The Great Caruso

[Derek McGovern]

I was delighted to learn today that a fully remastered version of The Great Caruso will be released on DVD on March 15th. According to Derek Mannering, we have Ellisa Lanza Bregman to thank for persuading Warners Home Video to honour the film with a proper remastering, rather than simply issuing it on DVD as part of their (non-remastered) video-on-demand series. Well done, Ellisa!

Apparently, if sales go well, Serenade will be the next Lanza film to be released on DVD.

Derek Mannering writes that The Great Caruso will initially be available from one seller only -- www.ccvideo.com -- before going on to general sale.

I can't wait to see what the remastering has achieved. For years now, we've had to put up with muddy-brown prints of the film, so I'm very hopeful that the remastering will greatly improve the colour. Then there's the sound, of course, which was always good, though a little on the thin side. Let's hope Warners have done Lanza proud in that department as well.

Roll on March the 15th!

[Derek McGovern]

P.S. Here's a link to the preorder page for The Great Caruso:

http://www.ccvideo.com/item.cfm?itemid=WBA000082

[Michael McAdam]

Lord Amighty! You must be tickled pink, Derek? Now. let's hope that, apart from remastered photographic frames, that the absolutely immortal soundtrack gets the best upgrade that Dolby labs has to offer (is a remastered Dolby 5.1 soundtrack too much to expect?).

If the DVD is also afforded interactive menu selections, a great liner note insert and a finished package befitting this landmark Hollywood blockbuster, then....what more can we ask?

 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Mike: I will indeed be tickled pink if those Warners engineers do a great job on both the sound and the picture. On their 2007 DVD, they didn't entirely get the picture quality right on That Midnight Kiss (the men came out a little too swarthy at times, with Mario looking rather suntanned), but Toast looked terrific. I'm not convinced that they remastered the sound on either film last time, though. (Ironically, the more recent Because You're Mine, which supposedly wasn't remastered at all, sounded the best I've heard it.)

Extras (other than the trailer) would be a long shot, I guess, but you just never know! There were several discarded scenes, including the "E' il Sol dell'Anima sequence with Jarmila Novotna, together with unreleased recordings (which may or may not have been filmed) such as a partial version of the Improvviso.

By the way, I forgot to mention earlier that the DVD will go on general sale from other outlets in mid-May. I'm not going to wait that long, though; in fact, I've already pre-ordered my copy from Critics' Choice. (It wasn't cheap at US$42, including postage, but I'm not complaining.)

Cheers
Derek

[Derek McGovern]

Hmmn. I've just noticed that the following text has appeared on the pre-order page for The Great Caruso at http://www.ccvideo.com/item.cfm?itemid=WBA000082:

** PLEASE NOTE: This product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R recordable media. These discs are expected to play back in DVD video Play Only devices and may not play back in other DVD devices, including Recorders and PC Drives.**

Surely this is a mistake? There can't be two versions of the movie being released on the same day at Critics's Choice. The above description clearly applies to Warners' non-remastered video-on-demand series, which includes Because You're Mine. I suggest that everyone holds off pre-ordering until we get some clarification.

[Derek McGovern]

Just a quick update: I wrote to Critics' Choice yesterday, asking for clarification. Their response: "We have no additional information on this item."

I must say that it bothers me that the cover of the DVD on display at Critics' Choice clearly shows The Great Caruso as being part of the same Warners Archive "On-Demand" series as Because You're Mine. Even the price is the same.

[Tony Partington]

Derek: I'm not absolutely sure of this, but I think what they are
referring to here in a new anti-copy/anti-piracy encoding formating
that is being used now on some commercial DVDs. I've seen some, not a
great deal, and as far as playing goes they play fine. Some however
WILL NOT play in a computer with a DVD drive. Rather, only in a legit
DVD "player." Now whether or not this is the case with this
particular disc I do not know but, as I say, the discs I've seen - and
I've only seen a few - would NOT play in my computer but would play in
my normal DVD player.

Hope this helps some. Probably not in the least!

Ciao ~ Tony

On Mar 1, 3:01 am, Derek McGovern <derek.mcgov...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hmmn. I've just noticed that the following text has appeared on the

> pre-order page for *The Great Caruso* athttp://www.ccvideo.com/item.cfm?itemid=WBA000082:

>
> ** PLEASE NOTE: This product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R
> recordable media. These discs are expected to play back in DVD video Play
> Only devices and may not play back in other DVD devices, including Recorders
> and PC Drives.**
>
> Surely this is a mistake? There can't be two versions of the movie being
> released on the same day at Critics's Choice. The above description clearly

> applies to Warners' *non*-remastered video-on-demand series, which includes
> *Because You're Mine*. I suggest that everyone holds off pre-ordering until
> we get some clarification.

[Derek McGovern]

I've just read Derek Mannering's announcement on the Rense forum that The Great Caruso has not been remastered after all for DVD. In fact, it's the very thing he said it wouldn't be (and that he'd credited Ellisa with stepping in and preventing): an "on-demand" release taken from the best available print. 

 

Naturally, I'm disappointed, as we can now say goodbye to any thought of extras or Mike's longed-for Dolby sound upgrades. These on-demand DVDs are "bare bones" releases. I also find it difficult to believe that this promised remastering didn't happen because it would have cost a million dollars. If that were true, then Warners would have known this all along and never agreed to Ellisa's request (that it be remastered) in the first place. 

 

On a positive note, the print that has been chosen for the DVD release is supposedly an excellent one. We'll know soon enough!!

[Michael McAdam]

I wonder where this "print" actually comes from, Derek? As you know from your past experiences in film, there are a select number of prints (copies) made for distribution to conemas from the original studio 35mm 'positive'. This original is usually stored in the studio's archive vault for posterity (or re-use in the event of disaster). Hopefully, by 1951 all the major studios had gotten rid of nitrate-based filmstock as we know what happens to those films....heaven forbid. Would this be a non-issue with The Great Caruso, Derek?

[leeann]

Morning.
I was aware that Roberto Alagna speaks of the influence of Lanza on his singing, but I wasn't aware of this quote he made after filming an abbreviated version of Romeo and Juliet in 2002 with Angela Gheorghiu,

"I think it was very important to do a new opera movie, because otherwise, opera will remain old-fashioned. A lot of people start to sing because they saw [such] movies. When I saw The Great Caruso with Mario Lanza for the first time when I was 10 years old, that was the moment I said, "OK, I want to do that." (Billboard, May 11, 2002)

When the biographical timeline was under construction on the (still) new website, it was pretty obvious what an incredible year 1951 was for Lanza, the year of the release of The Great Caruso. Even with this highlighted, abbreviated version of Lanza's life shows a series of events that would leave most people in a whirl, I'd think, and a year of tremendous highs from the birth of Ellisa in December 1950 (stretching a little) to the depths of the devastating Time Magazine article.

Just a few fun facts.

The extend of Lanza's popularity is staggering but a college poll from Billboard Magazine published in April 1951 before release of The Great Caruso gives further glimpses. (I've attached an image of the page just to show the layout--unfortunately it's not one of the better digitized documents and it is rather hard to read at all). Billboard classifies him as an operatic tenor whose popularity had to do with movies--not primarily as a movie star.

The articles accompanying the poll point to Lanza's "sweep" and according to Billboard's analysis, it was even more astounding than it appears because he topped both the popular and the classical section--the first time a single artist had appeared in both categories, much less  as number ONE in each.  "It points to the impact of a movie and of an artist," according to Billboard. Participants were asked to vote on recordings  not on the artists themselves, and in Lanza's case, it was Be My Love. (Side note: the notable "no-show" that year was Frank Sinatra). Best, Lee Ann

[Michael McAdam]

G' morning Lee Ann and, way to dig, gal! You certainly come up with some interesting stuff (Library of Congress links?).

 

Ray Anthony, Don Cherry, Mindy Carson? Guess they never made it to my mother's turntable (she was the family record buyer). Never heard of 'em!

That early pop/classical "dual-citizenship" an amazing feat of popularity for Lanza, as you say.

(P.S: Frankie may have been at the end of his Columbia recording contract and not yet signed up by Capitol in that time-frame?)

[Derek McGovern]

Mike wrote:

I wonder where this "print" actually comes from, Derek? As you know from your past experiences in film, there are a select number of prints (copies) made for distribution to cinemas from the original studio 35mm 'positive'. This original is usually stored in the studio's archive vault for posterity (or re-use in the event of disaster). Hopefully, by 1951 all the major studios had gotten rid of nitrate-based film stock as we know what happens to those films....heaven forbid. Would this be a non-issue with The Great Caruso, Derek?

Hi Mike: Non-flammable acetate film started replacing the highly flammable nitrate film in the late 1940s, so I'd imagine The Great Caruso "original" was on the former stock, and not the latter. But don't forget that acetate stock has its drawbacks too: the colour, for example, tends to deteriorate over time. In fact, if I hadn't seen the VCD of The Great Caruso that was released about eight years ago in the Philippines, I would have assumed that the muddy-brown print that was released commercially on video in the 1990s was proof that the original film was in poor condition. But, no, the colours were a lot better on the VCD. Let's hope the DVD has been taken from the same (or even a better) source.

Cheers
Derek

[Tony Partington]

Well, either way I'll be able to give everyone a report because I jumped in the deep end of the pool and ordered my copy last week.  As Malyva the old gypsy woman says to poor Lon Chaney Jr. in THE WOLFMAN after he's been bitten: "...and heaven help you."

 

I'll let you all know once it arrives.

 

Ciao,

 

Tony

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Tony: Yes, I also ordered a copy last week, and I received word overnight that it's already been shipped (seven days ahead of schedule). But since I'm in South Korea, you'll no doubt get yours before I do, so I look forward to your report!

[Derek McGovern]

Hey Tony: You've been quiet! Has your DVD of The Great Caruso arrived yet? Mine hasn't, but it can't be far away. In the meantime, I'm looking forward to your verdict on this DVD's sound and picture quality!

[Tony Partington]

Hi Derek,
Sorry about the silence but I've been ill and trying to keep a full
schedule at work has me a bit run down. My copy of TGC arrived today
so I should have a report for you by the end of the weekend.
All the best - Tony
On Mar 18, 9:56 pm, Derek McGovern <derek.mcgov...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hey Tony: You've been quiet! Has your DVD of *The Great Caruso* arrived yet?

> Mine hasn't, but it can't be far away. In the meantime, I'm looking forward

> to your verdict on this DVDs sound and picture quality!

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Tony: Sorry to hear you've been sick. Please don't worry about getting back to us on The Great Caruso DVD until you feel better! Besides, my copy should be arriving any day now.

[Tony Partington]

Hello All:  Well, my wife and I watched THE GREAT CARUSO ("new and improved") last night, and I wish I could tell you I was overjoyed to see that, the powers that be had found a pristine copy of the film and had done a magnificent job of transfering it to DVD but such is not the case.  The DVD itself is very spartan; no liner notes inside the case and on the DVD itself is the film and the film trailer.  It seems amazing to me with all the press at the time and with all the subsequent material afterwards, there could have been quite a nice little package of TGC related video extras, but no.

 

As to the video quality:  Yes, it is somewhat improved, but the first thing you notice is that the transfer is from a copy with blemishes.  These of course would be virtually non-existent had they actually digitally remastered the film.  The muddy quality noticeable in the VHS is, as I say, somewhat improved but there are stark inconsistencies between scenes, almost as if different copies of the film were used to transfer certain scenes.  Most noticeable is the scene of Lanza singing "Ave Maria" at the midnight mass.  The cut to that scene from the previous one, where Mario is talking about a voice owning him (a scene I always felt very prophetic and sadly ironic for him to have) is very noticeable in its difference in quality.  Side note - One thing's for sure, it's not Pavarotti singing "Ave Maria" with him, you can see that! 

 

A final thought on the video quality.  Perhaps this DVD will play very differently in an HDTV, but I rather think that this type of playback will only magnify the imperfections.

 

As for the audio, this is also a bit of a dissapointment.  While I think the audio on the whole is much improved; the audio range has been clearly extended in comparison to the VHS tape, the audio is very inconsistent.  There is a great variation of highs and lows in volume, almost as if some technician were riding the gain control while the transfer process was underway and he boosted the volume at certain spots.  Most noteable is in "Celeste Aida."  I might be wrong about this, but the volume seemed, as I say very inconsistent.  We found ourselves needing to raise the volume in spots and then lower it as the level seemed almost blaringly loud.

 

The DVD did hang up in one spot too but I scrolled back and played it back and it went through that spot just fine.  All in all I would say that we have a somewhat improved but certainly not state-of-the-art copy of THE GREAT CARUSO available now.  A technical point which forum members may want to take note of:  This DVD will only play in a DVD player.  It will not play in your computer even though you have a DVD port.  This is, I guess, the new mastering that Warner Bros. is now using.  I imagine it is their effort at anti-pirating, etc.  The "new" DVD of BECAUSE YOU'RE MINE is the same situation by the way.  It's too bad they weren't as successful with the DVD transferring of TGC as they were with BYM.

 

Finally, I think what we have is a somewhat improved copy of THE GREAT CARUSO on a playback medium that is much more durable and longer lasting than VHS.  As I was watching this wonderful film last night though, I couldn't help but muse about how wonderful a fully remastered version would be to both see and hear.

 

All the best,

 

Tony

 

 

[leeann]

Dear Tony, I am so glad you  started comments on the DVD and hope you are feeling better! Mine arrived yesterday also, and I burrowed in to watch it last night. It started inauspiciously with customary screen static which did then disappear. It is quite a step above the sepia-toned DVD versions I've rented from Netflix and several steps better than the secondhand VHS I, fortunately, purchased quite inexpensively. But the colors remain inconsistent; screen quality, visibly variable; and from time to time, the sound was nanoseconds off-sync with the script, and there were occasional pixellations--minute, but noticeable. I watched on a non-HDTV, no external speakers.

That said, I too, had volume issues, especially during perhaps the first half-hour and finally just kept the remote in hand. Then somewhere later (I need to watch it again), a  sudden surge in volume and sound quality gave me a doubletake--and the music was splendid for the better part of the remainder, but as you point out, still inconsistent.

There's so much even now still to be said about this film re script, acting, music, history, and it's been awfully interesting to read information about distribution and audience that Derek and Armando recently began exploring on another thread. This was an important film in its time. And despite its lesser showing in the US vs Europe, it was held over at Radio City for ten weeks, I believe,  (Mario Lanza: an American Tragedy), and one news source points out that other bookings were indefinitely postponed until the movie finished its run!

But for now, sticking only to the DVD--I'll just say I appreciate having a copy whose institutional origins certify that it is at least playable despite flaws, and it is certainly a cut above bootleg. But it is hard not to wish for a better compromise between the apparently impossible dream of total remastering and chunked transfers.  Best, Lee Ann

[Tony Partington]

Say Gang: I was just going through the IMDb and looking at the spec for THE GREAT CARUSO and saw an interesting bit of trivia.  Perhaps it's already been posted but just in case it hasn't:

 

Conductor Richard Hageman, who played Carlo Santi in the film, actually knew Enrico Caruso and led several performances with him at the Metropolitan Opera, including the 1918 War Relief Benefit re-created in the film.

Pretty cool eh?

 

[Tony Partington]

Hey, found even more on Hageman.  Quite interesting, and how appropriate that he should be in TGC.

 

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0006119/bio

 

Small world indeed!

[Derek McGovern]

Many thanks for those reviews, Tony and Lee Ann. It's disappointing to hear about the sound issues and inconsistent colour. So much for the "pristine" print that was supposedly used for this release!

I'll certainly post my thoughts on the DVD once it arrives. (I'm surprised it's not here yet; after all, it was mailed almost two weeks ago.)

Tony: Yes, I knew about the real-life Hageman-Caruso connection, and love the whole historical significance of having Hageman appear in the film's reenactment of the Liberty Bond Drive concert. The film-makers should have gone further and had him play himself! Incidentally, I've always liked Hageman's song "Do Not Go, My Love." It's very much in the "Tell Me, Oh Blue Blue Sky" mode of American art song, and has been recorded by the likes of James Melton and (very nicely) by Thomas Hampson.

Cheers
Derek

[Derek McGovern]

Well, my copy of The Great Caruso DVD finally arrived yesterday, and in between classes I had a quick look at its musical highlights.

Overall, it's better than I expected! While the picture's a bit grainy (more so in some parts than others), there's far more detail than I've seen before. In the "Che Gelida Manina" scene, for example, there's all sorts of background detail that I'd never noticed on the VHS or VCD versions. The extra definition isn't always flattering to Mario, though! I was struck by how much older he looks here at times (even in the early scenes) than in That Midnight Kiss -- despite the two films being filmed only roughly 20 months apart. The extra grain in the film's texture accentuates that, of course.

As for the colour, it's certainly quite different from what I've seen before. Mario's hair appears brown throughout, not black, and suits and ties that previously looked purple-ish, for example, on the VCD (which was always superior colour-wise to the VHS) now appear fawn (e.g. Egisto Barretto's suit). How closely it resembles the colour of the original print is hard to say! (Armando remembers the colour in the film that he saw in the cinema in the 1950s as being on the muddy side, so perhaps MGM was aiming for a less realistic period look.) Overall, I quite liked the colour here. It's certainly vivid, and while I prefer the VCD's colour in some scenes (I had the VCD on at the same time for a side-by-side comparison), the DVD picture, as you'd expect, is sharper than the VCD.

Yes, there are sound issues at times. "Celeste Aida" becomes muffled after the recitative and there's some annoying static (just as there is on the laser disc of the film). Worse, the ill-judged edits on the final note sound more obvious than ever before! The volume is too low on "M'Appari'" until the spectacular ending, while "Che Gelida" is very loud and initially riddled with dropouts. It gets better, though, and the high C sounds the best I've ever heard it. Fantastic! "Vesti la Giubba" is a little thin-sounding (though I think the recording itself is to blame), but "Because" sounds great.

I'll have more comments once I've actually watched the whole thing from start to finish. But for now I will say that this is the best representation (overall) of the film that I've seen on VHS, laser disc or VCD. It's definitely worth getting.

By the way, it does play on my Apple Mac notebook computer, though not on my older Hewlett Packard desktop.

Cheers
Derek

[leeann]

Dear Derek, It's exciting to get your comments--even on first glance, especially given that you're able to make comparisons with other apparently not-so-bad reproductions. Just for the record--I had tried the DVD in my Macbook Pro, but it was spit out repeatedly. Nice to have the option. Best, Lee Ann

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Lee Ann: Oddly enough, when I inserted The Great Caruso into my Apple notebook this morning, it immediately spat it out! However, it worked the second time.

I've had a closer look at the film today -- not the whole thing, but a good hour or so of it. Here are a few more thoughts on the DVD:

Listening on headphones, the sound in the Che Gelida scene is actually quite distorted. That's the real problem, not the dropouts (which start from "gioielli"). I'm afraid I was caught up in the excitement of Lanza's singing here when I wrote earlier that the sound gets better. The distortion doesn't go away, in fact, but, yes, that high C is still thrilling stuff. I think I'll surprise my students with it soon :)

'A Vucchella, although not one of the vocal highlights in the film (I wish they'd used the discarded Santa Lucia here instead!), does sound better than I've heard it before -- very richly reproduced. La Danza sounds good, as does the Cielo e Mar (by contrast, the Cavalleria "Schiavo non son" scene in the first operatic montage sounds a little muffled). Ave Maria sounds good too.

As Lee Ann found, you do need to keep the remote control handy when watching this DVD, as the volume levels are forever changing: dropping, for example, after the 'A Vucchella, and from "del mio pensiero" in Celeste Aida, rising for the Che Gelida Manina, and dropping again for the M'Appari', etc.

Visually, it's certainly inconsistent, with good flesh tones in the La Donna è Mobile scene, for example, but peculiar colour (and a loss of sharpness) in the Lucia Sextet, where the men's suits continually change from black to  blue. I love the extra detail in many of the scenes, though. A good example is the E Lucevan le Stelle, particularly at the beginning. I felt as though I was watching a different take!

Other oddities in the sound are familiar flaws from earlier VHS releases: the sudden surge at the end of the first stanza in La Donna è Mobile, and the loss of Alfredo's "palatable" when Mario/Enrico is reading aloud from the newspaper review of Aida (it should be "Caruso was too bourgeois to be..." "--palatable.")

So there you have it! A mixed bag, to be sure, but overall still a better reproduction of the film than we've had to date.

A side note: I was very struck by how good Lanza's miming to playback was in many of the sung scenes. You'd swear he was singing live in La Danza, for example; the position of his tongue in the "tra la la la la la"s is perfect. No mean feat! And except for a fleeting moment, the same thing happens on the Vesti la Giubba. I don't understand why some fans feel Lanza was poor at lip-synching to his recordings. For the most part, he pulls it off very well indeed. (The glaring exception here is the last note in the Martha Finale, as he falls to the ground.)

Cheers
Derek

[Derek McGovern]

P.S. The extra detail made it easier to see Mario's parents as extras in the "Loveliest Night of the Year" scene.

[Shawn]

Thanks everybody and you Derek in particular for filling us in on the DVD.... now I think I'll go ahead and get it as a present for my old man ;)

[Derek McGovern]

I'm sure your father will enjoy it, Shawn!

One thing I meant to comment on earlier is Tony's point that Warners "weren't as successful with the DVD transferring of TGC as they were with BYM." Comparing the two DVDs on a 50-inch HDTV, I actually found that the picture quality in The Great Caruso was noticeably sharper and less grainy than in Because You're Mine. True, the colours are more vibrant in the latter (and that may have been Tony's point), and the colour variations (especially in the early scenes) are distracting at times in the former, but overall I feel that The Great Caruso DVD is more satisfying to watch on a big screen. (I just wish it were as good to look at in terms of grain and colour as The Toast of New Orleans. From time to time, it comes close, though.)

Cheers
Derek

 

[Michael McAdam]

Great reviews from you all here. Derek in particular. I think I'll stick with my VHS version for now though. 

You know, if you look at the vintage tripe being lovingly remastered and repackaged for DVD on a continual basis, you would "assume" that, sooner or later, they would do the same for just one of Lanza's films? (some of these other choices must surely be accidental?)

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Mike: Yes, it's infuriating, really. It's been claimed that there isn't a big enough market for Lanza's films to justify a decent remastering for a DVD release, but God knows how many lesser movies (and with less commercial appeal to boot) have been treated to proper restoration. As Lee Ann wrote earlier in this thread, The Great Caruso is an important film. It may not constitute great filmmaking, but culturally, musically, and vocally it's of enormous value. There has never been a more successful or influential film about opera. Surely for those reasons alone it deserved to have some cash and attention lavished on it? If a lesser Rodgers and Hammerstein musical film like State Fair can be deemed worthy of remastering, then so should The Great Caruso.

Grrrr!

[Derek McGovern]

P.S. Mike: I meant to say above that just as it took forever for Lanza's recordings to appear on CD, it's almost cruelly consistent of the powers that be to release his films on DVD only when that particular technology is in its death throes :) Perhaps you'd be better off waiting for The Great Caruso to come out on Blu-ray --though what's the bet that doesn't happen until that technology is also on its way to becoming obsolete?!

[Barnabas Nemeth]

I've just also received my copy of WB's version. I agree, the general sound quality is better than that other editions like Chinese and Brazilian I also have. The picture is not so satisfying. Though, the Laserdisc version is even better for me.

 

Barnabas

On Fri, Apr 15, 2011 at 1:45 AM, Armando <ope...@primus.com.au> wrote:

Hi all: I Just received the DVD of The Great Caruso, and skipping through it, my first impressions are that it’s better than I expected. There are problems, mainly with the shifting volume on some of the musical numbers but, overall, it’s the best of what we have up to date, apart from my 16mm print, which has probably gone orange by now, but sound-wise was damn good.

Warner have done nothing more than revert to the same print that was used for the VHS and Laser releases. The “palatable” uttered by Alfredo Brazzi is missing on all of them. The colour is variable but, on the main, the print is pretty clear.

I was again blown over by the sheer magnificence of the voice coupled with the magnetic personality, the looks, the total identification and involvement with everything he sang. And I thought, as I have countless times before, this is the whole package, an unsurpassed singer at his peak. The fact that he didn’t sing at La Scala, the Met, or any of the major theatres pales into insignificance measured against the gigantic talent that Lanza possessed.

Personally, I am not influenced by the fact that a singer has sung 300 performances of La Boheme, Otello, or any number of operas at, say, the Met, La Scala, Covent Garden and so on.  I respond to what moves me, and the performance of the 29 -year old Lanza in The Great Caruso certainly does this and much more.

[leeann]

Dear Armando and Barnabas,

Now that we've commented a bit on the release itself, I got to thinking about Lanza's engagement with this role itself. As Armando pointed out: "...the magnetic personality, the looks, the total identification and involvement with everything he sang. And I thought, as I have countless times before, this is the whole package, an unsurpassed singer at his peak."

It's hard to believe the movie received criticism for its failure as a biopic. Actually, should  criticism ever have targeted the movie ever as a biographical documentary?  Historical fiction generally isn't intended as fact, hence the word "fiction" or the phrase "based upon,"  and movies in particular generally reflect varyng degrees or magnetism towards what's considered the true story. Ask any historian who's been called in as a film consultant; there's a point where tearing-out one's hair is tempting.

And yet, despite the divergence from events in the life of Caruso, I do think that Lanza's acting sheds light on the essence of Caruso, captures the heart of the man to a great extent.  We know that Caruso was an extraordinarily personable man. We know that he held his friends, his relationships, his family and his extended family close over time and cared for them. We know that there was a bit of machismo in those relationships (at least as we define that today).  We know that his relationship to his voice was both emotional and a bit pragmatic, business-like;  and I think all these elements and more  are conveyed in the film. And most importantly, I think they are conveyed because of Lanza's immersion in the character: he knew the man whose life he was interpreting, and this characterization shone through the anecdotal liberties of the script.

And yes, the voice. Even through the vagaries of volume in watching what, for me has been the best reproduction to date--regardless of its deficiencies--it overwhelms.

And as an aside, I love the photo from Life Magazine that shows up on Mario Lanza, Tenor in the second row of the press section when the Caruso family objected to the commercialism of the movie.  But that's an addendum to the story.  Best, Lee Ann

[Armando]

Hi Lee Ann: The criticism regarding the question of the of accuracy of The Great Caruso as a biography was addressed at the time (1951) by William Ludwig, who wrote the script with Sonya Levien. 

This is what Ludwig had to say in reference to a particular critic,

“The credit titles on The Great Caruso at no time said that it was based on the life of Caruso. The exact wording, after the writing credit is “Suggested by Dorothy Caruso biography of her husband”. The credit was specifically worded in this way since we at no time held out to an audience that this was a documentary study with pedantic attention to statistical and actual fact. This was essentially the story of a voice. It was our intention to remain true to the mood, character and emotional content of Enrico Caruso’s life and still present a dramatic and entertaining picture.

It was obvious from the beginning that the problems of dramatisation required many omissions and alterations not only for legal reasons (libel, slander, invasion of privacy, inability to secure releases from various persons, etc.), but also because it was physically impossible to present more than forty years of a life with statistical accuracy in the course of a two hour film, almost half of which is music.

It is unfortunate that this critic did not read the credits more carefully”.

And Lee Ann, I agree entirely with your statement, “I do think that Lanza's acting sheds light on the essence of Caruso, captures the heart of the man to a great extent.”

The view was similarly expressed by Variety in it’s review of the film, “His acting conveys something of the simple peasant Caruso essentially was, while his singing is easy, rich, musical and strong…. Lanza’s talent is obviously of high artistic calibre and quite stirring… musically he’s a treat”.  

 

[Derek McGovern]

Ciao Armando: I've always thought that Ludwig argued his case for artistic licence very well in that article. In any event, I'm sure that Dorothy Caruso's version of her husband's life was no less fictional in certain respects! I know, for example, that Enrico Jnr. was annoyed at the way his stepmother turned him and his brother Rodolfo into bit players in her 1945 biography Enrico Caruso – His Life and Death.

I wholeheartedly agree with you and Lee Ann that Lanza captured the essence of Caruso in his film. And he did so without the benefit of a script that put any real "flesh" on the great tenor. Apart from the observation that, "A man thinks he has a voice; the truth is: the voice has the man," Enrico's dialogue is banal, to say the least, and the script overall is cliche-ridden and full of dubious stereotypes (the haughty prima donna, the excitable and simplistic Italian who says things like, "And they-ah eat-ah good too," etc). There's very little in William Ludwig's and Sonya Levien's screenplay of the wit and sparkle that we find in their Student Prince collaboration of two years later; even the most memorable line in The Great Caruso -- "Tenor is not a voice; it is a disease" -- was not original. (The 19th-century conductor-pianist Hans von Bülow said it.)

Enrico Caruso Jnr was right when he wrote that his father's art -- and Lanza's -- deserved a better script. But in spite of that shortcoming (coupled with a pretty ordinary directorial effort from Richard "one-take" Thorpe), Mario somehow makes Caruso interesting and alive and real -- even when he's not singing. That's quite an achievement for someone who supposedly couldn't act.

Cheers
Derek

[Derek McGovern]

Getting back to the DVD of The Great Caruso for a moment: I've been puzzled by Derek Mannering's silence on the quality of the final product. After all, it was he who with some fanfare first announced the DVD, and then (with all the skill of a political spin doctor) turned the disappointment of discovering that the film wasn't going to be remastered after all into a positive -- writing that the DVD (reportedly) "looks and sounds fantastic." But unless I've missed something, he hasn't yet revealed his opinion of the DVD, and, ironically enough, most of the positive comments about the release have been made here rather than on his home forum. I'm genuinely curious to know what he thinks of the DVD.

[Armando]

Derek, you wrote: Enrico Caruso Jnr was right when he wrote that his father's art -- and Lanza's -- deserved a better script. But in spite of that shortcoming (coupled with a pretty ordinary directorial effort from Richard "one-take" Thorpe), Mario somehow makes Caruso interesting and alive and real -- even when he's not singing. That's quite an achievement for someone who supposedly couldn't act.

I’d like to comment on Mario’s acting. I’ve done some acting in my younger days and all I can tell you is that if you haven’t had at least some basic training (and I didn’t ) it’s a hell of a lot more difficult  than one might think. The secret of acting, in my opinion, is to come across as natural and genuine as possible, and I think this is precisely what Lanza’s acting conveys, not only in The Great Caruso, but also in all his first four films. Believe me, it can be quite daunting when you are standing there in front of a camera trying to deliver lines and emote at the same time in a reasonably convincing manner.

There are things that Lanza does in his last three movies that I don’t like but I cannot fault his performance in The Great Caruso.

 

[Derek McGovern]

Due to gremlins in the Google system, Armando's review of The Great Caruso DVD, which he posted a few days back, has vanished, so I'm reproducing it here. And I second everything in Armando's third and fourth paragraphs!

 

Hi all: I Just received the DVD of The Great Caruso, and skipping through it, my first impressions are that it’s better than I expected. There are problems, mainly with the shifting volume on some of the musical numbers but, overall, it’s the best of what we have up to date - apart from my 16mm print, which has probably gone orange by now, but sound-wise was damn good.

Warner have done nothing more than revert to the same print that was used for the VHS and Laser releases. The “palatable” uttered by Alfredo Brazzi is missing on all of them. The colour is variable but, in the main, the print is pretty clear.

I was again blown over by the sheer magnificence of the voice, coupled with the magnetic personality, the looks, the total identification and involvement with everything he sang. And I thought, as I have countless times before, this is the whole package: an unsurpassed singer at his peak. The fact that he didn’t sing at La Scala, the Met, or any of the other major theatres pales into insignificance measured against the gigantic talent that Lanza possessed.

Personally, I am not influenced by the fact that a singer has sung 300 performances of La Boheme, Otello, or any number of operas at, say, the Met, La Scala, Covent Garden and so on. I respond to what moves me, and the performance of the 29-year-old Lanza in The Great Caruso certainly does this and much more.

Bravo, Armando!

[leeann]

Dear Armando and Derek, The subject about Lanza's acting ability always seems controversial and rather hard to sum up. Just briefly, it seems to me that there are great actors born to do so as Lanza was born to sing. And give them any role, any director, any playwright, and their abilities shine through even if conditions are less than ideal. And then there are actors who do certain kinds of roles well--perhaps drama, but not comedy; stage, but not screen, vice versa and etcetera.  Lanza, I think, falls into that latter category, that of acting certain kinds of roles in certain kinds of situations and perhaps even certain parts of the script of an entire movie quite well. In fact, more than quite well--totally engagingly as the focal point of the movie--and not just because of star billing. And it's quite amazing, given the conditions you all have pointed to--bad scripts, limited dramatic coaching, one-take directors, studio deadlines. But there are rough patches, undoubtedly in part because of those limitations.

Does it seem reasonable to project, though, that his acting talents were made for the operatic stage, for that unique combination of dramatic ability and musicality that represents the pinnacle of operatic performance?   Lee Ann

[Derek McGovern]

Searching through TCM's website recently, I was amazed by the number of inaccurate and sometimes insulting comments about Lanza's career, talent, personality, and even his behaviour (on the sets of his various films). For instance, in the case of The Great Caruso, TCM includes well-known film critic Dave Kehr's nasty capsule review of the movie, in which Lanza is described as "thuggish" and "inexplicably popular," while elsewhere on the same page there's an almost completely inaccurate article by one Frank Miller. A sample paragraph from this luminary:

As if playing an operatic legend on-screen weren't enough, off-screen Lanza displayed enough temperament for a season-full of Met stars. His weight yo-yoed throughout the production. Costumes that fit properly on Friday, had to be rebuilt on Monday to accommodate weekend-long binges. He quarreled with everyone and refused to sing the film's one original song, "The Loveliest Night of the Year." Co-star Ann Blyth got to sing it instead. But when it became a hit, Lanza finally agreed to record it.

http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/1782/The-Great-Caruso/articles.html

What utter rubbish! 

On an infinitely more pleasant note, I've just spent an enjoyable fifteen minutes re-reading this delightful thread. 

[Derek McGovern]

Somehow I'd never read the entire 1951 New York Times review of The Great Caruso until today, and---my goodness!---critic Bosley Crowther was tough on the film:

http://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9E00E1DC153DEF3BBC4952DFB366838A649EDE

While I actually agree with many of his criticisms, particularly his observation that, "Something better—much better—as a story might have been contrived for the biography of Caruso, and something more subtle, too," I think he fails to give the film its musical due. The music is more than just "fine"---it's thrilling and inspirational. And it's as a showcase for great music and great singing that the film overwhelmingly succeeds.

I also thought it was a little unfair of Crowther to pick on Ann Blyth's "banal" singing and "reedy" voice. If he thought Blyth was mediocre, how on earth could he justify describing Kathryn Grayson the year before as an "accomplished soprano"?! :) 

Interestingly enough, the New York Times (albeit with a different reviewer) was kinder to Serenade as a film than it was to The Great Caruso. (That review can be read here.)

[Derek McGovern]

Steff has unearthed two 1951 letters to the editor of the Syracuse Post-Standard regarding The Great Caruso. They make for interesting reading:

[Armando]

The overall comments are typical of a time which was much more highbrow and stuffy than now, so one can imagine the reaction of the so called “serious music lovers” to the inclusion of  numbers such as Boom Biddy Boom Boom in a concert program.  Having said this, there’s no doubt that due to Lanza’s staggering success in the movies he was now catering primarily for an uncritical audience for which he could do no wrong. But to say that based on the content of the concert you could not appraise either his voice or the singer is simply nonsense. It makes me question the musical credentials of A) Eckhof, who neglects  to include the Arlesiana aria among what he considers serious numbers and B) Baldwyn, who  states that “Lanza lacks the full bodied vocal quality and the power which Caruso possessed.”

On the basis of the latter’s comments it would be interesting to know if Baldwyn had actually heard Caruso.

It’s interesting to compare the two tenors when they were the same age. In 1951 Lanza was 30 years old.  At the age of thirty Caruso’s voice, while slightly darker in timbre, was that of a lyric tenor, far from what one would describe as powerful and certainly not a voice suitable to sing Chenier, the very role that Lanza had been offered by both La Scala and the San Francisco Opera a year earlier when he was only 29. What Lanza had, even at that stage, was a spinto voice with enough ring to enable him to sing Chenier. Therefore, Baldwyn’s appraisal of Lanza doesn’t make any sense to me.  

[leeann]

It's awfully interesting how intensely audiences responded to The Great Caruso--the move that so many people today--singers, musicians, and just plain music-lovers--credit  with creating an impression so profound that it influenced careers, a life-long love of opera, and just a general appreciation of music. But some of the less-than-enthused comments in those Letters to the Editor above have certainly persisted through the decades and still get press time in blogs, twitter, forums!

Here are more examples--not as in-depth in their critique as those really exemplary Syracuse writers, they still are evidence of early and ongoing arguments. These letters, although shorter, are from the Daily Boston Globe in response to the paper's review on May 1, 1951. The reviewer, Cyrus Durgin, mostly emphasized biographic distortions of Caruso's actual life in the movie, but stated (in-line with Armando's note about the stuffiness and high-brow approach of reviewers of the day):

The leading role is acted and sung by Mario Lanza, who neither looks nor sounds precisely like Caruso. But Mr. Lanza is a personable actor and he has a nice, well-placed lyric tenor voice. Because of Mr. Lanza's rapidly growing popularity and because soprano Dorothy Kirsten is prominently cast as an Opera diva, "The Great Caruso" likely will do well at the box office. ...Go and enjoy "The Great Caruso" for what it does offer in the sentimental love story, the beauty of Ann Blyth as Dorothy Caruso, the richness of the color and production, and the singing of numerous opera arias and concert pieces...Caruso's actual career was far more dramatic than this harmless but nonsensical concoction.

Some letter writers agreed with the review; others definitely did not.

[Armando]

Thanks for those quotes and letters, Lee Ann.

I’ve often wondered whether there’s any point in posting anything given the response we get, (though, as Derek has often told me, we do get a lot of readers!) but I simply have to address Mr. Stone ‘s letter which is a mixture of bias and ignorance.

Mr. Stone makes it clear that he is a Caruso enthusiast – so am I. But regardless of his enthusiasm for Caruso, Mr. Stone is wrong.  He says that Caruso possessed the most powerful voice of his day. In fact he did not – obviously Mr. Stone had never heard of such Caruso contemporaries as Borgatti, Slezak, Zenatello and Melchior, among others.

Nor was Caruso’s voice of an extended compass, on the contrary, the man struggled to sing a high C and often transposed an aria down E.G. Di Quella Pira. Much has been made of Caruso having both sung and recorded the bass aria, Vecchia Zimarra from La Boheme, but as J. Freestone and H. J. Drummond point out in their book Enrico Caruso –His Recorded Legacy “[The recording] does not even suggest that Caruso could have been successful as a baritone, let alone a bass. The range of the aria is very small, and the lowest note is the low tenor C sharp. ….the aria does not explore the range of a true bass in any way.”   

Mr. Stone goes on to say that, “[Lanza’s] breathing is entirely  incorrect.”   He states, “On every breath he pushes out his chest. Correct breathing is done unnoticed in the diaphragm.”   Wrong again, Mr. Stone.  Here is what vocal expert Arnold Rose wrote in his book, The Singer and the Voice,

“Once a full breath has been taken in, the upper chest should be kept raised whilst singing except for a slight rise and fall when the breath is expelled through ascent of the diaphragm and descent of the lower ribs. The upper chest is elevated not so much for the air contained in it as for the fact that its elevation is necessary to enable the lower chest to expand to its maximum. This it cannot do if the upper chest is quite relaxed because of the way the two mechanisms are connected.”

I certainly don’t object to Mr. Stone’s admiration for Caruso, or Bjorling and Tucker for that matter, what I do question, though, is his bias which is evident throughout his entire letter.   

Imagine comparing Caruso to a neophyte who hasn’t even sung at the Met. Sheer sacrilege!

To quote Peter Ustinov, “Laughter would be bereaved if snobbery died.”

 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Lee Ann and Armando,

I too was much amused by Mr. Stone's assertions! Lanza's voice is "high and thin"? And his breathing is wrong because it's visible?  

The notes Lanza sings in the film are as "high" as they are supposed to be---nothing is transposed up!---so that criticism makes no sense. "Thin"? That's subjective, but it's not an adjective that I've ever thought anyone could reasonably apply to Lanza's voice. And especially not a devoted fan of the silver-toned Bjoerling, whose voice was clearly no richer than Lanza's. (Quite the opposite in fact.) I wonder how Stone would have reacted to hearing the baritonal voice on Caruso Favorites! 

As for the supposedly incorrect breathing, the hapless Mr. Stone not only knows nothing about operatic singing, but doesn't seem to grasp that Lanza was not actually singing live in the film---he was lip-synching. (Of course, he may have been singing along with his recordings, but it wouldn't have been in full voice.) Perhaps if Mario hadn't moved his chest so often when lip-synching, opting instead for a non-realistic approach in which no physical effort was visible, that would have pleased Mr. Stone :)

Cheers,

Derek  

[Lou]

Lanza's voice is "thin"? So is Santa Claus!

Mr. Stone writes that Lanza was never accepted by the Metropolitan. To my mind, this implies that Lanza had applied but was turned down.  If my reading is correct, Mr. Stone is talking through his hat. As Armando writes in his book, Edward Johnson, then general manager of the Metropolitan, twice made an offer to Lanza to join the company, but Lanza declined each time, "feeling he was not yet ready."

Thanks for the Peter Ustinov quote, Armando. It applies more so to snobs who are pseudo-experts to boot.

[Derek McGovern]

Quite right, Lou! Mr. E. Nathan Stone is not only "talking through his hat"---he deserves a different middle name: gall :)

Cheers,

Derek

[Tony Partington]

Armando, Wonderful and erudite post. As I was reading it I got this image of the character of Park Benjamin from THE GREAT CARUSO. Somehow I see him as the sort of fellow who would pen such a letter as is under discussion. After all, he did have the line in TGC (in reference to Caruso), "He's no Jean deReszke." In all events, thank you, once again, for attempting to lead the ignorant from the cold and dark to the light and warmth. By the way, I think Peter Ustinov was terrifc! Ciao - Tony

[Armando]

Thank you,Tony--apt comparison with Park Benjamin! What I forgot to mention, and Derek pointed out, is that old Stone wasn’t even aware that Mario was lip-synching.

As for Ustinov, I totally agree--a gigantic talent!

And Lou, pseudo experts indeed!

Cheers,

Armando

[Derek McGovern]

We've long known that at least two scenes involving soprano Jarmila Novotna were cut from The Great Caruso. (Photos of these deleted scenes can be found in Row 6 of our Miscellaneous Photos section.) One of these featured the duet "E' il sol dell-anima" from Rigoletto; the other---if the following snippet by Dorothy Kilgallen is to be believed---was a love scene. What's more, Kilgallen claimed (in this syndicated piece from the Greensboro Record of April 16. 1951), a full hour of footage was deleted from the release print. I'm sure she was exaggerating, but even so: it does make you wonder what treats we've been missing out on!