On the Riviera

There is probably more remakes left in The Red Cat, the play on which Folies Bergere, That Night In Rio, and now On The Riviera is based. Danny Kaye in this film steps into the shoes of first Maurice Chevalier and Don Ameche and they fit well.

Like his predecessors Kaye plays dual roles, an American entertainer who includes impressions in his act and a French industrialist who was an air ace a World War ago. The entertainer has Corinne Calvet in his act as an assistant and the industrialist is married to Gene Tierney.

When the industrialist makes a secret trip to Great Britain for some financing his associates are left holding the bag with another French industrialist. They hire Kaye the entertainer to impersonate the industrialist and the results, especially with the interaction between the women are hilarious.

I'm surprised that Danny Kaye never thought to play the Dromios in a film version of A Comedy Of Errors. With his friend Laurence Olivier as Antipholus it would have been a classic.

On The Riviera got two Oscar nominations for Art&Set Direction and for musical scoring by Alfred Newman. Sylvia Fine also known as Mrs. Kaye wrote most of the score and Popo The Puppet got Kaye a lot of success with his children fans. But the hit was the oldtime ragtime song Ballin' The Jack revived for On The Riviera.

This film holds up well and one of these days Robin Williams will see this as a property for him. As it is three fine films have been made already.

"The Red Cat" was a Broadway play. It was back Darryl Zanuck and brought to the screen almost immediately as "Folies Bergère de Paris" and then, within a short time, remade it as "A Night in Rio" and now here in "On the Riviera"! And, if that isn't enough, the basic story idea of this script is very familiar--using one of Hollywood's oldest clichés--the 'identical stranger'. Like "The Prisoner of Zenda" and "The Prince and the Pauper", this movie hinges on the audience accepting that this is possible. In other words, if you can't accept this, the film will be rough sailing.

In this version, the lead is played by the talented Danny Kaye--who sings and dances up a storm. Now if you like singing and dancing, you're in luck. If you don't, then once again it will be rough sailing. My problems is that I am not a huge musical fan. There are, of course, exceptions. Kaye plays dual roles--a singer/dancer as well as a famous French aviator. The humor begins, such as it is, when the aviator is in London and he's needed in Paris--so, reluctantly, the actor/dancer is paid to pretend to be the aviator. The acting is quite good but the story is just too old and too familiar to make the story anything other than a time-passer.

By the way, while I wasn't all that impressed by this film, I must say that the special features on the DVD for the film are terrific--and actually make watching it worth while. I especially liked "The Rivera Story", as it showed side-by-side comparisons of the three films--and they were often word-for-word the same picture.

I can't imagine why anyone would dislike this marvelous film. Danny Kaye does a superb job playing a double role, showing a subtlety of acting ability that some might not have thought he had. He is not, for once, cast like a complete fool. Don't get me wrong; he plays those parts well, and is often hysterically funny, as in The Inspector General and The Court Jester. In that picture he does get to play a part that is not a fool, as he is hypnotized into thinking himself a swashbuckling hero, but it is a role that calls for him to lampoon the part he is playing. In On The Riviera, however, he plays a genuine masterful leading male role: a millionaire French airplane manufacturer with a gorgeous wife who is worth the price of admission. His other role is a traditional Kaye role: an American comedian. The gimmick is that he is an almost perfect double for the suave French romantic lead. He really plays three roles, and the subtlety with which he distinguishes them is superb. He is the American comic, he is the French millionaire looking a little like Yves Montand, and he is the American comic successfully passing himself off as the millionaire, fooling the wife and the valet as well as the general public. The role reminds me of Yves Montand in Let's Make Love with Marilyn Monroe: he plays the millionaire and he plays a poor guy trying to break into show business by passing for the millionaire. All in all, a triumph for Danny Kaye, well decorated with gorgeous females.

When i was young i was a great fan of Danny Kaye.I even remember being taken to see him at the London Palladium.I saw all of his films and watched his TV shows when they were aired as BBC2s prime variety show when it opened in 1964.Now i look at films like these and wonder why.This is a tepid remake of Follies Bergere which starred Maurice Chevalier.The original was far funnier and had a couple of marvellous musical numbers.Unfortunately one has to say that one let alone two Kaye performances in this remake is too much.Lets be honest he just isn't funny.All of his routines we have already seen many times before this GE Walter Mitty.The musical numbers are long and drawn out and with more perspiration and inspiration.There must have been a reason why i liked him but i cant imagine why now.

Kaye won a Golden Globe for his great performance in dual roles as a military giant and an entertainer who tries to win the love of Gene Tierney. A fun filled musical comedy with great dancing and the always unstoppable Kaye, doing what he does best.