Deep in My Heart

Film appreciation by Robert Siegel of The Digital Bits

Warner Brothers has released their third set of classic MGM musicals on DVD, with the Classic Musicals from the Dream Factory: Volume 3 box. Included in this set is the 1954 MGM musical Deep in My Heart. The musical extravaganza is based on the life and melodies of Broadway's famous composer, Sigmund Romberg.

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Nineteen of MGM's finest were gathered for this production, with 104 speaking roles. The film features 21 famous songs, with music from 10 Romberg operettas represented. Deep in My Heart was made in the grand tradition of the MGM musicals and was near the end of a well remembered MGM streak of entertainments. The cast is headed by Jose Ferrer in the role of the composer. Several of the stars enact pivotal roles in the story of Romberg's life and all of them lend their singing and dancing talents. The picture had a long list of guest stars as well that included Walter Pidgeon, Paul Henreid, Rosemary Clooney, Gene and Fred Kelly, Jane Powell, Vic Damone, Ann Miller, Cyd Charise, Howard Keel and Tony Martin, proving that MGM was able to select from a vast array of signed musical stars within its studio.

Composer Sigmund Romberg started out to build dredges. Born in 1889 in the Hungarian community of Nagy Kaniza and Vienna-educated, he came to America in 1909. After wrapping pencils at New York's Eagle Pencil factory for $7 a week, he stepped onto the podium at the Pabst-Harlem restaurant to conduct the orchestra for twice his salary. On his second night, he was interrupted by a pale, tin-faced young man clutching a manuscript he had written. He asked Romberg to play it. And that's how Irving Berlin's Alexander's Ragtime Band came to be premiered at this Hungarian café with a Viennese accompaniment, conducted by Romberg, who did not even know yet how to speak English. Romberg was as colorful as his music. Often called the successor to Johann Strauss, he brought a nostalgic flavor to his lifting songs, which America took to its heart. Within two years after his playing at the café, he not only survived a 17-hour-a-day grind playing music, but while there composed Leg of Mutton, which became the rage of Tin Pan Alley. One of the most prolific writers of popular music, Romberg composed more than 2,000 songs and 79 operettas. Lyrics for the music in the film are from Dorothy Donnelly.

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LEFT: Jose Ferrer and Doe Avedon as drawn by the MGM artists for publicity.
RIGHT: Jose Ferrer, Marle Oberon (right), Helen Traubel (top)
and Doe Avedon posing for MGM.

Jose Ferrer was said to have commented that this picture was extremely difficult for him. An average week on the film included tap dancing with lessons, soft shoe and waltz clog lessons, a brush-up course in painting, plus business conferences for his ten publishing firm. Before he made Deep in My Heart, he had as many as four running Broadway hits at one time.

Helen Traubel, the famous Wagnerian opera soprano, made her debut in this film. For her first day in front of the MGM cameras on one of the 28 MGM sound stages used for the production, she kicked up her heels with Jose Ferrer. She was originally working with the Metropolitan Opera Company when she refused to re-sign her contract, because she was not allowed to appear in nightclubs or other venues. She had other dreams than Opera and wanted to do regular stage work and musical film. It was her good friend Jimmy Durante who detoured her from the straight and narrow life of Opera star to the path of popular music. She is one of the few opera stars who refused to go to Europe to study, and so was labeled the Yankee Doodle Diva by critics. An insight into her character revealed that on the night of a Carnagie Hall concert, the diva was entertaining a gentleman caller in her dressing room. His name was W.C. Handy and he had come to thank Miss Traubel for singing his song. The song was St. Louis Blues. Helen, only weeks after filming completed on Deep in My Heart, began her engagement at the Las Vegas Sahara.

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Careful attention was taken to correct dressware for the different periods,
as shown in these rare MGM costume department test shots.

For the film, Gene Kelly's legion of fans had their first chance to meet his brother, Fred Kelly. His appearance in the film is aligned with his former associations with the composer. And it was he who was named by Romberg to stage a spectacular benefit on behalf of the composer's favorite charities. It is interesting to note that in this film, Walter Pidgeon plays the great Shubert, and would later play the great Ziegfeld in Funny Girl. One of the most memorable sequences in this film is a fantastic dance sequence with Cyd Charisse and James Mitchell, which was at the time considered a little risque for an MGM musical.

Doe Avedon, who made her film debut in High and Mighty, follows with this important role as Mrs. Sigmund Romberg. She is a recruit from the New York stage, where she appeared in The Young and Fair and My Name is Aquilan. A protege of Irene Selzinck, who started Marlon Brando on the road to fame with his hit in Selznick's production of A Streetcar Named Desire, Miss Avedon was persuaded to take up an acting career after working as a model, a private secretary and, finally, as a page girl at the NBC studio in New York. Tamara Toumanova, world famed ballet star, was chosen to do the specialty number I Love to Say Hello to the Boys. This picture marked her first film role since her appearance as Pavlova in Tonight We Sing, and following this movie she danced with Gene Kelly in Invitation to the Dance. Merle Oberon made her first Hollywood appearance in five years here as Dorothy Donnelly, collaborator on some of Romberg's greatest successes. This would be her last major studio film until 1963, when she was cast in Love and Desire, followed by Hotel in 1967.

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The film, released in 1954, was somewhat lost in a sea of big extravaganzas, many in the new widescreen formats (including Brigadoon, The Glen Miller Story, Lucky Me, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, A Star is Born, White Christmas and There's No Business like Show Business), but it still has the flavor of the grand MGM musical tradition. Deep in My Heart had a grand MGM premiere at the Radio City Music Hall, and grossed a respectable $3,500,000 ($27,000,000 in 2008 dollars) - not bad for a picture that had so much competition from other musicals at the time. The DVD release contains a true stereo 5.1 remix and the original mono soundtrack, along with some deleted musical numbers.

The other titles included in the Classic Musicals from the Dream Factory: Volume 3 box set are: