Swing (Jan-Dec 1953)

THE CREAM OF CROSBY 29 "Though I see the danger, still the flame grows higher. I know I must surrender to your kiss of fire," I don't think Jack Bleeck would allow it in the place. After all, it's a family saloon. Let's have a return to decent, respectable sentiment, Tin Pan Alley, when a man could clutch his beer and really let go with "Why Did They Dig Ma's Grave So Deep?" Island Malarkey «-ROUR STAR PLAYHOUSE," the -L offshoot of a supercharged character named Don Sharpe, is one of the most ambitious dramatic efforts to come out of Hollywood. It is on film. It employs the high-priced regular services of such stars as Dick Powell, Charles Boyer and Joel McCrea and the occasional services of such people as Ronald Colman and David Niven. It is produced with painstaking care by a bunch of real experts. Naturally, with so many little blessings in its favor, the results are pretty spectacular. Not necessarily spectacularly good (though it has been that). Just spectacular. Sometimes it is spectacularly bad and, to your real connoisseur, that has a degree of interest too. For when you seek a really terrible movie you have to go to Hollywood. We haven't got the brains or the equipment or the know-how to do things anywhere near that badly here. We can turn out some punk movies. But if you're after downright lousy movies, then Hollywood is the place. They can get them for you wholesale. The movie the other night on "Four Star Playhouse" (CBS-TV 8:30 p.m. EST alternate Thursdays) was just such a movie. It had David Niven, an actor of great talent and tremendous charms. It was very capably directed and photographed. The dialogue was reasonably literate. And, in spite of it all, it was just plain awful. Let me tell you about this movie. It is set on a South Sea island paradise where the natives grin all day and the drums beat all night. And Dr. David Niven, who obviously has a guilty secret of some sort, happily shoots penicillin into the sick children and is rewarded by the love of the natives and, maybe, occasionally a cocoanut. Well, sir, into this paradise comes rich, nasty Mr. Masterson who owns the island and is exploiting the natives and getting filthy on copra. Right away Dr. Niven runs afoul of him. Brushes right past him without a hello because he's on his way to shoot penicillin into a native. So Masterson tells him to pack his syringes and get out. He's through. Not only in that island but in all the islands. (He owns the whole South Seas.) Naturally, the natives are very sad and the drumbeats get very mournful. Dr. Niven starts to pack the syringes when a native beater comes rushing in to tell him to hurry, hurry. It's rich, nasty Masterson, writhing in pain. Acute appendicitis. Has to be operated on immediately by the doctor he just ruined. No, that's not the half of it. Wait. Wait. The wind is rising. A big blow is on the way. And while the wind howls and shrieks around the flimsy hut, Dr. Niven slices away at Masterson's innards by candlelight in a manner that would have made Hippocrates weep with joy. "The master is going to send you away?" asks his wistful little native interne. "Scalpel," says Niven sternly, the wind howling like a banshee outside. Next evening. The crisis is past. The storm's over. Masterson's lovely young wife comes out on the porch in the moonlight and finds young Dr. Niven staring off into the distance. "Where will you go?" she asks. "Who knows? Somewhere out there. Some little island. Somewhere where I'm needed." Well, sir, they fall to walking in the moonlight together and you know what that leads to. In this case, it leads to nasty old Masterson suddenly realizing he'd better be nice to his pretty young wife or he'll lose her. "I'm not much for apologies," Masterson says shamefacedly to young Dr. Niven. "But I did a lot of thinking last night." He wants to make amends. He'll send young Dr. Niven anywhere — London, Paris, Rome. But no. Niven wants to stay right there where he's needed. After the Mastersons have departed, the guilty secret comes out. Niven isn't a doctor at all. Just