Chasing Rainbows

Laughs onstage, tears offstage! Playing members of a traveling theatrical troupe, a starry cast -- The Broadway Melody's Bessie Love and Charles King, plus Jack Benny, Marie Dressler and Polly Moran -- hit the road and all the right notes in an early musical extravaganza. This bedazzlement of tapping feet and aching hearts (Love loves King, he loves a two-timing temptress) boasts not only stellar support from three of Hollywood's grandest comics, but grand music as well. Highlights include Dressler defending her maidenly honor from "a son of a rich" in Poor but Honest and the hit tune Happy Days Are Here Again, the irrepressible thumb in the eye to the Depression that would become FDR's campaign anthem.

• comedy
• musical