Knickerbocker Holiday

There is no denying that is a low budget film, especially compared to Eddy's MGM classics. Yet there is something very satisfying about this musical. Eddy plays a small publisher who dares to criticize the local government. Charles Coburn is the visiting Governor, who is a scheming crook only interested in bettering his personal situation. The two men are sure to have a conflict. The conflict is heightened when Coburn meets Eddy's lady, the delightful Constance Dowling, and he takes a romantic interest in the lady.

If this all sounds very dramatic, it is not. The film has it's tongue firmly in it's cheek throughout and the comedy parts are the film's strength. Of note, the print I purchased on Bonanza did include September Song as I understand the song is deleted in some prints. However, it should be noted the song is sung by Charles Coburn, not Eddy. And finally, I'd like to say how much I enjoyed the films opening musical number. The song is very catchy and the production is very amusing and well done.

Maxwell Anderson's story, especially his comments about governments and their component politicians and bureaucrats, are, of course, toned down in this flawed motion picture adaptation of his classic Broadway play, but they still bite enough that I can recommend everyone to watch "Knickerbocker Holiday."

In my opinion, Charles Coburn stole this. He was always a very good to great actor, but his attempting a musical role just astonishes and impresses me.

And with a peg leg!

Coburn's version of "September Song" is at least as good as Walter Huston's, and neither was really a singer, just both superior actors.

Nelson Eddy was a good singer, but didn't have much to sing in this version. His leading lady, Constance Dowling, who died awfully young and with far too few credits, was not only beautiful and charming, she also could really sing. What a shame there are not more of her works available to us.

It's a Hollywood fairly low-budget movie made in the middle of World War II, and it has flaws. But the Anderson story and dialogue make it very worthwhile.

There is a fuzzy print at YouTube. The person who uploaded it apologizes for the mediocre quality of the print, but emphasizes the hard-to-find aspects of the movie so I think we can be grateful we have anything.

The 1938 stage musical, with book and lyrics by Maxwell Anderson (a conservative, and he hated Roosevelt; not for nothing is a "Roosevelt" presented here as a dimwitted ancestor) and music by Kurt Weill, was a flawed but very interesting look at the dangers of despotism, with a near-amazing score and a legendary Walter Huston performance. It's noticeably watered down in this independently produced 1944 adaptation, with a fraction of the original score ("Nowhere to Go But Up," "September Song," "The One Indispensable Man," and snatches of "It Never Was You" in the background) overwhelmed by interpolations, mostly by Jule Styne and Sammy Cahn, and they're not very good. The story is simplified, the bloody battles are eliminated, and the fun device of having Washington Irving narrate the story and interact with these figures from the past is gone. Nelson Eddy's more animated than usual and of course sings well, but there's not a lot of chemistry between him and his leading lady, a pallid Constance Dowling. Coburn acts Pieter Stuyvesant well but sure doesn't deliver much of a "September Song," and the supporting cast is mostly nobodies, though "Shelley Winter" (no s yet) is a noticeable giggling soubrette, a role not in the original. What it does have going for it is a fetching production design that conjures up a whimsical old Nieuw Amsterdam, and some of Anderson's speculation about the damage corrupt leaders do does survive. It rushes to an end, though, and so much great Weill is missing. Worth a look, certainly, but if you want to know how it's supposed to sound, there are complete recordings out there now, and Huston's own "September Song," which became a posthumous hit for him when tacked onto a 1950 movie, "September Affair," is the ultimate example of somebody with no voice making a song unforgettable.

Knickerbocker Holiday was one of three feature films Nelson Eddy starred in after leaving MGM after his last starring role with Jeanette MacDonald in I Married An Angel. His first film was the highly successful Phantom of the Opera, the third was a disastrous original musical for Republic, Northwest Outpost. Falling somewhere in the middle was Knickerbocker Holiday.

It's not that it's a bad film, but nearly all the Kurt Weill-Maxwell Anderson score is eliminated and a whole lot of the biting satire in the book. Knickerbocker Holiday ran for 168 performances on Broadway during the 1938-1939 season and starred Walter Huston as Peter Stuyvesant, the famous one legged colonial governor of New Amsterdam, the last one before the British took over the colonies.

Walter Huston's famous talk/sing version of the immortal September Song is world famous. Why they didn't get Huston for the screen is a mystery, but why Charles Coburn as Stuyvesant tried to actually sing the song is frightening. Coburn was decidedly not blessed with a singing voice and he really looks bad next to Nelson Eddy. Coburn can best be described as bellowing the immortal ballad.

Eddy took the role of the young firebrand Brom Broeck, a part not unlike the one he did at MGM in Let Freedom Ring. He doesn't get to sing the immortal September Song. His songs are quite forgettable and most of them were written by Jule Styne and Sammy Cahn who certainly have a lot better work to their credit. In fact a ballad entitled It Never Was You was Brom Broeck's big number on stage and that was eliminated. I commend a recording that Judy Garland made of it for Capitol records in the fifties. She sang it also in I Could Go On Singing.

Playing Eddy's love interest is Constance Dowling who sings nice and who Coburn is also on the prowl for. In fact the September Song is his way of wooing her by saying he's not getting any younger. Her younger sister is Shelley Winters in one of her first screen roles. I also liked Ernest Cossart as their greedy father and Percy Kilbride as the timid jailer of New Amsterdam.

Sad to say for all involved it was a nice effort, but a lot of improvement could have made this a classic.

While the main character, Peter Stuyvesant, was a real person and New Amsterdam was indeed a Dutch colony, don't consider "Knickerbocker Holiday" to be a history lesson. This is okay, as it's obvious that the musical comedy film isn't trying to be a historical piece and was based on a Broadway musical. Instead, just enjoy the story which was based very broadly on this colony.

The story is set in New Amsterdam in the 17th century. The town has been run by a group of repressive kleptocrats who are more concerned with bleeding the townsfolk of their money than anything else. When the new governor (Charles Coburn) arrives, folks are hopeful that he'll institute reforms...and at first it appears this will be the case. But Peter Stuyvesant is a conniver...and hires the local trouble-maker Brom Broeck (Nelson Eddy) to work for him instead of spending his time printing pamphlets demanding freedom. Eventually, Broeck realizes the Governor was just using him and the pair spend the movie fighting for the same woman and trying to outwit each other.

The story is purely tongue in cheek entertainment....fun as well. While the story is from a second-tier studio, the songs are fun, the acting nice and the story engaging. Well worth seeing...even if it's a lousy history lesson.

By the way, the real Peter Stuyvesant wasn't so much corrupt as a martinet who managed to make the citizens of Dutch North America thoroughly hate him. When the English arrived to seize the colony, Stuyvesant wanted to mount a defense...and the people of New Amsterdam quickly surrendered and seemed happier under English rule.

Also, it's not at all important but the film refers to Broeck being placed in the stocks for punishment, but the device was actually called a 'Pillory'. Stocks were for the feet...the pillory for the hands.