Serenade, a 1956

1956 in film

The year 1956 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* October 5 - The Ten Commandments opens in cinemas and becomes one of the most successful and popular movies of all time, currently ranking 5th on the list of all time moneymakers * February 5 - First showing of documentary films by...

 Warner Bros.

Warner Bros.

Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

 release, was tenor

Tenor

The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...

 Mario Lanza

Mario Lanza

right|thumb|[[MGM]] still, circa 1949Mario Lanza was an American tenor and Hollywood movie star of the late 1940s and the 1950s. The son of Italian emigrants, he began studying to be a professional singer at the age of 16....

's fifth film, and his first on-screen appearance in four years. Directed by Anthony Mann

Anthony Mann

Anthony Mann was an American actor and film director, most notably of film noirs and Westerns. As a director, he often collaborated with the cinematographer John Alton and with James Stewart in his Westerns.-Biography:...

 and based on the 1937

1937 in literature

The year 1937 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*January 9 - The first issue of Look magazine goes on sale in the United States.*Thomas Quinn Curtiss meets Klaus Mann.-New books:*Eric Ambler - Uncommon Danger...

 novel of the same name by James M. Cain

James M. Cain

James Mallahan Cain was an American author and journalist. Although Cain himself vehemently opposed labeling, he is usually associated with the hardboiled school of American crime fiction and seen as one of the creators of the roman noir...

, the film also stars Joan Fontaine

Joan Fontaine

Joan de Beauvoir de Havilland , known professionally as Joan Fontaine, is a British American actress. She and her elder sister Olivia de Havilland are two of the last surviving leading ladies from Hollywood of the 1930s....

, Sara Montiel

Sara Montiel

Sara Montiel is a Spanish singer, and actress. She is still a much-loved and internationally known name in the Spanish-speaking movie and music industries....

 (billed as Sarita Montiel), and Vincent Price

Vincent Price

Vincent Leonard Price, Jr. was an American actor, well known for his distinctive voice and serio-comic attitude in a series of horror films made in the latter part of his career.-Early life and career:Price was born in St...

.

Plot

Serenade tells the story of a poor vineyard worker who becomes an operatic tenor, and is involved with two women — one a high society hostess, the other a Mexican bullfighter's daughter. Highly melodramatic in nature, the film features a large amount of operatic music, all of it sung by Lanza. Of note is the monologue from Verdi's Otello

Otello

Otello is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Shakespeare's play Othello. It was Verdi's penultimate opera, and was first performed at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, on February 5, 1887....

(with Lanza in blackface

Blackface

Blackface is a form of theatrical makeup used in minstrel shows, and later vaudeville, in which performers create a stereotyped caricature of a black person. The practice gained popularity during the 19th century and contributed to the proliferation of stereotypes such as the "happy-go-lucky darky...

) featuring Metropolitan Opera

Metropolitan Opera

The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...

 soprano Licia Albanese

Licia Albanese

Licia Albanese is an Italian-born American operatic soprano. Noted especially for her portrayals of the lyric heroines of Verdi and Puccini, Albanese was a leading artist with the Metropolitan Opera of New York from 1940 to 1966...

. Reviewing the film in The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, A.H. Weiler wrote that, "Mr. Lanza, who was never in better voice, makes this a full and sometimes impressive musical entertainment."

The movie differs greatly from the James M. Cain

James M. Cain

James Mallahan Cain was an American author and journalist. Although Cain himself vehemently opposed labeling, he is usually associated with the hardboiled school of American crime fiction and seen as one of the creators of the roman noir...

source novel. In the book, Juana (Montiel) is a prostitute and she and Damon (Lanza) set out to open a brothel together. She comes into conflict with the local police and the two flee to Los Angeles and then move to New York, where Damon struggles to overcome his bisexuality. Obviously, none of this material could be made into a popular movie in the US in 1956, so the story becomes merely that of an opera singer torn between a bitchy, worldly patron of the arts (Fontaine) and a Mexican bullfighter's daughter. The tenor has a breakdown because of his unrequited love for the society woman, but finds love (and a happy ending) with the Mexican girl.

External links

• "Serenade - An Underrated Treasure", by Derek McGovern