{"id":45149,"date":"2024-10-04T18:59:00","date_gmt":"2024-10-04T22:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=45149"},"modified":"2024-10-04T18:59:00","modified_gmt":"2024-10-04T22:59:00","slug":"the-bootleg-files-the-lord-dont-play-favorites","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2024\/10\/04\/the-bootleg-files-the-lord-dont-play-favorites\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bootleg Files: The Lord Don’t Play Favorites"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 881:<\/strong> \u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d (1956 television musical starring Kay Starr, Louis Armstrong, Buster Keaton and Robert Stack). <\/p>\n

LAST SEEN:<\/strong> On Internet Archive and YouTube. <\/p>\n

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO:<\/strong> None.<\/p>\n

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS:<\/strong> Music clearance issues and a poor quality surviving kinescope. <\/p>\n

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE: <\/strong>Nope.<\/p>\n

One of all-time favorite books is Arthur Shulman and Roger Youman\u2019s \u201cHow Sweet it Was,\u201d which chronicles American television from the late 1940s through the mid-1960s. While many of the entries in the book are well-known, there was one photograph that always intrigued me \u2013 it was for a 1956 musical called \u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d and it showed Buster Keaton wearing a polka dot clown costume and his trademark flat hat while playing a calliope. Next to Keaton was Kay Starr, a popular singer in the 50s, who had a straw hat and a cane while wearing a striped blouse and a long black skirt. The caption for the photo only said that the show was a musical with a circus setting and co-starred Robert Stack, Dick Haymes and Louis Armstrong. (Yes, that\u2019s the photo at the top of this page.)
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For years, I always thought \u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d was a great title for a production \u2013 but I knew nothing about this show until the other week when I stumbled over a bootlegged upload of the offering on YouTube. To my disappointment, there is no scene in \u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d with Keaton and Starr performing that photographed moment \u2013 it was one of many publicity photos with the performers used to hype the show. <\/p>\n

To my delight, I discovered that \u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d is an unfairly forgotten work that offered a fun distraction. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d is based on a story by Patrick Malloy about a small town in Kansas that has challenged by a seemingly endless drought. The town\u2019s elected officials want to hire a rainmaker to bring much needed downpours to the devastated farmland, but the local pastor insists that the best solution is to pray for rain. A commonsense solution is offered by the town\u2019s veterinarian (played by crooner Dick Haymes) \u2013 he suggests that the townsfolk pray for rain and also hire a rainmaker.<\/p>\n

Alas, the town has no money to hire a rainmaker. But as luck would have it, a small traveling circus arrives and the town\u2019s venal sheriff begins to hit the show with a series of expensive fines totaling $250 \u2013 which was quite a sum in 1956. The sheriff also threatens to jail the circus owner (Kay Starr) unless payment is made immediately. Over the objection of her boyfriend and the circus\u2019 manager (Robert Stack), the circus is forced to give up its $250 in savings.<\/p>\n

The circus is now in a double mess \u2013 it cannot pay its workers and it is unable to bet the $250 on its star horse, which was scheduled to run in an upcoming race at a county fair. Stack\u2019s character disguises himself as a rainmaker by using a long beard, a derby and a Yiddish accent \u2013 trust me, this you must see to believe \u2013 and he recaptures the $250 from the sheriff while doing a phony rainmaker routine. Except that, amazingly, his act coincides with the coming of rain \u2013 and while that\u2019s good news for the rain-starved town, it is bad news for the circus because their horse favors a dry track and is a sure-fire loser on a muddy racing surface. However, the Lord seems to play favorites when it comes to helping the circus when they need His help the most.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d was presented as part of \u201cProducers\u2019 Showcase,\u201d an anthology series that ran from 1954 to 1957 and offered live 90-minute plays starring A-list talent. An unusual feature of the show was its broadcast in color \u2013 at that point in time, most households only had black-and-white television. However, \u201cProducers\u2019 Showcase\u201d used a compatible color technology that enabled viewers with black-and-white televisions to enjoy the program without any visual degradation. And while most of the \u201cProducers\u2019 Showcase\u201d offerings were dramatic, but the series occasionally offered musicals including broadcast of \u201cPeter Pan\u201d starring Mary Martin and \u201cOur Town\u201d starring Frank Sinatra, Paul Newman and Eva Marie Saint. <\/p>\n

Starr\u2019s husband at the time, Hal Stanley, collaborated with Jo Swerling on the musical with uncredited help from blacklisted writer Paul Jarrico. Starr was also under contract at the time to RCA Victor records \u2013 and NBC was owned by RCA, which was also pushing the color televisions that would have enabled viewers to enjoy \u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d as intended. Thus, she was a shoo-in for the show. And, in fairness, she does a decent job in handling the show\u2019s dramatic segments and is a pure delight in belting out the songs in her inimitable style.<\/p>\n

Dick Haymes is also a good singer, although he was a bit of a bland presence as an actor. Robert Stack was no one\u2019s idea of a song-and-dance man, but he gamely gives it his best shot and is clearly enjoying himself. Buster Keaton, cast as a clown in Emmett Kelly-style make-up, has relatively little do except to occasionally comment on the commotion swirling around him. The real energy comes from Louis Armstrong as the circus\u2019 trumpeter \u2013 he has two numbers that stop the show and he always manages to snag the viewers\u2019 attention whenever he is on screen.<\/p>\n

The one weak link of \u201cThe Lord Don\u2019t Play Favorites\u201d is the show\u2019s score \u2013 no hit songs emerged from the production, which may explain why it quickly became forgotten after its live broadcast on September 17, 1956. RCA Victor put out a record of Kay Starr performing selections from the score, but it was not a popular seller.<\/p>\n

There is no surviving copy of the original color broadcast, and the show was considered lost until a black-and-white kinescope emerged. A commercial home entertainment release is unlikely, given the music rights issues, the visual quality of the kinescope and a perceived lack of commercial value. However, it can be seen online \u2013 and if it not a musical classic, it is an enjoyable bit of mischief that scores as a light entertainment offering.<\/p>\n