{ "id": "epnjtm99jh", "slug": "road-to-morocco", "title": "Road to Morocco", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music", "label": "Musical and music films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music.musical-films-of-the-1930s-to-1960s", "label": "Musical films of the 1930s to 1960s", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music.musical-films-of-the-1930s-to-1960s" } ], "geo": [ { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music", "label": "United States · 1800 to 1945: Musical and music films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music", "path": [ { "id": "geo.us", "label": "United States", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800", "label": "United States · 1800 to 1945", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music", "label": "Musical and music films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music" } ] } ], "excerpt": "Road to Morocco (1942) is Paramount's third Road picture, directed by David Butler, starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour, with songs by Van Heusen and Burke including Moonlight Becomes You; two Oscar nominations and a 1996 National Film Registry selection.", "snippet": "Road to Morocco (1942) is Paramount's third Road picture, directed by David Butler, starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour, with songs by Van Heusen and Burke including Moonlight Becomes You; two Oscar nominations and a 1996 National Film Registry selection.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.musical-music.musical-films-of-the-1930s-to-1960s", "markdown": "# Road to Morocco\n\n**Road to Morocco** is a 1942 American musical comedy from [Paramount Pictures](https://www.edgepedia.org/paramount-pictures), the third of the seven \"Road\" pictures starring [Bing Crosby](https://www.edgepedia.org/bing-crosby), Bob Hope, and [Dorothy Lamour](https://www.edgepedia.org/dorothy-lamour), directed by David Butler from a screenplay by Frank Butler and Don Hartman.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) The team of stowaways Jeff Peters (Crosby) and Orville \"Turkey\" Jackson (Hope) is shipwrecked off North Africa, rides a camel to Morocco, and becomes entangled with Princess Shalmar (Lamour) and her jealous suitor Mullay Kasim (Anthony Quinn).[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) It is often considered the best entry in the series and was added to the National Film Registry in 1996.[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942) • [3](https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing)\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Release | New York opening 10 November 1942; produced by Paramount Pictures, Inc.[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO?cxt=ymal) |\n| Director and writers | David Butler; screenplay by Frank Butler and Don Hartman, who also wrote the first two Road films[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) |\n| Cast | Bing Crosby (Jeff Peters), Bob Hope (Orville \"Turkey\" Jackson), Dorothy Lamour (Princess Shalmar), Anthony Quinn (Mullay Kasim), Dona Drake (Mihirmah)[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO?cxt=ymal) |\n| Physical properties | 83 minutes, 7,304 feet on 7 reels, black and white, Western Electric Mirrophonic Recording[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) |\n| Songs | \"Road to Morocco,\" \"Moonlight Becomes You,\" \"Constantly,\" and \"Ain't Got a Dime to My Name,\" music by James (Jimmy) Van Heusen, lyrics by Johnny Burke[4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO?cxt=ymal) |\n| Honors | Two Academy Award nominations, Best Original Screenplay and Best Sound; National Film Registry selection, 1996[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942) • [3](https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing) |\n| Box office | $7.6 million worldwide[5](https://www.netflixmovies.com/road-to-morocco-1942) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Plot and songs\n\nTwo stowaways accidentally cause a freighter to explode off the coast of North Africa, float ashore on a makeshift raft, and ride a camel across the desert to Morocco.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) Broke and hungry, Jeff sells Orville into slavery for two hundred drachmas; Orville's owner turns out to be Princess Shalmar, who offers to marry him.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) • [9](https://kinolorber.com/film/road-to-morocco-special-edition) Her motive is self-protection: her prophet has warned that her first husband will meet a violent death within days of the marriage, so she chooses Orville instead of her beloved Mullay Kasim.[9](https://kinolorber.com/film/road-to-morocco-special-edition) When the princess falls for Jeff, things get complicated.[10](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/road_to_morocco)\n\nThe film is a spoof of the Arabian Nights genre.[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942) Its title number, sung by Crosby and Hope on the back of a two-humped camel, is the iconic image of the series' camaraderie, with Johnny Burke's lyrics poking fun at the formula itself: \"I'll lay you eight to five that we meet Dor-o-thy Lamour\" and \"Paramount will protect us 'cause we're signed for five more years.\"[6](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/road_morocco.pdf) The Burke–Van Heusen score also includes the standard \"Moonlight Becomes You,\" sung by Crosby, which the Library of Congress essay calls probably the best of all the Road pictures' scores.[6](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/road_morocco.pdf) A fifth song, \"Aladdin's Daughter,\" was written for the film but not used.[11](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035262/soundtrack/)\n\n## Place in the Road series\n\n[The Road](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-road) pictures began with *Road to Singapore* (1940), the first film to team [Bob Hope](https://www.edgepedia.org/bob-hope) and Bing Crosby, with Dorothy Lamour as the love interest for both; *Road to Zanzibar* (1941) followed.[6](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/road_morocco.pdf) *Road to Morocco* was the first Road Picture written specifically for Hope, Crosby, and Lamour rather than adapted from a shelved screenplay.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/296091/the-big-idea-road-to-morocco) Hope and Crosby went on to make seven Road pictures between 1940 and 1962, ending with *The Road to Hong Kong*; an eighth, *Road to the Fountain of Youth*, was being planned when Crosby died suddenly in 1977.[8](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/going-my-way/american-archetypes-how-crosby-and-hope-became-hollywoods-greatest-comedy-team/A1FFE708EFC62B5AD381F775708903B2)\n\nThe series' formula casts the two as small-time entertainers or hucksters in exotic settings, close friends but always at odds: Hope the patsy and worrier, Crosby the cool schemer.[6](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/road_morocco.pdf) From the start, the stars handed the scripts to their radio writers, who developed strings of gags for each star and inserted improvised lines during filming; the writers had also created an imaginary radio feud between the two, trading insults about Crosby's ears and wealth and Hope's nose and bad jokes.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/296091/the-big-idea-road-to-morocco) The Library of Congress essay on the film credits the series with bringing a new naturalness and improvisational spirit to Hollywood comedy, with repartee so fast and well timed that it sounds improvised but cannot be.[6](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/road_morocco.pdf)\n\n## Production\n\n**A change of director.** Victor Schertzinger, who had directed the first two Road pictures, was originally slated to direct *Road to Morocco* until his sudden death in October 1941; David Butler took over, having previously directed Hope and Lamour in *Caught in the Draft* (1941).[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/296091/the-big-idea-road-to-morocco)\n\n**From Moscow to Morocco.** Paramount had planned *Road to Moscow* as the third Road Picture but could not get a script together in time, so the action moved to North Africa.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/296091/the-big-idea-road-to-morocco) The AFI Catalog records that the planned film's future was dependent on the events of the war in Russia and that its screenplay was never developed.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) The Moscow concept came back for the series' fourth entry, yet as feeling against the Soviet Union grew in the closing days of World War II, Road to Utopia (1946) was set in Alaska instead.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/296091/the-big-idea-road-to-morocco)\n\n**Credits and shooting.** Production ran from 25 February to 23 April 1942, and Paramount copyrighted the film on 1 October 1942 (LP11703).[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) Correspondence in the Paramount Collection at the AMPAS Library indicates the original story was written by Eddie Davis and E. A. Ellington, but Paramount retained so little of it that they were not credited onscreen; the studio also bought comedy routines from Ralph Spence's story \"From Rags to Rhythm\" for use in the film.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) Desert exteriors were filmed on location in [Yuma, Arizona](https://www.edgepedia.org/yuma-arizona), and western film star Ken Maynard led the stunt riders in the chase through the Casbah scene, according to Bob Hope's autobiography.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO) According to a New York Times column, Paramount shot two endings; the unused one had the main characters enlisting in the Marines and closed with the line, \"See you on the road to Tokyo.\"[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO)\n\nDirector Butler kept the cameras running when anything out of the ordinary happened, and some of the film's funniest material came after a scene officially ended.[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942) One unscripted bit, in which a camel spat in Hope's face after kissing him, stayed in the final cut because Hope's reaction was so funny.[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942)\n\n## Reception and legacy\n\nContemporary critics were mostly positive. The New York Times called it \"a lampoon of all pictures having to do with exotic romance, played by a couple of wise guys who can make a gag do everything but lay an egg,\" and [Variety](https://www.edgepedia.org/variety-magazine) called it \"a bubbly spontaneous entertainment without a semblance of sanity\"; the Herald Tribune, by contrast, accused the film of hitting a new low in vulgarity.[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942) The Academy nominated it for Best Original Screenplay and Best Sound.[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942)\n\nThe film's standing has held. The Library of Congress essay by Richard Zoglin, a journalist and author who has written extensively about television and film, calls it probably the most fondly remembered of the entire series.[6](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/road_morocco.pdf) In 1996 the Library of Congress selected it for the [National Film Registry](https://www.edgepedia.org/national-film-registry) as culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.[3](https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing) The film is also notable as one of [Yvonne De Carlo](https://www.edgepedia.org/yvonne-de-carlo)'s first film appearances, in an uncredited handmaiden role.[2](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942) • [4](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO?cxt=ymal)\n\n## References\n\n1. [Road to Morocco (1942), AFI Catalog of Feature Films](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO)\n2. [Road to Morocco (1942), Turner Classic Movies, by Jeff Stafford](https://www.tcm.com/articles/79902/road-to-morocco-1942)\n3. [Complete National Film Registry Listing, National Film Preservation Board, Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing)\n4. [Road to Morocco (1942), AFI Catalog, cast and details page](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/27436-ROAD-TO-MOROCCO?cxt=ymal)\n5. [Road to Morocco (1942), NetflixMovies.com](https://www.netflixmovies.com/road-to-morocco-1942)\n6. [Road to Morocco, film essay by Richard Zoglin, National Film Preservation Board, Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/road_morocco.pdf)\n7. [The Big Idea – Road to Morocco, by Frank Miller, Turner Classic Movies](https://www.tcm.com/articles/296091/the-big-idea-road-to-morocco)\n8. [American Archetypes: How Crosby and Hope Became Hollywood's Greatest Comedy Team, in *Going My Way: Bing Crosby and American Culture*, Cambridge University Press](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/going-my-way/american-archetypes-how-crosby-and-hope-became-hollywoods-greatest-comedy-team/A1FFE708EFC62B5AD381F775708903B2)\n9. [Road to Morocco (Special Edition), Kino Lorber](https://kinolorber.com/film/road-to-morocco-special-edition)\n10. [Road to Morocco, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/road_to_morocco)\n11. [Road to Morocco (1942) Soundtracks, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035262/soundtrack/)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Musical and music films (individual works) › Musical films of the 1930s to 1960s*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/road-to-morocco", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/road-to-morocco.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"Road to Morocco\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/road-to-morocco. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[Road to Morocco](https://www.edgepedia.org/road-to-morocco)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/road-to-morocco](https://www.edgepedia.org/road-to-morocco). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"Road to Morocco\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/road-to-morocco. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "Road to Morocco is Paramount's third Road picture, directed by David Butler, starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour, with songs by Van Heusen and Burke including Moonlight Becomes You; two Oscar nominations and a 1996 National Film Registry selection." }