COM 246
Singin' in the Rain Study Guide
Released by MGM
Directors: Stanley Donen, Gene Kelly
Screenwriters: Betty Comden, Adolph Green
From the mid-1940s through the 1950s, MGM producer Arthur Freed led a production unit that completely dominated the genre of the movie musical. Drawing on MGM's impressive roster of contract talent, Freed was able to maintain a consistently high benchmark for his productions that forever linked the MGM name with the musical genre in the minds of a generation of moviegoers. Although many movie musicals were, naturally enough, adapted from stage musicals for the screen, Singin' in the Rain was an original screenplay, written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, who had earlier collaborated on the book for Leonard Bernstein's Broadway show, On the Town. Released 25 years after The Jazz Singer (1927) ushered in the era of talking pictures, Singin' in the Rain takes a nostalgic look back at the transition from silent films to talkies. This is an example of Hollywood portraying itself through the lens of history. The film draws affectionate humor from the awkwardness of the transition, poking fun at the early technical glitches and the panic of silent film actors at having to learn and recite lines for the first time.
Prior to the Freed unit's dominance of the form, movie musicals tended to be backstage stories about theatrical troupes putting on a show. The musical numbers therefore emerged naturally from the storyline, such as it was. Freed's work as an associate producer on MGM's The Wizard of Oz (1939) stimulated his interest in musicals in which musical numbers were integrated into non-theatrical stories. In Freed's Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), for example, a group of short stories by Sally Benson about family life in St. Louis were adapted for the screen. There was no built-in pretext for musical numbers as in the typical stage musicals; people simply burst into song, accompanied by an unseen orchestra. This sort of thing works well enough on the stage, but movies, being an inherently realistic medium, had always shied away from it.
In light of the above, consider this question: when movie musicals allow their characters to burst into song for no particular reason, do they therefore cross over into the fantasy genre as well?
How do stage musicals differ from movie musicals? More specifically, how does a stage musical differ from a movie version of the same play? Might these differences account for why musicals seem to be more consistently successful on the stage than in the movies?
What are some of the conventions of the movie musical? How are those conventions used in Singin' in the Rain?
What kind of cinematography do you expect to see in a movie musical? Does Singin' in the Rain meet this expectation?
What kind of acting style do you expect to see in a movie musical? Does Singin' in the Rain meet this expectation?
What kind of narrative do you expect to see in a movie musical? Does Singin' in the Rain meet this expectation?