Dr. Broadway is another one of those films that make me believe I am not the only one without a firm stance on film categories. It is included in the same Blu-ray set of noir films, published by Kino Lorber, as The Great Gatsby, which is the last film that I wrote about. Dr. Broadway could be called a comedy noir; I have been finding more and more of those in recent years. It is also a romance. In fact, Dr. Broadway could come under at least three categories.
You can see Dr. Broadway free online. Click here to see it at the Internet Archive. I used the Internet Archive print for the screenshots in this post, but the print quality on (my borrowed copy of) the Blu-ray is much better. The Blu-ray also comes with not one but two audio commentaries, one by filmmaker Allan Arkush and film historian/filmmaker Daniel Kremer, and the other by film historian Jeremy Arnold. Both are well worth a listen. Both give a lot of information about director Anthony Mann. Dr. Broadway was Mann’s debut film as director. This same Blu-ray is a collection of three films noir, including The Great Gatsby and Smooth as Silk.
The opening credits, in a neon script reminiscent of movie marquees and neon signs generally, appear over shots of the New York City skyline and Dr. Timothy Kane (aka Dr. Broadway) disembarking from a cab. He reads additional credits on an electric news ticker overlooking Times Square. It’s a clever way to tie the credits to the film’s locale.
The narrative starts with a woman (Connie Madigan) threatening to jump from the ledge of the Hotel Astor. She is drawing a crowd by shouting, “Out of this world! That’s where I’m going! That’s where you all ought to go! Out of this world!” Dr. Kane arrives and greets the police officer directing the scene on the street. He offers to go up to the ledge and help the woman, and he makes a bet with Detective Sergeant Pat Doyle, who also arrives on the scene, that he will be successful.
Dr. Kane does join Connie Madigan on the ledge and brings her into the hotel room, and that’s when he learns that she is part of a publicity stunt. She explains that she took the job only because she was desperate for money. Dr. Kane is angry, but he doesn’t want Madigan to be arrested. He tells the police arriving in the hotel room that she is suffering from malnutrition, and before the police can arrest Madigan for disturbing the peace, he knocks her out to make it look real, like she has fainted from her condition.
Detective Sergeant Doyle is one of the police officers to arrive in the hotel room, and he tells Dr. Kane that Vic Telli is out of jail, out early because of good behavior. It was Dr. Kane’s testimony that put Telli in jail in the first place. Dr. Kane isn’t pleased to hear the news, and even though he doesn’t appear too worried, the film has set up a possible romance and a source of tension from the start.
Dr. Kane meets Vic Telli in a nightclub because he doesn’t want to run scared. He can see that Telli is very sick, and Telli admits that he has one month, maybe two, to live. But he has some unfinished business, and he wants Dr. Kane’s help. Telli arranges to meet the doctor at his office and there, Telli tells Dr. Kane that he wants him to get some money that he has hidden in a safe deposit box in New Jersey and to give the money to his daughter, Margie Dove. She doesn’t know who her father is, and he wants to keep it that way. Dr. Kane is not comfortable with this request because he cannot be sure how Telli got the money, but Telli begs for the doctor’s help because he needs to do “one square thing” before he dies. Dr. Kane reluctantly agrees.
Dr. Kane puts Telli under an ultraviolet light for some light therapy. But then he is off to night court because Madigan has been arrested and fined $250.00 for threatening to jump from the ninth floor of the hotel. In the courtroom, Dr. Kane offers to pay the fine and also pleads for leniency in the case. He gets Madigan’s sentence suspended, and he promises Madigan a job as a receptionist in his office. While Dr. Kane is gone, Vic Telli is killed in his office.
From this point on, the narrative becomes darker. The murderer isn’t done with Dr. Kane because he knows about the money in the security deposit box, and he insists that it belongs to him, not to Vic Telli’s daughter. He has his henchmen kidnap Connie Madigan and devises a plan to blackmail Dr. Kane, using Madigan as a pawn. If he doesn’t get the money, the next phase of the plan involves Madigan’s murder and planting evidence to make Dr. Kane the prime suspect. And to show that their boss is serious, one of the murderer’s henchmen slaps Madigan for attempting to escape. The film doesn’t abandon its comic and romantic elements entirely, but it also doesn’t let the villain lapse into any beneficence or sentimentality.
Dr. Broadway is a lot of fun to watch, and the Blu-ray version is well worth it because the print quality is excellent, and the disc comes with audio commentary. The film is barely over an hour long, and that hour-plus is time well spent. Macdonald Carey is wonderful in the lead role, and Jean Phillips reminded me of Ginger Rogers, without the singing and the dancing, that is. The commentary by film historian Jeremy Arnold mentions how Jean Phillips got her start as a stand-in for Jean Harlow, but I would like to research that a bit further. I think Phillips looks an awful lot like Ginger Rogers!
May 9, 1942, release date • Directed by Anthony Mann • Screenplay by Art Arthur • Based on a story by Borden Chase • Music by Robert Emmett Dolan, Paul Sawtell • Edited by Arthur P. Schmidt • Cinematography by Theodor Sparkuhl
Macdonald Carey as Dr. Timothy Kane (aka Dr. Broadway) • Jean Phillips as Connie Madigan • Eduardo Ciannelli as Vic Telli • Richard Lane as Police Sergeant Patrick Doyle • J. Carrol Naish as Jack Venner • Joan Woodbury as Margie Dove • Arthur Loft as Police Captain Mahoney • Warren Hymer as Maxie the Goat • Frank Bruno as Marty Weber • Sid Melton as Louie La Conga • Olin Howland as Professor • Gerald Mohr as Red • Abe Dinovitch as Benny • Thomas W. Ross as the magistrate • Charles C. Wilson as District Attorney McNamara • Spencer Charters as Oscar Titus • Mary Gordon as Broadway Carrie • Jay Novello as Greeny • John Gallaudet as Al • Al Hill as Jerry • Edward Earle as Hayes • John Hamilton as Joe
Distributed by Paramount Pictures • Produced by Paramount Pictures
Blu-ray title: Film Noir: The Dark Side of Cinema XXVI, published by Kino Lorber, KL Studio Classics, 2025
No comments:
Post a Comment