MY DREAM IS YOURS: Blu-ray (Warner Bros. 1949) Warner Archive

Doris Day’s fledgling film career was ill-served by My Dream is Yours (1949), a rather tepid and haphazardly slapped together musical mélange whose only real selling feature was Day – on fire, after her magical screen debut in Romance on the High Seas the previous year. Ironically, director, Martin Scorsese has cited My Dream is Yours as his inspiration for New York, New York (1977) – a movie musical of as much dubious distinction with its own follies and flaws. Day’s wholesomeness herein shines through this treacle. But her best days as a musical comedy star were decidedly still ahead of her, this stepping stone, ironically, from the eminent, Michael Curtiz, more of a pebble than a boulder at the box office as it nimbly tripped along some very contrived scenarios, wedging songs between the barely connective dialogue for Day to sing with her usual skillfulness and fresh-faced sex appeal. The movie also marked the final appearance of delightful comedian, Edgar Kennedy as Uncle Charlie; Kennedy, a veteran of more than 500 movies, dying of throat cancer shortly after completion of his partaking here and never to see the finished movie hit theater screens. Screenwriters, Laura Kerr, Harry Kurnitz, Dane Lussier, and, Allen Rivkin, basing their fluff and nonsense on a story by Paul Finder Moss and future producer, Jerry Wald, gleaned some invaluable insight into the character of Martha Gibson by pilfering inspiration from Day’s real life; chiefly, in Day’s pre-movie career as a hit singer on the radio. The movie’s subplot, addressing Martha’s heartbreak at being separated from her young son, Freddie (Duncan Richardson) also reflected Day’s painful decision to place her child, Terry, in the care of his grandmother while she pursued her career, touring in the big band circuit. Indeed, in an era where stars decidedly did not call the shots, Day’s singular stipulation before signing a 7-year contract with Warner Bros. was their agreement to help her establish a home in Burbank, shared by her son and mother.

My Dream is Yours is more than a bit of a mutt, and in more ways than are immediately apparent on the screen. Those with keen eyes will be able to easily identify portions of the apartment set from Hitchcock’s Rope (1949) recycled as pop singer, Garry Mitchell’s (Lee Bowman) fashionable digs. And apart from the screenplay – a real/reel cobbled together affair, loosely held together by Day’s silken warbling of a handful of songs, the best of the lot being the smooth and tender, ‘Someone Like You’, bouncy ‘Canadian Capers’, and dreamily yearning, ‘I’ll String Along With You’ – the plot of this practically plot-less yarn, inveigles Day’s Martha in the frantic search of talent scout, Doug Blake (Jack Carson) who – no kidding – ‘discovers’ Martha, then promotes her as a jukebox princess on the fictional radio program, ‘The Hour of Enchantment’ while simultaneously falling in love with her. Day’s meteoric ascendance to the top echelons of screen stardom was evident in her ‘second billing’ here, just under Carson, and 2 steps up from her 4^th billing in the aforementioned Romance on the High Seas. It would take another 3 movies before she received ‘top billing’ on the marquee. And the picture was something of an ‘old home’s week’ for composer, Harry Warren, whose legendary songs had graced many a Busby Berkeley musical back in the mid-1930’s.  But by 1949, Warren was at MGM, his best years as a song writer behind him, and loaned out for this occasion.

Given the studio’s ambitions to continue Day’s upward trajectory as a new and highly marketable commodity, My Dream is Yours remains a thoroughly undistinguished follow-up for their newest leading lady, and odd too, in that it was directed by Curtiz, whose back catalog included such monumental efforts as 1935’s Captain Blood, 1936’s Charge of the Light Brigade, 1938’s The Adventures of Robin Hood, 1939’s The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex, 1940’s The Sea Hawk, 1941’s The Sea Wolf, 1942’s Casablanca, and, Yankee Doodle Dandy, 1943’s This Is the Army, and, 1945’s Mildred Pierce. The chief difficulty with My Dream Is Yours (1949) is its slight screenplay, a rather amiable, though totally forgettable remake of 1934’s 20 Million Sweethearts. The film’s most captivating asset is thus Doris Day as young hopeful, Martha Gibson – a single mom who can really belt out the tunes if anyone would stop to give her a chance to prove it. Alas, talent and stardom do not necessarily go hand in glove, and, Martha remains curiously out of the limelight. However, when conceited radio personality, Garry Mitchell (Lee Bowman) decides he has had enough of the big time and refuses to renew his contract, the station sends contact agent, Doug Blake (Jack Carson) on a talent-scouting mission to find a fresh new face to take his place.

Blake soon discovers Martha. But he also encounters infinite opposition from the sponsors who are wary of an ‘unknown’ and would much prefer to have Garry back – whatever the price. If things are looking down professionally, they are even worse – privately. Soon, Martha and Blake are inseparable. But as fame draws nearer, it also tugs at Martha’s affections, away from Blake to Garry instead. The heavy-handed script leaves zero tolerance for the saccharine sweetness – pushed to its limit in a very awkward blend of live action and animation, cut-and-pasted together by Fritz Freleng, and, featuring Warner Bros. most valuable cartoon asset - Bugs Bunny. For the rest, Day was given the opportunity to warble some fine tunes, the best being the utterly heart-felt, ‘I’ll String Along with You.’ Resident Warner contract players, Eve Arden, Adolph Menjou, and one of the all-time treasures of the American cinema - S.Z. Sakall – ‘shoooosh!’, are all welcome additions to the cast. But in the end, the picture does little to sell Day, relying instead on the magnet pull of her previous effort to sell the tickets.

Worse for Curtiz, much of the plot of the original movie had already been regurgitated in Swing Hostess (1944). Thus, the encroaching ennui resulting from yet another trip to the same well…well – it left a decided sour taste in most critic’s mouths. Eve Arden – often inserted as the perennial tart-mouthed ‘bright spot’ of such drivel, makes the most of her go-getter business woman, Vivian Martin, a rancorous co-worker on the fictional ‘Hour of Enchantment’ and proves integral to the plot later on when, in a blind leap of faith, she hocks her expensive furs to help launch Martha’s singing career. Alas, the focus remains squarely on a clumsily assembled lover’s triangle between Doug, Martha, and Garry.  As this goes nowhere – and fast – the resultant contrivances, all rather obviously directed to the picture’s proverbial ‘happy ending’ seemed even more convivial at best, to down-right mechanical at their worst.  Production was also delayed when the usually ‘healthy-as-a-horse’ Day contracted a virulent flu, requiring 3-bed-ridden days of recuperation. If My Dream is Yours is remembered fondly at all today, it likely remains for its animated and Easter-themed ‘dream sequence’ in which an exuberant Bugs Bunny and Tweety cavorts with Jack Carson and Doris Day to Franz Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2.

The picture is also brightened by the presence of the inimitable Eve Arden, whose career as the life-long, sharp-eyed and shoot-from-the-hip kind’a gal was just beginning. Born, Eunice Mary Quedens in 1908, Arden made her film debut in 1929 before embarking on a sting of Broadway successes under her stage name, rumored to be an amalgam of the perfume, ‘Eve’ning in Paris, and Elizabeth Arden. Her initial contract with RKO in 1937 would lead to bigger and better things, though here, she established her presence as the razor-witted, best pal ‘type’, loaned out to MGM and Warner Bros. where she briefly settled into a string of memorable ‘supporting’ roles, Oscar-nominated as Joan Crawford’s wise-cracking sidekick, Ida, in Mildred Pierce (1945).  Arden would later prove a very fine actress, in Anatomy of a Murder (1959). Yet, despite being voted by exhibitors as the sixth-most promising ‘star of tomorrow’ in 1946, it would take radio, then television to make her a household name. In both, she played the memorable ‘Our Miss Brooks’ – on the radio, from 1948 to 1957, crossing over to TV, playing the same character from 1952 to 1956; a role so popular, Arden was afforded the title of honorary member of the National Education Association and also received the Teachers College of Connecticut's Alumni Association award in 1952 “for humanizing the American teacher”. My Dream is Yours doesn’t give Arden much playtime, but what’s here illustrates what a superior comedienne she was, and, whenever she appears, the screen is a little bit brighter and more invigorated for her presence.

Despite not being advertised as anything better than a ‘new master’ created last year, the results on this Warner Archive (WAC) title prove spectacular – with caveats. So, some work has decidedly been done to achieve a gorgeous Technicolor image that remains true to those bold and brassy 3-strip Technicolor hues. Flesh tones still teeter – just slightly – into that pasty pink range. But this could be the result of vintage make-up and lighting.  Contrast is fairly solid, with inky blacks. Whites, however, occasionally adopt a slight bluish caste. Minor Technicolor mis-registration is scattered throughout. Owing to dupes and multi-exposures, grain gets exaggerated during the animated ‘dream sequence’ but the age-related dirt and scratches to also have afflicted these portions on the old DVD release, have now been eradicated. The DTS 2.0 mono is adequately represented. WAC has also included the 3 short subjects that were originally marketed with the DVD release, albeit, without any additional clean-up or upgrades performed to their video masters. Bottom line: My Dream is Yours is forgettable fluff. If you love Doris Day – and, let’s be honest, who doesn’t? – then, I suppose this one will do. But Day has done far better work elsewhere and some of it, like 1951’s Lullaby of Broadway, still remains absent in hi-def.  Here’s to hoping. Recommended for Day completionists. Others can pass.

FILM RATING (out of 5 - 5 being the best)

2

VIDEO/AUDIO

4

EXTRAS

1