Well great, now I hate America.
Plot summary (with spoilers): Real-life person and Broadway writer/producer/singer/dancer/star George M Cohan is just finishing up his performance of "I'd Rather Be Right", in which he imitates the President of the United States, Franklin Roosevelt. He tap dances around the stage vigorously, as FDR was known to do, then finishes to rapturous applause. His wife greets him off-stage and then shoe-horns in awkward dialog about how it's supposedly controversial to imitate the president. Suddenly, George's partner Sam interrupts with news that the President is on the phone and wants to speak to George. George gulps theatrically, and takes the call. The President wants to see him, and won't say why. Throughout the movie, everyone talks in that irritating clipped/fast way that they do in old movies, ones where newspaper boys say "extr-y, extr-y, read all about it!"
Cut to...somewhere...definitely not the White House, where George meets up with some servant in the lobby (?) who informs him he can go upstairs to some office where FDR is waiting for him. There's no security at all, even though it's the President and the middle of WWII.
George goes in and meets the President nervously, still unsure as to why he's here. I guess FDR says, "tell me your whole fucking life story, please", because suddenly we're in flashback mode, to the 1880's or so, on the day George is born, the 4th of July. His parents are actors, and soon after, he and his little sister are incorporated into his parent's vaudeville act, which includes a lovely bit of blackface, natch. As a kid, George gets a big head and starts demanding star treatment, declaring himself the best actor in the family. He even chases out a potential producer after his list of demands grows too great. George's dad full-on is about to punch him in the face, but the mom says, "no, he needs his mouth to sing!" so George's dad spanks him instead. It isn't as awesome as it sounds.
Cut to ten years later, and George is now twenty, and being played by Cagney. He's in a play portraying an old man with a beard and grey hair, and afterwards, while backstage, a woman approaches him saying she's an actress and would like a part in his plays. She also is apparently legally blind and/or mentally challenged, because she believes the the beard and hair are real and that George is an old man. George plays along, and then starts tap dancing quickly. The woman (Mary) is shocked and worries he'll have a heart-attack. The irony (?) is that George really is an old man in the opening FDR scene, and he tap dances just a quickly in that scene, so I don't know. Anyway, George takes off his beard and fake hair, and Mary does a quadruple take and faints or something, probably clutching her pearls. I think I was on Facebook on that part.
Later, George and Mary are dating and George and his family are performing in like a talent show or something. One of the acts, a performing dog, is drunk, and George tells Mary she should perform a song he wrote in the dog's place. He assures her it will go perfectly because he's so talented and what not. She sings well, but the play's director has a fit, and correctly deduces that George got the dog drunk (seriously) and demands the curtain go down. George pinches the director's nose and knocks off his hat and the director tut-tuts and says, "I never!" and lowers the curtain during the middle of Mary's song. Smooth.
They get into a shouting match, then George pushes the director, knocking him into some dudes in tights trying to rehearse some acrobatic act, and they in turn crash into a set and a tarp lands on all three of them, and I think maybe some chimps get lose and start ripping people's faces off. The director pulls the tarp off his head and yells, "SKINNER!" like Superintendent Chalmers, and then declares George won't ever work in this town again.
Sometime later, George and Mary are married and attempting to get funding for their own show. Every producer in town turns them down. One day, George overhears a conversation with the rest of his family and some friends, who tell the family that they could easily start working again if they drop George from the act, but they refuse to do so. George rightly feels guilty and tells them that he's been hired to write a show, but it will take a while before it reaches the performance stage, so they should feel free to branch off without him for a while. He then redoubles his efforts to get a gig. At a restaurant, he overhears another writer and a producer talking about a show the writer is pitching. Insanely, he joins the conversation, pretends to be the writer's partner and tells him that they just got another offer from some other producer and they don't need this guy. The producer is as stupid as Mary, and falls for this, and suddenly desperately wants to do their show. A partnership is born!
We see endless scenes from his play, Yankee Doodle Dandy, and then it becomes a big hit, the rest of the Cohans are summoned to join the show, and we see even more scenes. A rough estimate, I'd say three or four hundred musical numbers take place in this part. There's a subplot involving a diva who insists on singing Mary's main musical number, that I won't get into because it's too boring for words. Then we learn that people began to grow tired of Cohan's patriotic plays and wondered if he could do anything else. In response, George writes a dramatic play with no mentions of the flag and no songs. It is apparently so bad the critics walk out in intermission. George is devastated, but no sooner can he process the news than a kid on the street yells "extr-y extr-y, read all about it, Germans declare war!" and World War I has begun. In a voice over, Cagney fully goes, "It always seems to happen this way. Every time an audience starts to think they're too sophisticated for the American flag anymore, someone comes along and reminds us why it's so important". Yes, that's right, the Germans invaded France and Russia because George's play sucked.
George tries to enlist, but he's too old at 39, and the recruiters turn him down. George insists he's physically fit and to prove it, does yet another fucking tap dance number. The soldiers are far more polite than I would've been, and turn him down gently.
But that won't stop George from doing more patriotic plays! Sophistication be damned! He performs in "Over There", which I'll admit is actually a pretty cool song. Then there's fifteen hundred more songs.
Years later, George's family has passed away, even his little sister, and he's left show business, living on a farm with Mary. Some teenagers approach the farm, needing some gas for their car. George introduces himself to them. They are polite, but have no idea who he is. He explains that he used to be on Broadway, and mentions "Yankee Doodle Dandy" and "Over There" and "Give My Regards to Broadway" as his main hits. Even though these characters were born before my mother, they have never heard of these songs, and would much rather sing "Jeepers Creepers". George feels frustrated and impotent. At the same time, George's old partner Sam needs someone for his new show about FDR. A reunion tour begins.
Cut back to not the White House, where FDR says "thanks for wasting two hours of my life" and gives George the medal of freedom or purple heart or something because of all his patriotic inspiring songs. George thanks him and leaves, and sees some soldiers marching in a parade on the street. They're singing "Over There". And weirdly--even though it's way too little and way too late, and Cagney has spent the last two hours vainly mugging his way through every scene, trying to make me crack a smile in this "comedy"--this moment is oddly effective. George joins the parade and starts marching with the soldiers. The solider next to him notices he's not singing. "What's the matter, old timer? Forget the words?" George assures him that he does indeed remember the words. "So, sing!" the solider playfully scolds him. And George does, with tears in his eyes.
Fin.
Stars: One out of five, for that last scene.
Review: Sucked. Su-u-u-u-u-cked.
Does it deserve "Best 100" status: No, Hell-to-the.
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