The Big Broadcast

featuring

Stuart Erwin, Bing Crosby, Leila Hyams, Sharon Lynn,

Bing Crosby heads an all-star musical lineup in this freewheeling comedy from radio’s golden age. Fired from his radio show and dumped by his girl, Bing bonds with lovelorn oilman Stuart Erwin during a dark night of the soul (“You sing into a little hole year after year and then you die,” the despondent crooner laments). Soon Erwin resolves to rescue the radio station and Bing’s career with a broadcast revue featuring Cab Calloway, the Mills Brothers, Kate Smith, and more. The movie pops with jazzy visuals, slapstick surrealism, and a pinch of pre-Code spice, plus George Burns and Gracie Allen’s ineffable nonsense.

Juliet Clark
FILM DETAILS 
Screenwriter
  • George Marion Jr.
Based On
  • The play Wild Waves by William Ford

Cinematographer
  • George Folsey
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 35mm
  • 80 mins
Source
  • UCLA Film & Television Archive
Permission
  • Universal Pictures
Additional Info
  • Preservation funded by the Packard Humanities Institute and Universal Pictures