Joyce Compton News & Notes

Blues in the Night ranks as one of the more enjoyable Warner Brothers melodramas of the 1940s. Silly and overblown at times, but engrossing nonetheless. Richard Whorf (above, left) heads a mid-level cast as jazz pianist Jigger Pine, a regular guy with a quartet that includes wormlike Elia Kazan, hulking Peter Whitney and young pup Billy Halop. The trio are at a crossroads. A scuffle with a belligerent customer at the dive where they’re playing lands them in jail, prompting them to stick with the noncommercial blues-influenced style they love. They travel to New Orleans to meet with trumpeter Jack Carson, who is married to lovely singer Priscilla Lane. The group form a swell combo, riding the rails and playing wherever they can to get a decent meal. Eventually they befriend gangster Lloyd Nolan, who leads them to a New Jersey dive where sad sack Wallace Ford and hard-bitten singer Betty Field (who is amazing in this) work. The story gets very complex from there, helped along by some ...

“Pre Code Shirley Tempe” might be the best description for the heated Southern drama Lena Rivers , which recently came out on DVD under its reissue title The Sin of Lena Rivers . The film focuses on elfin actress Charlotte Henry playing a girl from the wrong side of the tracks who bears the stigma of illegitimate parentage. Henry’s Lena Rivers is raised by her grandmother (Beryl Mercer doing her usual kindhearted mama thing) after he mother dies in childbirth. After the grandfather dies in a boating accident, the duo are invited to live with a rich uncle in their relatives’ plush Kentucky mansion. The girl doesn’t fit in with the hoi polloi, preferring the company of the servants, but one neighbor (James Kirkwood) has a strange bond with the girl — even gifting her with a wild horse that only she can tame. As it turns out, the neighbor is the girl’s father and her ability to turn the horse into a racing champion is what will endear her to the others. A rather sweet film that is marre...

Was it the blonde hair? Joyce got another chance to play a temptress in Sing, Sinner, Sing , a 1933 production from the budget-level studio Majestic. Sing, Sinner, Sing is a rather ordinary pre-Code drama based a the real life fraças between singer Libby Holman and her husband, tobacco heir Zachary Smith Reynolds, who was found shot to death under mysterious circumstances in their apartment. Actress Leila Hyams plays the Holman stand-in, a torch singer who shares a stormy romance with gambling ship captain Paul Lukas. She escapes his clutches with a wealthy playboy (Don Dillaway), but after they marry she finds that her new husband is carrying on with a hotsy-totsy blonde — and that's where Joyce Compton comes in. Probably the best reason to see this hoary drama would be Leila Hyams, who is attractive and somewhat fragile in a way that reminds me of the slightly later Virginia Bruce. She also sings a few numbers in an agreeable (apparently non-dubbed) low voice. The story is p...

Kid Galahad is something of a gangster/boxing/romantic melodrama mishmash that somehow works thanks to the assured direction of Michael Curtiz and a phalanx of regulars from the Warner Bros. acting stable. Edward G. Robinson stars as a tough boxing manager with Bette Davis as his longtime gal. The two take notice of a swift-handed hotel bellhop (Wayne Morris) and groom him into a boxing ring champ. Davis' character Fluff finds herself romantically drawn to Morris, but Morris winds up taking a shine to Robinson's kid sister (Jane Bryan). This angers the protective Robinson so much that he decides to engineer a fight sure to put the young pugilist in a body cast. While the script ventures into overly familiar territory, this film ends up being a winner due to great work by Robinson and Davis, along with several stirring, realistic fight scenes. Joyce Compton appears about 20 minutes into the film as a hanger-on at the huge party thrown in Edward G. Robinson's hotel suite....

Rhythm in the Clouds was another modest-budgeted musical that Joyce Compton briefly appeared in as comedy relief from all the (rather dull) singing and dancing. The story follows pretty blonde songwriter Patricia Ellis, who makes an impulsive decision to crash a well-known songwriter's apartment — submitting her own compositions as collaborations with the better-known but oblivious man. Neighbor William Hull is annoyed with the noisy Ellis living next door, but faster than you can say "unbelievable coincidence" he is selected to be the lyricist on her next would-be hit song (which gets a gala premiere on a popular local radio show). The song is a hit, and love blooms for the once-quarreling duo. Joyce contributes a small bright spot to this otherwise forgettable film as the secretary at the radio station where Ellis and Hull work. She played a lot of snappy steno gals around this time; Three Smart Girls (1936), Under Your Spell (1936), Rhythm in the Clouds (1937)...

The Edward G. Robinson actioner Manpower has a strangely magnetic pull on me; I first saw it in the early ’90s on one of my local UHF outlets’ pre- TCM version of the “Late Late Show,” then jumped when the film finally became available on DVD via the Warner Archive . Part of its appeal it that, although it’s not an especially standout film in any particular area, it has a bit of something for everything mashed together in a way that somehow comes together beautifully. Robinson plays a power line worker who shares his dangerous vocation with a bunch of rowdy buddies which include Alan Hale, Frank McHugh (who does his signature nasal laugh a few times), Ward Bond, and best friend George Raft. Robinson is something of a big brother to the crew and takes it upon himself to aid the daughter of an elderly co-worker who dies in an accident. The daughter is an exotic beauty and ex-con played by Marlene Dietrich, whom the earnest Robinson falls for despite cynical pal Raft’s knowledge that s...

Joyce Compton's exposure in the screwball classic The Awful Truth led to a series of supporting roles in big-budget films for the actress, often playing the leading lady's best friend. The splashy, nostalgic Fox musical Rose of Washington Square was one example: Joyce appears here as Peggy, the perky pal of Alice Faye's sorta-based-on-Fanny-Brice Broadway musical comedy star, Rose Sargent. Rose of Washington Square is a typically handsome Fox production, a frothy and historically suspect period vehicle for the warmly appealing Faye. As a singer rising to fame in 1910s New York, she gets wooed by Tyrone Power as a smooth cad with a passing resemblance to Fanny Brice's second husband, Nicky Arnstein. This was a lighthearted and fun movie first and foremost, one made momentarily uncomfortable by Al Jolson playing himself in blackface makeup. Fifth-billed Joyce appears sporadically throughout the picture whenever Faye needs a shoulder to cry on; she even gets to share a ...

1936's Sitting on the Moon is one of several "poverty row" genre films Joyce Compton made a small contribution to. A brief and airy musical, Sitting chronicles the star-crossed romance of songwriter Roger Pryor and appealing singer Grace Bradley. Bradley's career is on the outs when Pryor pens a jaunty melody for her (the title tune, repeated ad nauseam) which lands the woman a featured vocalist gig on a top radio hour. She becomes a star while he lands in obscurity, until another song and complications involving a gold-digging hussy (Joyce Compton!) change things around for the hapless guy. On the whole, slight and forgettable stuff which benefits from nice Art Deco production design and a pleasing title tune. It's interesting to note that this is one of the earliest productions for Republic Pictures. Along with sister companies Monogram and PRC, Republic would become the source for several eclectic parts Joyce would do throughout the '40s. Sitting on the M...

Melodramatic intrigue meets down 'n dirty truck driving in director Raoul Walsh's They Drive By Night , a typically energetic Warner Bros. production from 1940. The film follows truckers George Raft and Humphrey Bogart as they deal with punishing hours and low pay hauling produce on all-night drives. Ann Sheridan adds a salty cynicism as the waitress whom Raft takes a shine to. Although enjoyable, this is truly a movie with a split personality. It begins as a gritty working-class melodrama of the type Warners did so well, but then the latter half veers into overheated murder mystery with the arrival of Ida Lupino as the scheming wife of the trucking company boss (Alan Hale). Lupino's big courtroom scene is campy beyond belief, but it only detracts slightly from what is an exciting corker of a movie. Joyce Compton appears in They Drive By Night 's second half as the ditsy girlfriend of Raft and Bogart's fellow driver, played by Roscoe Ates (when Ates declares that sh...

Behind the Mask counts among the handful of films Joyce Compton did for the budget Monogram studio in the 1940s — whether she was a signed contract player there remains to be seen. Monogram's offerings spanned several genres including Westerns, Romances, Musicals and Film Noir Melodrama. Solid, modest entertainment was the hallmark of their best product, but even the lousiest of Monogram pictures (and trust me, there's plenty) had a scrappy charm. Behind the Mask was the second of three Monogram productions starring popular radio character The Shadow. What sounds like a promising, gritty drama going in, however, ends up a strange, grimy little film that awkwardly injects comedy into an otherwise unremarkable whodunit. The story concerns the murder of a blackmailing newspaper reporter. Witnesses believe it was the Shadow who committed the deed; the Shadow's alter ego Lamont Cranston (Kane Richmond, sort of a poor guy's Phillip Terry) must prove otherwise with the help ...

In the same year that Joyce Compton made a splash supporting Cary Grant and Irene Dunne in The Awful Truth , she marked time in the shoestring-budgeted Small Town Boy . Here Joyce plays a girl named Molly Summers, sweetie-pie girlfriend of Stuart Erwin's title character. Erwin's Henry Armstrong is a bumbling sap who works in an insurance office run by Joyce's domineering uncle (Clarence Wilson). He's also suffering through a turbulent home life with a nagging mother (Clara Blandick), indifferent dad (Jed Prouty) and ne'er-do-well brother (James Blakeley) - so it comes as a pleasant surprise when he finds a crisp thousand dollar bill under a stubborn horse's hoof. Erwin does the honest thing by advertising his find in the local paper, offering the bill to anyone who can supply the serial number. This causes even more trouble in the Erwin household, and when the bill is misplaced it leads to a comic chase all across town. Scripted and directed by Glenn Tryon (fath...

Under 18 is a great, lesser-known example of the prototypical Warner Bros. Pre-Code drama. In the film, pretty Marian Marsh stars as a young woman from the slums of New York trying to make ends meet with her recently widowed mother (Emma Dunn). Although she is dating a sweet delivery truck driver (Regis Toomey), witnessing the stormy relationship of her sister (Anita Page) and her lazy gambler of a husband (Norman Foster) has made her cynical about love and marriage. Working as a seamstress at a local fashion house, Marsh is drafted into a modeling job and meets a slimy millionaire (Warren William in the first of many "heel" roles) who invites the comely girl up to his penthouse. Although she is turned off by the way the models in her workplace have become rich mens' mistresses, a desperate turn for her sister prompts Marsh to re-think the man's offer. Despite the film's salacious title, Under 18 is actually quite a gritty and compelling drama which is given spi...

Go Into Your Dance was Al Jolson’s final star vehicle at Warner Brothers, and the only film in which he co-starred with his then-wife Ruby Keeler. As far as Al goes, he delivers a surprisingly subdued performance here (who knew?), and the relative lack of black-faced hamminess makes it a better bet to modern viewers. Here he plays an eccentric former Broadway star who lives exiled in Mexico. Al’s snappy sister (Glenda Farrell, always terrific) persuades him to go back to work, a situation where he is so emboldened he opens a nightclub funded with shady gangster money. At some point, he also deals with a sweet dancer (Keeler) who is stuck on him but doesn’t know quite how to express it. This is a typically predictable yet super-slick outing with a lively cast and a few polished, Busby Berkely-ish numbers (particularly “A Quarter To Nine”). Ruby Keeler is cute as always and rises to the occasion despite her shortcomings in the acting department; singer Helen Morgan actually outshines th...