"Fred Astaire, Eleanor Powell, and George Murphy. That's a lot of tapping. Astaire and Murphy are both hoping to get the Broadway role opposite the dancing star, Powell; by mistake, the producers hire Murphy, but Astaire gets to play it, after all. This is a big, lavish M-G-M musical with a Cole Porter score and lots of spectacular dancing; what's missing is romance, sensuousness, magic. The indefatigable, intensely dull Eleanor Powell is better on her own than when she has a partner and is still on her own. With Astaire nearby, you're terribly aware of what long arms she has and what a jolly, good-natured, big, all-American girl she is. (Her costumes always suggest uniforms.) Their dancing together does have vitality and verve and, at times, it's good, carefree hoofing, but it seems healthy and impersonal. Even in the finale, when they dance to "Begin the Beguine" - the only song that Porter didn't write specially for the film - it isn't memorable. The new songs include "I Concentrate on You," sung by Douglas MacPhail, and "I've Got My Eyes on You," and a real bummer that Astaire and Murphy team up for - it's called "Please Don't Monkey with Broadway." With Frank Morgan, Ian Hunter, Florence Rice, Lynne Carver, Herman Bing, Jack Mulhall, Joe Yule, and Barbara Jo Allen (Vera Vague) as a receptionist. Produced by Jack Cummings; directed by Norman Taurog; script by Leon Gordon and George Oppenheimer, from a story by Dore Schary and Jack McGowan. The choreography is by Astaire and Bobby Connelly."
