Broadway Babies
About Broadway Babies
Chorus girl Delight Foster, called Dee, and stage manager Billy Buvanny plan to marry. Bootlegger Perc Gessant comes between them. Dee is led to think Billy loves someone else, takes up with Gessant, and accepts his proposal. On the way to the wedding, rival gangsters shoot Gessant and he dies. Dee and Billy get engaged again.
Cast & crew
More about Broadway Babies
Mervyn LeRoy directed. Monte M. Katterjohn and Humphrey Pearson wrote the screenplay from Jay Gelzer's story "Broadway Musketeers." Sol Polito photographed it. Leo F. Forbstein supervised the music. First National produced it and Warner Bros. distributed it. The sound version opened on 30 June 1929 and a silent version on 28 July 1929. In Britain it was called Broadway Daddies.
Themes
Background
A pre-Code backstage story released in the first summer of all-talking features, with a bootlegger in the place of the usual rich angel.
Making
Studios were still shipping silent versions alongside talkies in 1929. Only the sound version of this one is known to survive, as a 16mm reduction positive at the Library of Congress. The trailer survives incomplete.
Look
Sol Polito photographed the sound version in black and white.
Music
Leo F. Forbstein is credited with the music. Original songs are by Al Bryan with George W. Meyer, and by Grant Clarke with Harry Akst.
Preservation
The sound version survives as a 16mm reduction positive in the Library of Congress. The silent version is not known to survive. The trailer is incomplete.
Notes
- Alice White's first sound film with spoken dialogue. She plays Dee. Charles Delaney plays Billy.
- Sally Eilers plays Navarre King and Marion Byron plays Florine Chanler. Fred Kohler plays Perc Gessant.
- Songs include "Jig, Jig, Jigaloo" and "Broadway Baby Dolls" (Al Bryan and George W. Meyer) and "Wishing and Waiting for Love" (Grant Clarke and Harry Akst).
- The score also uses George M. Cohan's "Give My Regards to Broadway," Leoncavallo's "Vesti la giubba," and Wagner's bridal chorus.
- Copyright was renewed, so the film entered the U.S. public domain on 1 January 2025.
- Warner Archive issued it on DVD in 2017.
Scenes
- Dee accepts Perc Gessant after she is told Billy loves another girl.
- Rival gangsters shoot Gessant as the wedding is about to start.
Influenced by
- Broadway Musketeers (Jay Gelzer story)
Also available
- Warner Archive DVD (2017)
