Lady of Burlesque (1943)

I love this movie so much

You won't be disappointed!

For having a relatively low budget, the film's style and overall art direction are immensely impressive.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Based on Gypsy Rose Lee murder mystery novel The G-String Murders, the film's play like a B-movie in The Thin Man-like style. There someone who don't like strippers. Barbara Stanwyck plays a Gypsy Rose Lee like-character with a fellow comedian who had crush on her and both them team up on solving the case. Stanwyck, the murder victim and "The Princess" are unattractive, but the supporting and minor actresses playing the strippers are pretty. I like one dress Stanwyck wore design by the great Edith Head. Stanwyck's role may not be great maybe it's how the part was written, she's sassy and wisecracking I agree the second choice who could play the role of Dixie Daisy would be the lovely Rita Hayworth. Stanwyck has nice body and singing and dancing. Her singing in two stage act was not good. When I first saw it two years ago I didn't like it but rewatching; now I finding it entertain fun.

*Spoiler/plot- Lady in Burlesque, 1943. A mystery about the closing and sale of a large theater involving the theater's management, owner, and vaudeville show cast.*Special Stars- Barbara Stanwyck, Michael O'Shea, Pinky Lee, *Theme- Strippers are not all dumb women.*Trivia/location/goofs- B&W. Murder mystery. Written by Gypsy Rose Lee. Pinky Lee was a longtime performer in both theater genres.*Emotion- A pedestrian mystery film except for the elements of seeing how vaudeville shows were done in those times and experiencing Gypy Rose Lee writing. Barbara Stanwwyck glamored up to be a sexy stripper is comical. Pinky Lee is worth seeing for his comedic lisping little boy stage sketch role that was later copied by several performers in Vaudeville era like the Three Stooges, Ed Wynn, Bert Lar, and many others.*Based On- The dying of the vaudeville theater and it's performance circuit.

Barbara Stanwyck got to really show her versatility in Lady of Burlesque doing a couple of numbers that did make me wonder why she didn't try to do a full blown musical. Of course she had the best of inspiration in a book that was partially written by the one and only Gypsy Rose Lee.Gypsy needed a ghostwriter, but she certainly knew the world of burlesque as none other. So with Craig Rice's ghostwriting they fashioned a murder mystery set in the burlesque world. Somebody is killing the strippers at a burlesque theater and Barbara isn't sitting around waiting to be the next victim. With the help of comic Michael O'Shea she's going to find the perpetrator before she gets done in with her G String.A lovely group of movie queens help Barbara out in this film. Playing some of her peers are Iris Adrian, Gloria Dickson, Marion Martin, Janis Carter, Stephanie Bachelor, and Victoria Faust. Some of these don't make it to the end of the picture.Playing another of the comics is Pinky Lee who I well remember because I used to watch his kid's television show back in my salad days. Pinky was as frantic as I remember him and he does a mean jitterbug with Stanwyck.William Wellman as director keeps the pace of things going pretty nicely. And if you're a leg man, this picture will leave you nothing to complain about. As for the murderer, here's a hint, it's roughly the equivalent of the butler doing it.

This film is full of surprises. I saw it accidentally and thought it was much older than I discovered it is when looking it up on IMDb. It's like a peek backstage at a burlesque show (exactly where most of the action takes place). And it actually catches your interest and manages to hold it, because of these historical artifacts if nothing else.For example, you'll be surprised to see Barbara Stanwyck dancing and doing it very well, in long full body shots that show it's actually her doing the dancing. And, to my surprise, it was quite a body. I've never been one to think she was very attractive in the face (which in my opinion detracted from Double Indemnity because the whole point of that movie was that she was irresistible). But here she shows off a comely set of gams, as they would say in the day.Next you'll see Pee Wee Herman...then realize it couldn't possibly be him and you realize it's Pinky Lee, the one who inspired Herman's career which is nothing (period in my opinion) without Lee. But there's none of the perverse overtones with Lee that you felt with Herman even before the scandal where he proved it.You'll recognize all of the vaudeville routines from other comedians. Abbott and Costello's routines especially. But burlesque and vaudeville were the library where all of these comics and all after them drew their knowledge of how to make people laugh, even in spite of themselves. And many of the stars in this film were experts since childhood in the very acts they portrayed in burlesque and vaudeville all their lives.All in all it's a film worth watching, and watch for the surprises as well. You'll never realize how much you owe to burlesque and vaudeville and how you have laughed all your life at jokes that were written long before any of us were ever born.