Plot
It is 1932, during the early days of the Depression, and Broadway producers Jones (Robert McWade) and Barry (Ned Sparks) put on Pretty Lady, a musical starring beautiful Dorothy Brock (Bebe Daniels). Brock is involved with industrialist Abner Dillon (Guy Kibbee), who is the show's "angel" (financial backer). But while she is busy keeping Dillon both hooked and at arm's length, she still secretly meets her old vaudeville partner and lover, the out-of-work Pat Denning (George Brent).
To ensure success Julian Marsh (Warner Baxter), who is the best, is hired to direct. But Marsh is ill, destitute, friendless, and bitter as a result of the 1929 Stock Market Crash. "Did you ever try to cash a reputation in a bank?" he asks the producers who are surprised to hear his desperation. Gambling with health and life, Marsh must make his last show a major hit and financial success if he is to have enough money to retire on. "This time I'm going to sock it away so hard you'll have to blast to get it out" he says after signing up to direct, referring to his financial situation.
Cast selection and rehearsals begin amidst fierce competition, with not a few "casting couch" innuendos flying around. Naïve newcomer Peggy Sawyer (Ruby Keeler), who arrives in New York from her home in Allentown, Pennsylvania, is duped and ignored until two chorines, Lorraine Fleming (Una Merkel) and Ann "Anytime Annie" Lowell (Ginger Rogers), take her under their wing. Lorraine has an "in" with dance director Andy Lee (George E. Stone), while the show's juvenile lead Billy Lawler (Dick Powell) takes a liking to Peggy and puts in a good word for her with Marsh.
Rehearsals continue for five weeks to Marsh's complete dissatisfaction, until the night before the opening in Philadelphia when Brock fractures her ankle. Next morning Abner Dillon wants Marsh to cast his new interest, Annie Lowell, as the star. Annie decides she is not talented enough but tells Marsh that the untried, green, Peggy Sawyer is.
With 200 jobs and his own financial and personal future riding on the outcome, Marsh rehearses Sawyer mercilessly (vowing "I'll either have a live leading lady or a dead chorus girl") until an hour before curtain time on the night of the premiere Brock, soon to be married to Pat, arrives and wishes Peggy luck, and the show is on. Nearly twenty minutes are devoted to three Busby Berkeley production numbers: Shuffle Off to Buffalo, Keep Young and Healthy, and the title song 42nd Street. The show is a success, and in the final scene Marsh turns wearily away from the brightly lit theatre entrance and slumps down on a fire escape as theatre-goers depart praising the musical.
In the original Bradford Ropes novel, Julian Marsh and Billy Lawler are lovers. Since this sort of relationship was deemed unacceptable to audiences of the era, an invented romance was created for Billy and Peggy.
Read more about this topic: 42nd Street (film)
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