A Night in Hollywood (1953)

A Night in Hollywood is a 1953 burlesque movie.

This was an odd genre. These were actual burlesque shows, filmed in actual burlesque theatres but without an audience present (presumably because that would have caused major sound recording problems). They’re a chance to see what classical burlesque was really like. Burlesque was a mix of songs, comedy sketches and strip-tease routines.

The songs were usually terrible. The comedy was invariably atrocious. This was the so-called ”baggy pants” style of comedy and it’s an ordeal to sit through. There was only ever one reason for seeing a burlesque show (or a burlesque movie) - the strippers. Fortunately the strip-tease artistes were often excellent.

How much the girls could reveal varied from city to city and varied over time. In some cases the moment the girl took her dress off the police would move in and arrest everybody, in order to protect America from the mortal danger posed by half-clad women. In other cases the girl could strip down to a G-string and pasties. In rare cases they might get away with losing the pasties. They generally took off as much as they could get away with.

Since the girls were not naked they had to rely on provocative dancing to generate the necessary erotic heat. The things some of these girls could do with their hips and their posteriors can only inspire awe. These women played the female body like a musical instrument.

By 1953 when this film was shot burlesque was almost dead. Strip-tease would survive but old-time burlesque finally succumbed to the twin challenges of legal persecution and the rise of new forms of erotic entertainment. That makes watching the burlesque movies (mostly filmed between the very late 1940s and the early 50s) a rather poignant experience.

Nothing seems to be known about where this particular movie was shot. The fact that it’s partly in black-and-white and partly in colour suggests it was filmed on two separate occasions, possibly in different burlesque theatres.

It’s notable mainly for featuring two of the legendary burlesque queens, Misty Ayres and Tempest Storm. There are half-a-dozen strip-tease routines. Tempest Storm’s routine is by far the most daring.

My advice is to fast-forward through the songs and the comedy.

These movies do have enormous historical interest. This is a fascinating uniquely American art form now totally extinct.

Modern attempts to revive burlesque can never work because classical strip-tease relies on the tease. It relies on the fact that at a particular historical moment seeing pretty girls in very very skimpy costumes was a genuine erotic thrill. I have no moral problems with strip shows in which the girls take everything off but if the strippers end up fully nude it’s not burlesque. It’s no longer a tease. It has become something different. Not necessarily better or worse, but different.

A Night in Hollywood is perhaps worth seeing for Tempest Storm but there are better burlesque movies.

This movie is included in Something Weird’s six-movie DVD set Strip Strip Hooray. I’d recommend some of the other movies in this set such as Everybody’s Girl (1950), Midnight Frolics (1949), B Girl Rhapsody (1952) and French Follies (1951) much more highly than this one. Image quality is acceptable.

Sinderella and the Golden Bra (1964)

Sinderella and the Golden Bra is a 1964 nudie-cutie and it also belongs to a rather small sub-genre, the nudie musical.

It has what seems like a perfect setup for a nudie-cutie. It’s the Cinderella story, but when our heroine flees the masked ball she doesn’t leave behind her glass slipper but her bra. A golden bra. So in order to find the mysterious girl whom the price hopes to marry the kingdom has to be searched for a maiden possessing the physical attributes that will perfectly fill out that golden bra. It’s exactly the sort of naughty but goofy concept you want for a movie such as this. Honestly, with that setup you can’t go wrong. But surprisingly this movie does go wrong, for reasons we’ll get to in a moment.

The prince is a dreamy lad and his father feels that his son needs to be married off as soon as possible. A masked ball to which every young lady in the kingdom will be invited seems like the answer. Somewhere in this land there has to be a girl capable of arousing the prince’s interest.

The problem is that he already knows which girl he wants to marry - the one he keeps dreaming about.

The king is really much more interested in his knitting than in his son’s romantic problems. The idea of a king devoting himself to knitting is mildly amusing at first but it wears thin real fast.

Derella (Suzanne Sybele) is of course the step-sister of two awful girls, Flossy and Fanny. Both they and their mother treat Derella with contempt. Derella is beautiful but no-one has noticed.

Instead of a fairy godmother she has a fairy godfather who does the magic stuff with pumpkins to get Derella to the ball. He’s well-meaning but he’s a drunk and he’s been a failure as a fairy godfather.

Derella flees from the ball at the stroke of midnight, minus her bra. The rest of the movie follows the basic fairy tale story.

Now, as to what went wrong. Firstly, the songs are rather lacklustre. Secondly, the jokes are rather feeble. The biggest problem however is that by 1964 nudie-cutie standards it’s ridiculously tame. We get a few very brief glimpses of bare breasts. Given that the musical and comedy elements are not up to scratch the movie could still have been saved had it been made genuinely titillating. But it isn’t. And we spend the whole movie expecting that we will see Derella’s presumably impressive bust but all we get is a brief flash. Given that Suzanne Sybele isn’t much of a singer or actress you have to wonder why she was cast if she wasn’t willing to show a bit more skin.

Of course it’s probable that the print that Something Weird found is the only surviving print and it is possible that it was cut at some stage. But it gives the impression that it really was simply a very tame film.

The print is certainly in very poor condition. There’s a lot of print damage.

Sinderella and the Golden Bra is good-natured and inoffensive but doesn’t quite make it. It is mildly interesting if you’re into nudie fairy tales.

Something Weird paired this film on DVD with H.G. Lewis’s Goldilocks and the Three Bares which I am yet to watch. There are of course also the assorted short subjects you expect from Something Weird.

Some online reviews will tell you that this is one of only two known nudie musicals. That is utter nonsense. There have been quite a few, several of which are in fact extremely good.

The First Nudie Musical (1976) is inspired sexy craziness and I highly recommend it. And the 1977 Cinderella (AKA The Other Cinderella) is an example of how to do a nudie musical fairy tale properly. It’s very sexy and very crazy and the songs are a riot.