can help. 

Meanwhile here's an alternate placement of the intermission.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ojkyx0kxzwcm4cp/86-Mame Alternate Intermission Break.mp4?dl=0

[Sdolginoff]

Neil—this is a dream come true.  You have PROVEN that there was a far better movie hiding in there somewhere.   Thank You!

[Neil]

I don't think there's another movie that needed re-editing more; nor is there another movie I know well enough to do this to.   I gleaned some of the added background music from the soundtrack album of "Auntie Mame" and from Mame instrumentals here and there, making good use of the OBC overture, slowed down to cover whole scenes.   Not perfectly matched in all cases but I don't have access to anything else.   I think one of the things that brings the movie down a notch is the lack of underscoring in so many talky scenes.   Makes them appear more leaden than they should play.  Look what I could do with my meager skills to pep up Lucy's voice.  Certainly Warners sound department could have done much more.   I raised most of the songs up a tone ( one key) and added reverb to her singing  ( in review, too much reverb in a few vocals). Lucy's vocals are pretty consistently 4 tones lower than Angela's.   One tone is about all you can raise a key before people start to sound helium-y.  Also  I put in background vocals where I could, etc. and changed key camera shots to closer if I could get away with it.   Sharpening Lucy up was no problem but there were four that were challenging:  "You know you're very good looking/so are you",  the whole "My Best Girl" scenes, "You look so terrific nobody would notice" and that beautiful close-up on the dance floor when Beau is singing to her. I wanted to go closer to capture some of Lucy's great facial reactions, most of which are lost on TV viewings but it starts to look sort of muddy when you zoom in too far.  Went close several times during  the conversation with the Upsons which the original keeps in a pretty wide shot of the three. (The "you know: the 'wrong kind of people' conversation).   I just do these as a hobby because my audience consists of 5 or 6 people outside the board and the handful on the board that are interested.   I always like to have some project in the works (not are all Lucy-related).  This is probably the longest one I've done and now that I'm finished, I need to get my mine on  ANOTHER! 

I hope everybody who wanted to was able to access the dropbox file. 

Here's Act 2.  

https://www.dropbox.com/s/9k3sge14lc1v173/88-MAME Act 2.mp4?dl=0

[Mot Morenzi]

Just discovered that the "other" Mame movie with Rosalind Russell got a Blu-ray release back in December. Here's the review:

http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Auntie-Mame-Blu-ray/102581/

It's worth reading to learn about how the film was shot, and the efforts the Warner Archive Collection undertook in preparing for this release. Undoubtedly the Lucy movie will get the Warner Archive treatment at some stage.

[JoeySanJoaquin]

On 2/14/2018 at 10:01 AM, Mot Morenzi said:

Just discovered that the "other" Mame movie with Rosalind Russell got a Blu-ray release back in December. Here's the review:

http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Auntie-Mame-Blu-ray/102581/

It's worth reading to learn about how the film was shot, and the efforts the Warner Archive Collection undertook in preparing for this release. Undoubtedly the Lucy movie will get the Warner Archive treatment at some stage.

I'm not as assured as you are but just as hopeful! 

[JoeySanJoaquin]

On 2/14/2018 at 10:01 AM, Mot Morenzi said:

Just discovered that the "other" Mame movie with Rosalind Russell got a Blu-ray release back in December. Here's the review:

http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Auntie-Mame-Blu-ray/102581/

It's worth reading to learn about how the film was shot, and the efforts the Warner Archive Collection undertook in preparing for this release. Undoubtedly the Lucy movie will get the Warner Archive treatment at some stage.

Yeah! Been fortunate to have seen this classic on the Big Screen several times and now this! Looks like a stellar blu release and I hope to get my hands on one soon! Thanks for the heads up!