Review of The Merry Widow

Based loosely on the operetta by Franz Lehár, this Ruritanian confection has some of the original music—notably the waltz, and "Meet Me at Maxim's—both as musical numbers and leitmotifs. The tiny kingdom of Marshovia is in trouble—its principal citizen, the wealthy widow Sonja (Jeanette MacDonald)—who, heavily veiled, has attracted the attention of Count Danilo (Maurice Chevalier)—has cast off her black clothes and gone to Paris. The King sends Danilo to Paris to marry her so her fortune won't leave the kingdom. Sonja is already smitten, and goes to Maxim's to see him. He hasn't seen her face, and accepts her as "Fifi." She declines his advances in a private dining room, saying she prefers truth to lies, and she leaves. He goes to the embassy to be presented to the woman he must marry, and the nervous ambassador Popoff (Edward Everett Horton) introduces them. Okay, but she gets wind of the plot and calls the union off. Danilo manages to win her back. There is a great deal of singing, and some rather luscious waltz scenes where maybe a hundred couples swoop through a colonnaded ballroom. Chevalier maintains his usual charm even though the part—a man no woman can resist, and about whom no woman is jealous of another, and whose leaving they accept perfectly cheerfully—is tripe. He throws back his head and laughs. As a musical it can succeed only if you like Jeannette MacDonald and her fluttery soprano voice and the swoopy big orchestral productions behind her. No really memorable tunes except the great Lehár waltz. Oh, and Marshovia is a mess—it's sort of Slavic and sort of Islamic (the king is named Achmet) and sort of feudal and backward, and yet the palaces are vast. Mme. Sonja's bedroom looks about the size of a hockey arena in a populous city; if there's a vase, you can bet it is twelve feet high and made of marble, and if there's a bed, you can bet that there's room for milady and all her household staff, including the Russian wolfhound they forgot to throw in. This is a stupid movie of the sort one rather enjoys in spite of one's better judgment.