Du Barry Was a Lady *** (1943, Red Skelton, Lucille Ball, Gene Kelly, Virginia O’Brien, Zero Mostel, Tommy Dorsey) – Classic Movie Review 9892

Cole Porter’s 1939 hit stage show with Ethel Merman and Bert Lahr is less satisfactorily cast with non-singing comedians Lucille Ball and Red Skelton for director Roy Del Ruth’s vigorous and amusing 1943 MGM film version Du Barry was a Lady.

Shockingly, nearly all of the witty Porter songs have disappeared or been turned to background music (even ‘Well, Did You Evah?’), with only three numbers remaining: ‘Friendship, ‘Katie Went to Haiti’ and ‘Do I Love You’. What were they thinking?

‘Well, Did You Evah?’ is heard in the first nightclub scene as Virginia O’Brien sells cigars and cigarettes. The song languished for 13 years until it became a showstopping duet for Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra in High Society (1956).

Red Skelton plays the night club cloakroom attendant hat-check guy Louis Blore, in love with lovely night-club singing star May Daly (Lucille Ball), who sips a drugged drink and he dreams that they are at the court of King Louis XV, where he is king and she is Madame Du Barry.

Gene Kelly (as Alec Howe / Black Arrow), Virginia O’Brien as Ginny, Zero Mostel as Rami the Swami / Taliostra, Rags Ragland as Charlie / the Dauphin, Tommy Dorsey as himself, Donald Meek as Mr Jones / Duc de Choiseul, Douglass Dumbrille as Willie / Duc de Rigor, George Givot as Cheezy / Count de Roquefort, and Louise Beavers as Niagara all help, especially O’Brien (singing ‘Salome’), Kelly (singing ‘Do I Love You?’) and Tommy Dorsey’s Orchestra with their sweet jazz/ swing music and Gene Krupa on the drums.

Porter’s three remaining tunes are ‘Friendship’ (sung by the company), ‘Do I Love You?’ (sung and also danced by Gene Kelly) and ‘Katie Went to Haiti’ (sung by The Pied Pipers, including Jo Stafford and Dick Haymes).

It is Zero Mostel’s début.

Lucille Ball replaced a pregnant Ann Sothern, requiring a vocal double for Ms Ball’s singing (dubbed by Martha Mears).

After her name being mentioned repeatedly in the lyrics of ‘I Love an Esquire Girl’, Lana Turner makes a cameo in the final shot of the number, her first film appearance in Technicolor.

Lucille Ball was so pleased at how she looked under Karl Freund’s Technicolor photography that she later hired him for her TV show I Love Lucy. For the film MGM hairstylist Sydney Guilaroff dyed Lucille Ball’s hair red, which she kept for the rest of her life.

Du Barry Was a Lady is adapted from the Broadway show that opened at the 46th Street Theatre on 6 December 1939 and ran for 408 performances. Gypsy Rose Lee was a later replacement for Ethel Merman. Bert Lahr played a bathroom attendant in the stage show and much of its bathroom humour was not acceptable to the censors and was cut from the movie version.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 9892

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