In the most unpretentious way possible, Singin’ in the Rain gives an audience the elements necessary for a good musical: carefully established reality and unreality, with smooth transitions between them. And for those who do want a musical, there are old tunes and new tunes and great performers to present them. For people who think romance is sappy, there’s the humorously treated history of the transition to sound in film. For people who don’t want comedy, there’s a charming romance. For people who don’t like musicals, it’s still a very funny comedy. Love it or hate it (and few hate it), overrate it or underrate it, the 1952 film makes a perfect musical yardstick. Kelly stars as a silent-movie idol who is making his first talking picture he falls for a chorus girl, played by Debbie Reynolds, who’s tasked with dubbing the strident-voiced leading lady’s lines. It’s the musical for people who don’t like musicals. The producer Arthur Freed, the directors Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, and the writers Betty Comden and Adolph Green succeeded with this challenge in Singin’ in the Rain. They wanted to push the boundaries of the musical genre, test the form, take it apart and find out what made it work best.
But as film artists began to think more and more about musicals, and innovators stepped up to make them, the desire to create a musical that was about being musical emerged and took hold. When sound came to the motion-picture industry, the rush to create musicals was mostly motivated by straightforward thinking: Let’s get some songs and dances up there on the screen.
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