Hollywood Musicals : The Film Reader

The articles in this collection examine the musical in relation to its generic form and conventions, the relationship between narrative and spectacle, gender and feminist analysis, camp production and reception, stardom, and the representation of race and ethnicity. The book includes essays by Rick Altman, Lucie Arbuthnot and Gail Seneca, Carol Clover, Steven Cohan, Richard Dyer, Jane Feuer, Patricia Mellencamp, Linda Mizejewski, Shari Roberts, Pamela Robertson, Michael Rogin, Martin Rubin and Matthew Tinkcom.
Contents:
Introduction - musicals of the studio era. Part I Generic forms: entertainment and utopia, Richard Dyer; the self-reflective musical and the myth of entertainment, Jane Feuer; the American film musical as dual-focus narrative, Rick Altman; Busby Berkley and the backsatge musical, Martin Rubin. Part II Gendered spectacles: sexual economics - "Gold Diggers" of 1933, Patricia Mellencamp; pre-text and text in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes", Lucie Arbuthnot and Gail Seneca; feminizing the song-and-dance man - Fred Astaire and the spectacle of masculinity in the Hollywood musical, Steven Cohan. Part III Interventions: Judy Garland and camp, Richard Dyer; working like a homosexual - camp visual codes and the labour of gay subjects in the MGM Freed Unit, Matthew Tinkcom; feminist camp in "Gold Diggers" of 1933, Pamela Robertson; the lady in the tutti-fruti hat - Carmen Miranda, a spectacle of ethnicity, Shari Roberts. Part IV Radical displacements: dancing in the rain, Carol J. Clover; new deal blackface, Michael Rogin; beautiful white bodies, Linda Mizejewski.