Joan Crawford, nearly 50 and sporting red hair, in a Technicolor MGM musical. Oh brother! Joan plays an acerbic Broadway diva who bosses everybody around and cuts them down with her acid tongue. She's thrown for a loop when she's forced to work with a blind piano player who gets under her skin. To her credit (and our amusement) Joan plays the part with the utmost seriousness. There isn't the slightest hint of self-deprecation here. Our diva doesn't seem to get that, intended or not, this is all one big garish joke. Joan gets lots of costume changes and there's an overdose of color throughout the film. What I was reminded of while watching was "The Barkleys of Broadway." In that film, Ginger Rogers was given the Technicolor treatment and also lots of wardrobe changes. The difference between the two films is that the costumes and color of "Barkleys" made an already beautiful Ginger even more ravishing. Whereas this film comes across like one big practical joke on Joan Crawford by MGM. They do nothing to make her look good. As for the acting and dancing, that's all on Joan. She stomps her way through the film, as graceful as a hippopotamus. Her diet during the making of this movie consisted entirely of scenery. She chews every inch of it. The singing is dubbed by India Adams and it's so obvious that it takes you out of the scenes to laugh at Joan's lip-syncing. Again, MGM did nothing to help hide any of Joan's weaknesses. If anything, they embraced and exaggerated them.Michael Wilding plays the blind piano player that Joan falls in love with. He comes across as mentally deficient at times with that irritating smirk on his face. His deliberately mannered way of speaking got on my nerves so much. His ludicrous performance is never worse than when he's doing emotional scenes. The scene where he gives a blonde beauty the brush-off because he's fixed on Joan is so overwrought you will be doubled over in laughter. Also, Wilding's character is the only blind man I've ever seen whose seeing-eye dog walks BEHIND him! The final scene between he and Joan has to be seen to be believed. Marjorie Rambeau plays Joan's mother and was actually pretty fun. Her reaction to Joan's being in love with a blind man is priceless. But she's only in a few brief scenes. She received a Best Supporting Actress nomination for this film.It's a movie full of unintentionally funny moments. An early scene that will no doubt draw laughter from the audience sees Joan leaving rehearsal to be swamped by adoring teenage fans. I guess before rock & roll the kids all hung around back alleys waiting to get autographs from their favorite middle-aged Broadway stars! Another funny scene is where Joan throws a party and only invites men. It's a total sausage fest! The "Two Faced Woman" musical number is one of the worst MGM ever produced. It's the infamous number where Joan wears blackface, bright red lipstick, and a shiny blue sequin dress while writhing around on stage with male backup dancers. It was included in the MGM retrospective film "That's Entertainment III." It was only included to show a side-by-side comparison of Joan and Cyd Charisse separately performing the same song, seemingly to embarrass Joan. It's a terrible movie but also a camp classic. It's so bad you have to see it. Joan Crawford fans will love it.

I'm willing to bet this was Joan Crawford's life/personality to a "T".Aside from Mommy Dearest, this was a thinly disguised and much tamer version of a "fictional" portrait of a demanding Broadway stars life (or Ms. Crawford's life if you will). If this film would have changed from a Broadway star to Hollywood star then we would have certainly known that this was her real life.This lady had attitude with a capital "A". I don't know any man on earth who would have taken the abuse she spills out to people. I would have taken it once before I took a walk. Of course reading about her life you come to understand why she was...the way she was. She certainly was an entertaining personality whether it was good or bad.For me this film was OK. The odd part to look for is the final rehearsal for the show when she appears in black face. What a bizarre scene to say the least.Give this one a go if you are so inclined...and remember to watch Mommy Dearest after it and you'll see...her daughter wasn't too far off.

Second time I've seen it.So many don't things add up I can't imagine this movie wasn't concocted as some sort of payback by some former-flunky-turned-Hollywood-producer out to "get back" at Joan.The color styling is offputting - garish in way unlike any other movie of its time.Joan ends up cast as a variant of her "Harriet Craig" character: controlling, bitchy, chewing every one and everything (like cigarettes) up, then spitting them out. (I guess they should have named the character "JENNY Craig"???)She just comes off looking completely ridiculous.Oh - that blackface number - "Two-Faced Women" - very curious. Referred to as "The Finale" by the show's stage manager, it bears the marks of some awful editing/re-shooting.When they are first scrambling to take places, the chorus looks like they're decked out in coal-black face makeup (the burnt-cork of the old minstrel performers). Then Joan starts the number and looks similar.Strangely, after she makes her way down to the male members of the chorus, she lightens up (on her makeup - NOT her hammy-acting), while they seem to have lost theirs. For the rest of the number, the blackface seems to have disappeared on the guys, lightened up considerably on the girls (I think one female may even be a real African-American), then at the close of the number suddenly everyone darkens down. Finally, when Joan tears off her wig in frustration at Ty's departing despite her "wonderful" rendition of "Two-Faced Woman", she sports not only dark makeup but rhinestones on her eyebrows. The orange hair that sprouts out from under her black wig - disheveled as it is - makes her look like a troll doll from the 1970s (Joan was ahead of her time?). Oddly enough, her "look" seems a color complement to the getup Faye Dunaway put together for "Mommie Dearest":black- vs. white-face, orange vs. dark hair. It is in no way complimentary - it looks absurd, not dramatic, and I'm sure she was completely unhappy when she saw the result on screen (I think even audiences in the 1950s during the first-run of this trainwreck must have laughed at her bizarre appearance.)Someone has also mentioned the "all-male" plus one party thrown by Jenny. Jeez - it's filled with gay entendres - but the strangest aspect of all is the fact that a genuine African- American actor is at the piano, apparently singing but in reality dubbed by professional dub artist Bill Lee.From what I can tell, very little original music was written for this piece - a very curious decision considering MGM had all the song-writing talent they needed.One dance rehearsal uses a Fred Astaire song from "Royal Wedding", in another instance a dropped number intended for Cyd Charisse in "The Bandwagon" (the aforementioned "Two- Faced Woman" blackface) gets a second attempt at life here via Joan (it dies an ignoble death unfortunately).I just can't believe anyone was serious regarding this production - except the actors, in particular poor Joan who was desperate to regain her former crown at her old studio.

That's a couplet from a production number in which Miss Joan Crawford declares, in Technicolor blackface, "I can't help being a two-faced woman." She overestimates herself: In this peerlessly ripe '50s melodrama she has one face, glaring, glaring. She's a harder-than-nails Broadway singer-dancer (dubbed, and clearly no Terpsichorean natural) who shouts down anyone opposed to her in the tiniest way, and then smokes countless cigarettes, glowers, and downs alcohol to betray her neuroses. She's inexplicably adored by her blind rehearsal accompanist (Michael Wilding, who got some terrible parts at MGM), who at least doesn't have to witness her terrifying eyebrows or orange hair, and who's in turn pursued by a nice blonde musician who's obviously a much better match for him. What's surprising and endlessly entertaining about this not-quite-musical is how willing, and even eager, La Crawford is to play up to her public's worst estimation of her. She'll play unsympathetic up to the armpits, as long as they sense that underneath is the heart of a real woman who merely needs to be dominated by a devoted male. None of the characters makes much sense--Marjorie Rambeau, Oscar-nominated as her mother, is either cold and grasping or warm and sympathetic depending on the moment in the plot--but the dialog has some sarcastic snap to it, and it's fun to watch Crawford go through her purification-through-humiliation paces. There's a brilliant Carol Burnett parody of this called "Torchy Song," but the original is even more giggle-inducing.