VARIETY GIRL (1947) ¢ ¢ 1/2
D: George Marshall
Mary Hatcher, Olga San Juan, DeForest Kelley,
Frank Ferguson, Bing Crosby, Bob Hope,
Gary Cooper, Alan Ladd, Ray Milland, Diana Lynn,
Barbara Stanwyck, William Holden, Veronica Lake,
Dorothy Lamour, Sterling Hayden, Gail Russell,
Burt Lancaster, William Bendix, Paulette Goddard,
Barry Fitzgerald, Lizabeth Scott, Robert Preston,
Pearl Bailey, Mona Freeman, William Demarest,
Frank Faylen, Cecil Kellaway, Spike Jones
A sort of Hollywood home movie in which a girl turns up in the land of dreams hoping for an audition and lots of stars wander in and out, some of them on screen no more than a few seconds. Pearl Bailey's the highlight. Alan Ladd sings a duet with Dorothy Lamour, and he's not bad. Paulette Goddard takes a bubble bath. Hope and Crosby trade a few good-natured barbs and do a little soft-shoe dance routine. In a demonstration of erratic marksmanship, Burt Lancaster aims a gun at the cigarette in Lizabeth Scott's mouth and shoots her instead. William Bendix shoves a grapefruit in Olga San Juan's face. It's silly and inconsequential, but when the stakes are this low, it doesn't really matter very much.
