On the Town

In 1948, Jules Dassin used New York as one big location for The Naked City. The following year, to Louis B Mayer's incredulity, producer Arthur Freed turned the city into a sound stage for the movie of the Broadway musical of the Leonard Bernstein/Jerome Robbins ballet Fancy Free. Taking as its premise 'New York, New York, it's a wonderful town', the show looses three 'gobs' on the women (including the imperishable Alice Pearce), the sights, and the nightlife of the town. The most cinematic of film musicals and the one most given to dance, On the Town is exhilarating, brash spectacle, all rip-snorting, wisecracking attack, and maybe just a teensy bit unlikeable.