@@MichaelHonscar Me, too. Never liked Gene. How can you dislike someone you have never met? Well, he reminds me of someone I intensely disliked and for good reasons.
Gene made Fred Astaire look a bit stiff in his dance moves. Gene had a more rounded, athletic figure which gave his dancing a very enviable smoothness. And as said on this show he was a great all around talent with a down-to-earth handsomeness. The Gods certainly favored him and in turn he favored us ABUNDANTLY.
@@patrickryan1515 In addition to his dance and choreographic skills, Gene was a fine singer. In fact, compared to Fred Astaire, Gene sounded like Pavarotti!
I really enjoy watching this. As a Brit it doesn't necessarily make me think of a simpler time, as it were, but the friendliness and cheerful nature, plus the interesting guests and thought process of the game really puts a smile on my face. I started watching these after searching for clips with David Niven, and have watched many more since. Television programmes nowadays are nothing like this, and neither are the people who are in the public eye. It's rather a shame
Are you familiar with the British WML? I saw one clip on youtube and it was very interesting to see the differences. For one thing, the audience would cue when the panelists were on the right track by applauding. It's like the WML version of Prime Ministers Questions. . . ;)
Thank you for suggesting this. I just searched for this and got a clip from 1955. The accents are more familiar to me (although I do love that old fashioned American), and I love how the audience claps along when the panel does well, very British :). I need to find more of these clips.
Luke Jordan If you find any, please let me know, cause I could only find the one clip. I'd love to see more. According to Gil Fates (producer of the U.S. version), the British show was very dry, more interested in stumping the panel with tediously boring professions they'd never guess than in entertaining the audience. The one clip I saw of British WML didn't fit that description at *all*.
I'm very glad that you are enjoying WHAT'S MY LINE? it is one of my top 5 favorite games shows of all time. And as an American I do look as these wonderful shows and think of a simpler time in our History. We had better manners and sense of putting one's best foot forward when appearing before others. I watch these shows and smile constantly too.
Gene Kelly is a HUGE HUGE HUGE Hollywood legend and I'm amazed the audience didn't raise the roof. I can only guess that in 1957 he'd past his commercial peak and it was too early for him to be looked back on so fondly (as say, Fred Astaire). Had he been on five years earlier he would've had not just applause but screams!
Gene was on the downward slope. After 'Singin' in the Rain' (1952), which was a moderate hit on first release, he went to Britain and France for two years, partly for tax reasons. There he made 'Invitation to the Dance', a wordless all-ballet episodic film. It flopped, and the more conventional musical he starred in on returning to Hollywood, 'It's Always Fair Weather', lost money as well: a quasi-sequel to 'On the Town', it was too downbeat and managed to co-star Cyd Charisse without giving her a romantic pas de deux with Gene. His last movie with Metro, 'Les Girls', came out this year but did not get its cost back despite a classy pedigree (Cukor, Cole Porter, Jack Cole) and is almost forgotten. Gene had a few successes to come, but no more on-screen triumphs, and some more dire misjudgments such as 'Gigot', 'Hello, Dolly' and 'Xanadu'.
@@esmeephillips5888 Xanadu was possibly the worst movie I actually paid to see. It had two redeeming qualities-the beautiful Olivia Newton John(but even she could not save it)and the only scene where the producers actually spent some money on-the skating.
Gene Kelly was a superstar among superstars! He could do it all entertainment-wise. Mr. Gabel was tremendous guessing the baseball umpire. His performance was impressive. Thanks for the video.
Earlier that day, John Rice umpired a doubleheader at Yankee Stadium between the White Sox and Yankees. The Yankees won the first game that Rice umpired behind the plate and the White Sox came back to win the second game with Rice at third base. John Daly mentions a "megillah" that took place in Chicago between these two teams earlier in the season where Rice was also part of the umpiring team. I believe it occurred on June 13, 1957, an afternoon game at the original Comiskey Park. It happened in the first inning when Art Ditmar of the Yankees threw a pitch close to the head of White Sox slugger and future Hall of Fame member Larry Doby. Fights broke out a couple of times as a result. According to the home plate umpire that day, nine participants in the fights were ejected from the premises. Rice was the second base umpire that day. There were no "megillahs" in the four game series between the White Sox and Yankees at Yankee Stadium from June 21-23.
John Rice umpired 19 full seasons in the American League, 1955-73. He umpired four World Series (two of which he only umpired the foul lines), three All-Star Games and two League Championship Series. Born in Homestead (PA) near Pittsburgh, he eventually made Chicago his home. He served in the Marines from 1942-46. He started umpiring in the minor leagues in 1948. He died on January 1, 2011.
'LaChoy makes Chinese food, swing American.' that was the commercial jingle on their T. V. ad, when I was in highschool. My mom bought LaChoy when she didn't feel like cooking. It tasted okay. But I preferred my mom's cooking. She got a break sometimes though.
WOW Matin Gable must have set a new speed record when he so quickly guessed that Mr. Rice was a Major League Baseball umpire! Rice said he was the youngest umpire in Baseball then.
+Steve Burrus Actually John Daly said it and Rice demurred. Although Nestor Chylak started umpiring a year earlier in the American League, he was born in 1922. Rice was born in 1918. And in terms of service, Tony Venzon and former major league players Bill Baker and Ken Burkhart were rookie umpires in the National League in 1957, even though they were older than Rice. National League umpire Stan Landes, who like Rice had been umpiring in the majors since 1955, was born in 1923. Ed Sudol would make his major league debut as a National League umpire six days after this episode aired.
“The big Megillah” Love it! Most people probably don’t know that the word Megillah is what’s read on the Jewish holiday of Purim about Queen Esther. Anyone remember Magilla gorilla?
Oh, my! I am 65 and this is how we ALL learned to write…as a retired teacher, I am sorry that we no longer teach cursive (and not just because it’s pretty.)
I wonder if having Leslie Caron as a co-star had anything to do with that? lol. Seriously, it was a fine movie, with incredible dancing by Kelly and Caron. By the way, the screen play for the movie was written by Alan Jay Lerner, who was the MG along with Frederick Loewe on a 1956 episode of WML.
Mr Hagerty could not cope with the game, but he tried his best and was very friendy. And in WML you can clearly see the vast influence that baseball had in the American society. Every few episodes there is a player or an official or whoever as contestant. That was long before Air Jordan and the Superbowl! And we should mention again how charming and unbelievably beautiful Arlene Francis is.
You must be seeing something different than me. I saw a laughing umpire when Martin Gabel guessed correctly. I think the lack of a handshake was just incidental.
Zac M. I agree I also saw a laughing umpire. He did recognize the panel with a node of his head. If you look at the end of a game today you will see the umpires leave at the end, no shaking of hands.
Gene Kelly is a legend even well known in former east germany (where we could recieve west german tv secetly before the wall came down) with a CTV TV in black and white). Besides his dance interludes I am in favour for him starring as D'Artagnan in 1948, the best musqueteer ever. For sake Constance died only in the movie, it killed me watching this as a child.
The Pirate. Not a great movie nor does it have memorable songs but the dancing is off the charts. Invitation to the Dance should have been a huge hit but wasn't. Probably his best work outside of Singing in the Rain. Not a fan of Brigadoon because I've seen it on stage done so well a few times and I'm okay with An American in Paris.
After watching Jim Hagerty twitch and shuffle in his seat, I think that one key skill of a TV performer is to keep still. The other panellists seem at ease on camera, especially Arlene Francis who radiates charm and cheerfulness as if she's talking face to face with the viewers. John Daly takes it a step further with his deadpan face direct to camera which reminds me of comedians Stan Laurel and Jack Benny. There's a lot of skill and practice in appearing effortless!
He didn't seem to have too much on the ball-asking if it was a food then asking if it could be eaten. He seemed very uncomfortable for someone who should be used to appearing before a camera.
At 16:57 Arlene asks if grain is used in the product, and their answer is no. I have a hard time believing that a manufacturer of Chinese food (even a nontraditional version available in grocery stores) would not use rice, wheat (noodles), or corn starch.
It was the La Choy brand, and they mostly made things like Chow Mien or Chop Suey. Whoever prepared the meal would then cook the rice and serve it. But they also made noodles. I wonder if those were started after the show, or if they thought it was a minor matter compared to the more important products.
I think it was taken to mean if it were a grain food specifically, so I believe the issue was how the question was interpreted. I remember growing up and mom would buy their canned bamboo shoots and water chestnuts when she would make Lumpias, so it's possible that with that in mind, grains wouldn't really apply with the canned vegetables.
"La Choy Food Products Company, in 1922, and to use metal to can a variety of Oriental vegetables in addition to bean sprouts." They might use grains today as that's a cheap source of carbs many prepared food and Frozen foods rely on. In some ways, food used to be healthier than it is now. It probably did have a boatload of salt though.
No one could have anticipated that 6 actors working together in the 1948 MGM film "The Three Musketeers" would be future WML MGs and that two others would be future guest panelists (and a few were both). Besides Gene Kelly, the future MGs were Van Heflin, Vincent Price, June Allyson, Lana Turner, and Angela Lansbury. The future guest panelists were Keenan Wynn and Gig Young.
I was surprised to see the first contestant exit without shaking hands with the panel members. The men on the panel did not even stand up in anticipation, so I wonder whether it was decided that they would not shake hands. I wonder why.
4:40 probably Martin Gabel's finest hour, they must have thought that since Bennett (who was Mr. Sport expert) was absent, they'd have difficulties to find the occupation but Gabel nailed it perfectly and you could see how proud he is :)
I wish instead of trying to squeeze in that last contestant, they had spent the extra 5 min. with Gene Kelly. This ia a thing that annoys me about this show, which otherwise, i love.
Renata Ninetynine i said the same thing about another episode. It would just be nice if they would spend time and talk with the mystery guest instead of wasting time of 2 or 3 minutes with a last panelist who they have to rush through to guess his line.
I agree,. It's so frustrating that John often fails to take the opportunity, and it is a rare opportunity, to spend at least a few moments talking to these "mystery guests" as many are top-flight celebrities and major stars who otherwise rarely appear as themselves in public...such a missed opportunity!
Starting at 16:35, Mr. Hagerty, Mr. Muldoon, and John Charles Daly all pronounce "manufactured" as though it were spelled "mannafactured". I think that this pronunciation was much more common in the 1950's, when the word was more commonly used than it is today. Today, we are more likely to pronounce the "u" in "manufactured" as a long "u".
I don't think Mr Hagerty really felt comfortable as a panelist as he seemed to look forward to getting passed over to have Arlene take over with the questions
Here Gene Kelly mentions he had been in a helicopter. Years later, when Kellty showed up one more time as a mystery guest, Dorothy asked him if he had dropped his address book out of a helicopter over Greece. He did not do such a thing either here or in Greece.
Dorothy asked this one many times, one of her insider questions that would provide her a clue but give no information to her fellow panelists to help them. Like Casey Stengel and study of dentistry, she never wound up asking this to the person who did in fact apparently drop his address book out of a helicopter in Greece, Anthony Perkins. Kelly answered truthfully.
I was surprised to read that he and Arlene were married 40 years and that she died just months after he did. They were a special couple indeed, and except for a few films, there are no examples of his, (or her) stage work. A true shame.
I'm glad too - although her last years were really bad..she had both Alzheimer and Cancer. The Alzheimer started already mid '80s. Every time I see her now on these episodes, I think of this terrible ending of hers...
it could be that Dorothy did not want a gushing introduction. I know if I was introducing her I would ask her if she was ok with the introduction I was going to give.
They met while working together on a radio show called “Big sister” where Martin had one of the leading roles. She knew that he was involved in Orson Welles’ Mercury Theater and asked him to suggest her for one of the roles in an upcoming play, which he did. On the syndicated version of WML they often had a short segment each show, where they read questions from viewers. One of them had the same question as you, so Arlene answered: arlenefrancisandwhatsmyline.tumblr.com/post/611775785008840704/arlene-is-asked-how-she-met-martin-and-whether-it And here is a link to an interview with Arlene. It says they met during the play (they met before, but it sounds like they fell in love while working on the play together): arlenefrancisandwhatsmyline.tumblr.com/post/189630943689/theyre-expecting-the-stork-in-february-and
People can have different opinions. I found that Kelly was a serious detriment to that picture, which is otherwise a terrific "message picture," detracting from the film for sure as a would be HL Mencken. By 1960 his movie musical days were over and I give him credit for trying a different kind of role, but he was just not a serious dramatic actor. And although he did comedy well in his musical comedies, I didn't think he was funny in that film. The message of the film could have been enhanced by having another actor play that part.
They're also already using the new type font style for the opening WML introductions at 0:23, even though the new opening animation using that font wouldn't debut for another couple of weeks.
Another 30 minutes of entertainment. I read they have close to 850 episodes so that means I've got about 425 hours of entertainment now. This is the first time I ever saw the first panel member to start the questions and figure out who it was.
One of his wives, Betsy Blair, played Ernest Borgnine's love interest in the Best Picture "Marty." His last wife had no idea who he was (she was much younger). She worked for PBS and was part of a team that worked on a documentary for American Masters on his life. When it was announced orally that Gene Kelly was going to be the subject, and only a few of the staff were chosen, others were very disappointed. His future wife had no idea if "Gene Kelly" was a man or a woman or that Gene Kelly was a dancer. She interviewed him over the course of making the documentary and they hit it off.
Yes, I grew up in the Midwest in the 1950s and '60s. We thought La Choy canned chop suey was authentic, not knowing any better until a trip to San Francisco in 1965 when I was 9. I think we relied on the few Chinese restaurants in town rather than the grocery store after that. Taste recollections are notoriously unreliable, but as far as I can recall the canned chop suey was salty but otherwise very bland. La Choy did manage to package fried chow mein noodles, dry and crisp, in metal cans, just with air around them, no sauce, and those were appealing to me at the time.
The noodles and the soy sauce is acceptable. I would not buy any of their prepared dishes. In the NYC Metropolitan Area, good Chinese take out is both ubiquitous and quite reasonably priced. And it is prepared quickly. No need to buy ersatz canned stuff. I have La Choy soy sauce in my cupboard. Their location is now in Irvine, CA. The company has been sold a few times since 1957.
Dorothy should know better! James C. Hagerty was press secretary NOT to the United States Of America! C'mon, Dottie! He was press secretary to Dwight Eisenhower. Jeepers!
Johan Bengtsson It's official pronunciation is Angeless but I have heard one or two people pronounce it the other way. Although it's rare to find somebody who actually lives there pronounce it wrong
Hardly anyone uses the authentic Spanish pronunciation, which I can only approximate using short English words as ON-hay-lace. By far the most common today is more like ANN-gel-less. In old movies one can sometimes hear it with a hard G something like ANGLE-ease.
+Johan Bengtsson One of the greatest American sports broadcasters of all time, Red Barber (1930's to 1960's) pronounced it the same way as the last challenger. But that way is being used less often over time.
Welcome to the American dialect of English. the problem in Amerca is, unlike most countries that have the same language and people for a thousand years, we are a collection of every people and language. each brings their own pronunciations based on the rules of their language. add to that, Los Angeles was not originally part of the US. the Spanish speaking people who settled it, named it. now you have non-Spanish speaking people trying to pronounce a Spanish word. then you have regional accents. then you have non English words which the foreigners change to English pronunciations, but some foreigners keep the native pronunciation. the last name "DeJesus" can be pronounced " Day Hay Zeus" or "Dee Jesus". and you have no way of knowing until the guy pronounces his name. people who speak English as a second language usually learn the formal, proper British dialect of English. when they come to Amerca, they have to learn English again. then, if they move to several locations across the country, they have to relearn the local dialect of English each time. in answer to your question, you pronounce it based on where you are from. and you will usually change to pronouncing it the way the locals pronounce to fit in. there really is no right way.
Many words were pronounced differently earlier in the 20th Century. If you listen to an old radio commercial for example, the word protein is pronounce pro-tee-un.
There was a song & dance sequence with Esther Williams that was cut from Take Me Out to the Ball Game. Gene felt awkward because they were the same height.
Dorothy and other panelists would often whisper the guest's name to their neighbors. This is an obvious breach of the rules and don't understand why it was tolerated.
Gene Kelly, amazingly enough, never had a big movie hit after "Singin' in the Rain" in 1952. I don't know why "Brigadoon" was not a huge hit, but it was not. "It's Always Fair Weather" in 1955 was very creative and flopped, maybe because it sort of negative about human friendship. And 1957 saw the biggest of his flops "Invitation to the Dance."
Brigadoon in my opinion, isn't very good. It's fantastic on stage. I find Gene totally miscast. He doesn't have the pipes for those songs at all. MGM had a way of ruining Broadway shows and Brigadoon is just one example. 20th Century Fox did a much better job with Broadway musicals. But that info you provide, I didn't know any of that. Thank you. Invitation is one of my all time favorites. Directing without Stanley Donen was never a good idea for Gene: Gigot (Gleason makes him look good) and Hello, Dolly (no one looks good except Satchmo).
@@Bigbadwhitecracker Gene Kelly was perfectly cast in Brigadoon compared to casting him as the HL Mencken character in Inherit the Wind. A terrific movie in every way except that Kelly was terrible. Even Spencer Tracy couldn't make him look good. I like so many of Kelly's musical films, including On the Town, which hasn't been raised by others in the comments. And I know he had to try something else after movie musicals ended. But it was a terrible decision to cast him as a straight dramatic actor.
@@Bigbadwhitecracker Even compared to other Hollywood artists, and especially compared to Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly had an enormous ego. It is clear from the way he presented himself on film when he was the director. It may be the case that Kelly directing without Donen was not a good idea -- the problem was that Donen refused to codirect with him any more. He just couldn't put up with that ego. I saw quotations from Donen to that effect, as well as addressing the inherent difficulties in having two directors.
@@preppysocks209 - Gene Kelly was great in Inherit the Wind. Bite your tongue...also, it’s known that Kelly was a perfectionist and that he met Donen when they were both working on Broadway and Donen followed Kelly to Hollywood. The real reason that Donen and Kelly had their falling out? Donen’s wife Jeanne confessed to being in love with Kelly, she was Kelly’s dance assistant and helped him develop choreography for his films along with Donen. Donen and Jeanne divorced. In 1957, Kelly divorced his first wife Betsy Blair over adultery and he married Jeanne, Donen’s ex-wife. Kelly and Jeanne had two children together and were together until she died in 1973. That’s the biggest reason why Donen wouldn’t work with Kelly.
![What's My Line? - Gene Kelly; Martin Gabel [panel]; James C. Hagerty [panel] (Jun 23, 1957)](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
