1949 - MY DREAM IS YOURS, Doris Day's second film

This is Doris Day's second film. She is again under the direction of Michael Curtiz one of the best directors in the film business.  Curtiz had discovered her and cast her in her first film Romance On The High Seas.  Curtiz's instructions to her was just play herself and let your likable natural personality come out.  Day was also tutored by her co-star Jack Carson who showed her all the technical tricks of acting in front of a camera.  In essence know where your marks are and understand the function of cinema lighting and photography.

Day absorbed these lessons well and in this her second film she had a very natural screen presence.  Day played a widow with a young son looking to break into the entertainment business.  She teams up with Jack Carson who plays her manager and starts to fall in love with her.  However Doris is attracted to nightclub singer Lee Bowman a drunk and a lowlife.  It's obvious where the story is going to go.  I should also point out that this film looks quite beautiful in stunning 1940's technicolor.   

All of this drama along with the musical interludes was expertly handled by Curtiz a man who was practically an idiot savant when it came to making films.  Curtiz always knew where to place the camera to get the maximum effect out of almost ever scene.  Curtiz was a great director in almost any genre.  He was comfortable making westerns, dramas, musicals or comedies and had a very long career.

This film was a major influence on Martin Scorcese when he came to make his musical disaster New York, New York a bloated, unlikable and incoherent mess.  My Dream Is Yours had a completed screenplay to work with.  Scorcese and Robert DeNiro tried to improvise their way through their film with the predictable disastrous results.

My Dream Is Yours is a very entertaining film in a 1940's kind of way.  No one could knock out a song like Doris Day. The film also has a kind of weird animated sequence featuring Day, Carson and Bugs Bunny.  The cast besides Day and Carson is a who's who of 1940's Hollywood.  Eve Arden, Adolphe Menjou. S.Z. "Cuddles" Sakall, Sheldon Leonard and Franklin Pangborn.  

This was the last appearance of character actor Edgar Kennedy who could trace his career back to silent films.  He worked with just about everybody, Charles Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, The Mark Brothers, John Barrymore, Rex Harrison and Harold Lloyd.  A remarkable career.

 The film was written by, Harry Kurnitz, Dane Lussier, Allen Rivkin, and Laura Kerr.  The running time is 101 minutes.