Torch Song (film)
Torch Song is a 1953 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer feature film starring Joan Crawford and Michael Wilding in a story about a Broadway star and her rehearsal pianist. The screenplay by John Michael Hayes and Jan Lustig was based upon the story "Why Should I Cry?" by I. A. R. Wylie. The film was directed by Charles Walters and produced by Sidney Franklin, Henry Berman, and Charles Schnee.
The cast includes Harry Morgan (billed as "Henry Morgan"), Gig Young, Marjorie Rambeau, Dorothy Patrick, Eugene Loring, Maidie Norman and James Todd.
Torch Song has gained note for the musical number "Two-Faced Woman" from The Band Wagon in which Crawford, in blackface, lip-syncs to the voice of India Adams while writhing with male dancers. The film marked Crawford's return to MGM after a ten-year absence. Her original recordings for the soundtrack, which were not used in the film, have survived and been included in home video releases.
Read more about Torch Song (film): Plot, Reception, Award Nominations
Famous quotes containing the words torch and/or song:
“The genius of Byron, which appeared at the beginning of this century, is like a funeral torch sculptured on our cradles.”
—Emilio Castelar Y Ripoll (1832–1899)
“There is the falsely mystical view of art that assumes a kind of supernatural inspiration, a possession by universal forces unrelated to questions of power and privilege or the artist’s relation to bread and blood. In this view, the channel of art can only become clogged and misdirected by the artist’s concern with merely temporary and local disturbances. The song is higher than the struggle.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)