Musical Double Feature: Sunny (1941)/ Calendar Girl (1947) (DVD)

SUNNY (1941): Anna Neagle is Sunny O'Day, the pretty owner of a ramshackle traveling circus. During a layover in New Orleans, Sunny takes in Mardi Gras, where she meets dashing young playboy Larry Warren. The pair immediately fall in love, but are faced with incompatible backgrounds. Larry's rich parents don't want him settling down with a commoner, while Sunny's circus family fear that marriage will take her far away from them. The two worlds meet head-on when the entire circus troupe crashes the couple's nuptials at the Warren mansion, resulting in a wedding that no one will ever forget!

Sunny is the second movie adaptation of the famous Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein musical, having been previously filmed by Warner Brothers in 1930 with Broadway actress Marilyn Miller. Director Herbert Wilcox purchased the rights to the play from Warners so it could serve as a showcase for his wife Anna Neagle. Wilcox and Neagle had previously collaborated on the musical comedies Irene and No, No Nanette (both 1940). Loose-limbed Ray Bolger will forever be remembered as the Scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz (1939). Edward Everett Horton was the perfect foil to Fred Astaire in in the Astaire/Rogers dance pictures, including The Gay Divorcee (1934), Top Hat (1935) and Shall We Dance (1937).

CALENDAR GIRL (1947): Two best friends, Johnny Bennett and Steve Adams, arrive in Greenwich Village with dreams of becoming a composter and an artist, respectively. Johnny becomes distracted from his piano keys by leggy next door neighbor Patricia O'Neill, who has eyes for him. Their relationship becomes rocky when lusty Steve asks her to pose for a painting to be used in a firemen's calendar. The lascivious artist decides to use his imagination and illustrate a bit more of the girl's physique than she wanted. To her embarrassment, soon Patricia is known all over town as New York's favorite "Calendar Girl"! It's up to Johnny to smooth things over with the girl of his dreams.

An entertaining low-budget musical from Republic Pictures, Calendar Girl stars stunning blue-eyed brunette Jane Frazee. Initially half of the Frazee Sisters singing group, she hit it big on her own in motion pictures with Abbott and Costello's Buck Privates (1941). Several westerns co-starring with legendary cowboy Roy Rogers followed, during a period when Roy's wife Dale Evans had become interested in other types of roles. More distinguished is Victor McLaglen, an Academy Award winner for his performance in John Ford's The Informer (1935). His unforgettable characterizations are integral to many Hollywood classics, most notably Gunga Din (1939), She Wore A Yellow Ribbon (1949) and The Quiet Man (1952).

• musical