General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Hollywood Revue of 1929

The Hollywood Revue of 1929 is an American all-star musical revue film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) and directed by Charles Reisner, in which nearly the studio's entire roster of featured players appeared in a plotless sequence of songs, dances, and comedy skits. The Hollywood Filmograph of 15 June 1929 called it "the first musical extravaganza without any attempt at a plot," and credit for the idea was given to producer Harry Rapf.¹ It is remembered chiefly for introducing the song "Singin' in the Rain," later the title tune of the 1952 MGM musical.²

Key fact	Detail
Studio and producer	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer; produced by Harry Rapf, directed by Charles Reisner¹
Release	Premiered 15 June 1929 at Grauman's Chinese Theatre, Los Angeles; general release 23 November 1929³
Format	Plotless all-star revue, emceed by Conrad Nagel and Jack Benny; Benny's feature film debut¹^•²
Signature song	"Singin' in the Rain" (Arthur Freed and Nacio Herb Brown), introduced by Cliff Edwards and reprised by the full cast in rain slickers²
Color sequences	Several segments filmed in two-strip Technicolor, including the Romeo and Juliet parody, a "Technicolor Ballet," and the finale²^•⁴
Awards	Nominated for Best Picture (then called Production); lost to MGM's The Broadway Melody⁵
Runtime	113 minutes per the AFI Catalog; 118 minutes (12 reels) per the Silent Era listing¹^•³

Spoilers

Content

The film presents itself as a stage revue performed by the stars for an audience, with Jack Benny and Conrad Nagel as masters of ceremonies. Benny came from vaudeville and Nagel was a movie matinee idol, and several of their jokes turned on the difference between stage performers and film actors; topical gags kidded Prohibition and the arrival of sound in the movies.²

The acts included Joan Crawford, in her singing debut, performing "Got a Feelin' for You" with a jazz dance; Marion Davies singing "Tommy Atkins on Parade"; Marie Dressler in "For I'm the Queen" and a trio with Polly Moran and Bessie Love; Laurel and Hardy as bumbling magicians; Buster Keaton in a burlesque ballet as a harem girl; and Anita Page singing "You Were Meant for Me."²^•⁵ In a Technicolor sequence, John Gilbert and Norma Shearer offered a slang version of the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet, with Lionel Barrymore as their director.² Choreographer Sammy Lee created dance routines designed to be photographed from overhead.²

The film closed with the all-cast Technicolor finale of "Singin' in the Rain." Cliff Edwards introduced the Freed and Brown song, which became the film's leitmotif and later an MGM "signature" song; it was subsequently performed by Jimmy Durante in Speak Easily (1932), Judy Garland in Little Nellie Kelly (1940), and Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange (1971), and it inspired the title of the 1952 Gene Kelly musical.²^•⁴ During the "Technicolor Ballet," some theaters arranged for the smell of orange blossoms to waft through the audience.²

Production

The picture was first announced in the 17 March 1929 Film Daily as "Gus Edwards' M-G-M Revue," with Edwards receiving a "music and lyrics by" onscreen credit and also appearing as a cast member. Production began the following week under the working title The MGM Revue of Revues, and the 5 May 1929 Film Daily reported the title change to The Hollywood Revue of 1929, initially naming Christy Cabanne and Charles Reisner as co-directors; Cabanne's name was dropped and Reisner received sole directing credit.¹

Rapf pursued the project despite opposition from MGM executives and, according to the 22 June 1929 Motion Picture News, agreed to take full responsibility for its success or failure. His initial concept reportedly did not include the MGM stars. Nearly the entire MGM stable of featured players took part, supplemented by vaudeville and comedy performers.¹

Two stars were absent. Greta Garbo's contract stipulated that she could only be starred alone in a film or co-starred with a male player, so she did not appear; a planned scene for her from George Bernard Shaw's "Saint Joan" was scrapped when she decided that Anna Christie would be her first sound film.²^•⁶ Lon Chaney also did not appear, which modern sources attribute to his failing health, although the film still included a Gus Edwards number titled "Lon Chaney Will Get You If You Don't Watch Out."¹

Reception

The film was a hit. The New Yorker's John C. Mosher, reviewing it at the Astor in August 1929, called it "the most extravagant and extensive musical comedy so far presented by the talking pictures" and "blessedly without plot," while noting that the celebrities appeared only briefly and that the sound quality varied.⁷ The New York Times predicted that such entertaining films would seriously hamper the attendance of live theater, and Mark Hellinger wrote in the New York Daily News that as an example of what the talking film had done to the legitimate theater, the revue was "pretty nearly the last word."²^•⁵ Dave Kehr of the Chicago Reader later described it as MGM's entry in the cycle of all-star studio revues that came with the advent of sound, and by far the most popular of them.⁸

At the Academy Awards for 1928/29 the film was nominated for Best Picture, then called Production, and lost to another MGM musical, The Broadway Melody; the other nominees were Alibi, In Old Arizona, and The Patriot.⁵

Legacy and status

The revue stands as a document of the early talkie period, when sound cinema was still a novelty and Hollywood was transposing stage formats to the screen. A 1929 German-language version, Wir Schalten um auf Hollywood, was reshot for that market.³ Modern viewers encounter the film's technical limits: a reviewer in 2019 described the surviving picture as rough, with cut-off framing, low contrast, and poor sound.⁹ On Rotten Tomatoes it holds a 43% Tomatometer from 7 reviews and a 17% audience score, with critics treating it as a historical artifact rather than entertainment.⁸ The Silent Era listing records that a print exists as a 16mm reduction positive and that the film is in the public domain in the United States.³

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026