Yankee Doodle Dandy

Plot synopsis:
In the early days of World War II, Cohan comes out of retirement to star as President Roosevelt in the Rodgers and Hart musical I'd Rather Be Right. On the first night, he is summoned to meet the President at the White House, who presents him with a Congressional Gold Medal (in fact, this happened several years previously). Cohan is overcome and chats with Roosevelt, recalling his early days on the stage. The film flashes back to his supposed birth on July 4, whilst his father is performing on the vaudeville stage.
Cohan and his sister join the family act as soon as they can learn to dance, and soon The Four Cohans are performing successfully. But George gets too cocky as he grows up and is blacklisted by theatrical producers for being troublesome. He leaves the act and hawks his songs unsuccessfully around to producers. In partnership with another struggling writer, Sam Harris, he finally interests a producer and they are on the road to success. He also marries Mary, a young singer/dancer.
As his star ascends, he persuades his now struggling parents to join his act, eventually vesting some of his valuable theatrical properties in their name.
Cohan retires, but returns to the stage several times, culminating in the role of the U.S. President. As he leaves the White House, after receiving the Congressional Gold Medal from the President, he performs a tap dance down a set of interior stairs (which Cagney thought up before the scene was filmed and performed with no rehearsal). Outside, he joins a military parade, where the soldiers are singing "Over There", and, at first, he isn't singing. Not knowing that Cohan is the song's composer, one of them asks if he knows the words. Cohan's response is a smile and then joins in the singing.

Tags: melodrama, flashback

Review:
Unlike today's biographies, this is a very positive story about a man who brought patriotism alive during World War I with such inspirational songs as "It's A Grand Old Flag" and "Over There." For some of us, listening to these songs can bring a tear or two.Cagney is his normal riveting self and Joan Leslie certainly makes an appealing female lead as Cohan's wife.
`Yankee Doodle Dandy' makes the viewer say, `They don't make them like that anymore.' The film is uplifting for its espousal of unabashed patriotism and its representation of America as a place in which a gifted performer like George M.
I was moved to tears by the ending showing the elderly Cohan joining in a World War II parade, a group of soldiers marching to `Over There' and being asked why he isn't singing, `Hey old-timer, don't you know this song?' `Yankee Doodle Dandy' is a celebration of Cohan's life and career -- a little sanitised perhaps, but still portraying his love for his family, his profession and his country.
YANKEE DOODLE DANDY (Warner Brothers, 1942), directed by Michael Curtiz, is an autobiographical musical of a legendary Broadway showman, composer, actor and dancer, George M.
Interesting to see a noted movie tough guy singing and dancing, but it's even more-so in watching Walter Huston as Cohan's father doing a song and dance himself.The story opens with the middle-aged Cohan (James Cagney), following a comical musical performance in "I'd Rather Be Right" in which he plays and spoofs the president (Franklin D.
Believing the worst, he arrives to meet "with the head man." Alone with him in the Oval Office, the two men converse which leads to Cohan to soon be relating his life story via flashback starting with his birth (born on the 4th of July), as the son of stage entertainers, Jerry and Nellie Cohan (Walter Huston and Rosemary DeCamp), followed by his boyhood days as the star of "Peck's Bad Boy" (Douglas Croft playing George at age 12), the teaming up with his younger sister, Josie (first played by JoAnn Marlowe, then by Patsy Lee Parsons, and by Jeanne Cagney as an adult) and his parents, forming the act called "The Four Cohans," George leaving the family to form an act on his own, his association with a young hopeful named Mary (Joan Leslie), whom he eventually marries, the publication of his songs that make him world famous, the death of his parents, his retirement from the stage and his return to Broadway to appear in a play that has summoned him with an invitation from the president, and after nearly two hours of recollection, the story moves forward to present day with Cohan to find out why he was really asked to come to visit with the president.With a handful of song and dance tunes, many composed by Cohan himself, the soundtrack is as follows: "The Dancing Master," "The Dancing Master" (reprise); "Strolling Through the Park One Day" (by Joe Goodwin and Gus Edwards); "Minstrel Number," "I Was Born in Virginia," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Harrigan," "Yankee Doodle Dandy," "Yankee Doodle Dandy," "All Aboard for Old Broadway" (by Jack Scholl and M.K. Jerome), "Give My Regards to Broadway," "Oh, You Wonderful Girl," "Blue Skies, Grey Skies," "The Barber's Ball," "Mary," "Forty-Five Minutes From Broadway," "Mary" (reprise); "Forty-Five Minutes From Broadway," "So Long, Mary," "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Battle Hymn of the Republic" (by William Steffe and Julia Ward Howe); "When Johnny Comes Marching Home," "Of Thee I Sing," "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Come Along With Me," "Over There," "I'm Happy As Can Be," "Love Nest" (by Louis A.
Hirsch and Otto Harbach); "Little Nellie Kelly," "The Man Who Owns Broadway," "Molly Malone," "Billie," "Jeepers Creepers" (by Johnny Mercer and Harry Warren); "Off the Record" and "Over There." Of the songs listed above, several could have been chosen as alternate titles in regards to Cohan, including: "Give My Regards to Broadway," "Grand Old Flag," "The Man Who Owns Broadway," or "Off the Record," but the final selection became "Yankee Doodle Dandy." While many of these songs are Broadway show tunes, the most memorable ones happen to be the patriotic songs, especially "Grand Old Flag," "Over There," and of course, the title tune.In the supporting cast are Irene Manning (Fay Templeton); Richard Wholf (Samuel H.
As a movie, YANKEE DOODLE DANDY is a grand old musical that blends nostalgia of the past (early twentieth century, World War I) with patriotism of the 1940s.
Although the patriotism plays towards the World War II audience, much of Cohan's spirit of being an American continues to reflect upon the present generation.Full of memorable lines, YANKEE DOODLE DANDY's most noted happens to be Cohan's closing speech following a performance, "My father thanks you, my mother thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I THANK YOU." Filmed with crisp black and white photography, YANKEE DOODLE DANDY did go through the process of colorization in the mid 1980s.
Already terminally ill, Cohan lived long enough to see the film and no doubt he would have approved of it because it sure is how he would like to have been remembered.In 1942 when Yankee Doodle Dandy premiered there was a whole generations of people left alive who saw George M.
And his first real success was Little Johnny Jones which score included American classics, Yankee Doodle Dandy and Give My Regards to Broadway.What's left out is the fact Cohan had two wives.
Far from it, he was a very bitter man and when he did that final comeback in I'd Rather Be Right he fought with Kaufman and Hart over the book and Rodgers and Hart over the songs.But Yankee Doodle Dandy presents the public musical face of George M.
YANKEE DOODLE DANDY, the classic WB wartime musical, has delighted three generations of audiences with its unabashed patriotism, rousing songs, and, most of all, with the unmatched energy and talent of its Academy Award-winning star, James Cagney.
From his first Broadway success (1904's 'Little Johnny Jones'), he had been determined to leave a legacy that would not be forgotten, and by 60, with his health beginning to decline, he concluded a film biography was the surest way to achieve immortality.He first approached Sam Goldwyn, a personal friend, to do the picture, but demanded creative control, and when his choice to play himself, Fred Astaire, turned down the role, Cohan backed out of the project.
Warner was more than happy to take on the biography, and after viewing earlier Cagney musicals, Cohan agreed with the selection of leading man (Cagney had actually auditioned, once, for a Cohan play...and was rejected!)Cohan's colorful life had to be toned down, somewhat, for the screen (he had been married twice, and 'wholesome family films' did NOT portray divorce), so an amalgamation of both wives was created by screenwriter Robert Buckner, and named Mary (to capitalize on one of Cohan's most popular tunes).
While the showman fretted that current wife Agnes might be offended, the second Mrs. Cohan was actually pleased (her middle name was Mary, she had started in the chorus line, and so she assumed the character Joan Leslie played WAS her!)Finally (after the Epstein brothers were called in to add their legendary comic touches to the screenplay), filming began...on December 8, 1941.
Cast and crew listened to President Roosevelt's radio address about Pearl Harbor, Cagney led everyone in a prayer, and an unspoken goal was set, to make YANKEE DOODLE DANDY the most patriotic, inspiring film possible.
The film was a huge hit, and was gratifying to Cohan (it is said that the day he died, November 5, 1942, he took a last stroll on Broadway, then joined the long line waiting to see his film biography, and watched James Cagney's unforgettable performance).While it is true that the film is a bit dated, it is still a grand entertainment, and is on the AFI's list of the '100 Greatest Films of the Twentieth Century'.George M.
Hollywood- and the nation at the time- was more concerned with the way things should have been than with the way they actually were.Cagney was surely a perfect choice to play Cohan, being an Irishman who enter show business as a song and dance man, (and always considered himself primarily that).
James Cagney (who was a first rate song and dance man on Broadway) studied THE PHANTOM PRESIDENT to know what were Cohan's singing and dancing style.
Oddly enough, it was Cohan who said he wanted as little romance in the film as possible.The more I learn about Cohan the more I realize that Cagney was perfect to play him - both Irish Americans, both about the same size and build, and George Cohan's style of dancing and singing were about the same as Cagney's.
recount his life story to FDR, receiving his Congressional medal in the Oval Office, and then dance joyously down the White House stairs and into the streets joining a group of marching soldiers in a chorus of "Over There" was probably a great way to bridge Cohan's patriotic past with what was then an uncertain time that certainly needed a dose of his optimism.The one thing that I did find a little odd - and one thing isn't much in a two plus hour long movie - is that it is hard to spot the actual point in the film where Mary becomes George's wife.
Being a newbie to both the world of Cagney as well as American propaganda, "Yankee Doodle Dandy" seemed the best place to start, and from the opening scene of the birth of George M.
James Cagney put down his tommy gun and grapefruit long enough to register his lone Oscar-winning performance in one of Hollywood's most enduring biopics, playing song-and-dance man George M.
Cohan songs for extra insurance.There are plenty of delightful moments, along with some pretty corny and sentimental nonsense dreamed up by the scriptwriters, but there's an infectious air about all the song and dance numbers that make the musical moments count the most.WALTER HUSTON as dad, ROSEMARY DeCAMP as mom and Cagney's real-life sister JEANNE CAGNEY, all of them turn in inspired performances.
In case you've seen Yankee Doodle Dandy and couldn't figure out why James Cagney won his Oscar for it, when he lost the gold in Angels with Dirty Faces and Love Me or Leave Me, you need to remind yourself when it was made.
He was also nominated for his role, probably because it was fun to see him sing and dance, and he's in the big tearjerker scene of the film.If you're a sucker for patriotic songs and want to see big production numbers of "Over There," "Give My Regards to Broadway," "You're a Grand Old Flag," and of course, the title song, you're going to want to rent a copy of this famous forties flick.
I don't think any other actor could portray George M Cohans dancing style better than James Cagney.
was known for it's gangster films rather than musicals (that was M-G-M's domain), but with 'Yankee Doodle Dandy' they scored a hit with wartime audiences and the Academy Awards.'Dandy' is a sentimental, albeit fictitious biography of prolific Broadway producer, composer, actor, George M.
booth), his songs, 'Give My Regards to Broadway' and 'You're A Grand Old Flag' are still being sung today.The film's patriotic message may seem a bit over the top to some in the 21st century, but for the era in which it was created it clearly expressed the feelings of the majority of Americans involved in the war effort.The real reason to enjoy this classic showbiz musical is the stellar performance by James Cagney.
Like Fred Astaire, Marilyn Monroe, Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, Jack Nicholson, Jodie Foster and Robert De Niro,  Cagney truly possesses that screen presence and 'aura' that defines a true Hollywood star.One of the most interesting numbers is Cagney as Cohan performing 'Off the Record,' in a recreation of the 1937 Broadway musical 'I'd Rather Be Right.'  Cagney/Cohan portrays a singing, dancing Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivering a press conference to a group of reporters in Central Park (trust me, it's more convincing when you see it on screen).
Cagney, best known for his gangster roles, had always wanted to be a 'song and dance man', and this movie showcases his talents.
Cagney took the role because it was a great part, maybe the greatest part he'd get that played to his talents; Cagney was a song and dance man on vaudeville before he went to Hollywood and did gangster movies; he and his wife even opened a dance studio briefly to make ends meet and took every opportunity to break free of his gangster typecasting to do musicals.
The movie is a delight not only for Cagney's performance, but for all the character actors who shined in their individual roles; George Barbier, who played the guy representing Fay Templeton, was also featured in "The Phantom President" 1932 which starred the real Cohan!
I think I might have heard the warning signals about Jimmy Cagney's Yankee Doodle Dandy as a movie that was great when it came out (1942) as it was exactly the type of movie the USA needed, but after watching it, I must say that I agree with a lot of people that say that this movie hasn't dated very well, and it's over the top patriotism would probably make people wince.Jimmy Cagney is here playing George M.
Cohan incarnates the USA.The genius of the film, is that you don't even need to open a book about America, to get the meaning of the patriotism that inhabited the hearts of people, in these doomed years, Cohan embodies this proud and passionate feeling: the "Yankee Doodle Boy", James Cagney's greatest role.
We love Cohan, because we admire him, and would love to be like him.Like a good biopic, the film starts with the family life, but this part is even more relevant because it shows George as the center of a Family, he's one of the four Cohans, including Josie, the sister, Nellie, the mother, and Jerry, the father, played by Walter Huston in an admirable supporting performance that made me forget he was Howard, the Old prospector from "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre".
Where "Yankee Doodle Dandy" succeeds, "Saving Private Ryan" fails, Curtiz' film says "We're great" while Spielberg says "We're greater" It's all about emotions, and by not trying to manipulate MY emotions, "Yankee Doodle Dandy" made me feel for this country, and this spirit This probably wasn't intended but the film, released when the Americans were going "over there" for the second time, is so refreshing and entertaining it still appeals now, even beyond the frontiers, and make some more recent movies look like propaganda.But "Yankee" is definitely not a propaganda, it has the same patriotism I found in the cartoons that enriched my childhood, I knew the 'Battle Hymn of Reblic' song from the Looney Tunes, the "Yankee Doodle" music from Tom and Jerry, and the "Over There" theme from a Tex Avery's cartoon, I grew up with this music, with "When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again", with all this catchy and inspiring themes that celebrate for me an eternal fascination for USA, as people, as a spirit and I watched this film with the same joy as when I was a child watching these cartoons, and this is not belittling the merit of the film, not at all.
Released in 1942, "Yankee Doodle Dandy" is a superior film with a great cast, music, story line, and dancing.
Cohan (James Cagney) in director Michael Curtiz's 1942 musical biopic "Yankee Doodle Dandy".
Amongst the big life events we follow Mr. Cohan through include joining his parents (Walter Huston, Rosemary DeCamp) and sister (Jeanne Cagney) in the family's vaudeville act as a young and cocky kid, meeting his future wife Mary (Joan Leslie) who is also in showbiz, and his successful partnership with struggling writer Sam Harris (Richard Whorf) in producing one popular musical production after another.
But for the great scenes, and they are many, you will forget all about your popcorn and just marvel at the energy and life in this movie, a great deal of which emanates from the deservedly Oscar-winning performance of its star, James Cagney.-------------------------I just finished watching the new Ken Burns series on The Roosevelts.
Likely no one under the age of 40, surely 30, has ever heard of him....and there's a good reason for that.Cohan was still alive in 1942 when this film was produced AND the United States had just been drawn into World War II...making "Yankee" relevant for the time.
Cohan, was Irish-American and a song and dance man.Yankee Doodle Dandy was the most patriotic of WWII films and its flag waving and American "Over There" mentality was just the shot in the arm the country needed.
Well, I don't think anyone in 2006 (or 1942 for that matter) should care that Yankee Doodle Dandy is not exactly faithful to the facts about the real George M Cohan.Can any actor today have the played the part as well as Cagney did?
Get past that and you have an incredibly entertaining film, with great music, a strong supporting cast, and a one-of-a-kind performance from James Cagney.
He meets his wife backstage, gets his first big break backstage and soon becomes the writer of some of the most well-known patriotic songs ever written, including "A Grand Old Flag, "Over There, and of course "Yankee Doodle Dandy." Unfortunately, there is very little truth to most of this as the actual Cohan saw the film, loved it but was unsure who it was about.
The film was released just-in-time for World War II, and accurately predicted its outcome.********** Yankee Doodle Dandy (5/29/42) Michael Curtiz ~ James Cagney, Joan Leslie, Walter Huston, Richard Whorf.
it is good enough to watch on any day, not just the Fourth of July.James Cagney really brings George Cohan to life.