gene nelson, charlotte greenwood, and chorus
by Douglas Messerli
Sony Levien and William Ludwig
(screenplay, adapted from the musical by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein
and based on the play Lynn Riggs), Fred Zinnemann (director) Oklahoma! / 1955
Much of the "action" of the scene lies dormant in its
hunkering cowboys, Will among them to begin. But as he recounts the wonders of
Kansas City, it is clear that he cannot for long remain still, particularly
when they've built a building seven stories high and a dancing girl who has
revealed that everything she had was absolutely real. The actual dance begins,
innocently enough, with Will executing a two-step that has taken his world by
surprise, supplanting the waltz! Although Eller (the long-legged, high-kicking
Charlotte Greenwood) joins in for a few minutes, the cowboys don't like it.
When a few minutes later, Will taps out the first few steps of Ragtime,
they like it even less. But the women are smitten, particularly two younger
girls, and before you know it, they are cautiously attempting to join in. His
cowboy friends, however, are still not convinced, and Will, accordingly,
returns to the hunker, before, one by one, the men pick up the rhythms and try
out the dance. Suddenly everyone is up and dancing, moving forward and away,
backs to the camera, as Aunt Eller holds out her hands, in an iconic DeMille
movement, that suggests that the community sensibility has prevailed. Soon
there is a whole chorus of rag-timing, tap-dancing cowboys, which so thrills
Will that he takes out his lasso skillfully stepping in and out of the symbolic
circle it creates. In his ecstasy of the shared experience, he leaps upon a
railroad car just as the train takes off. As in any good western, his horse
comes to his rescue whereupon he is returned to his comrades and friends.
Los Angeles, March 2, 2011 / Reprinted from World Cinema Review (March 2011).
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