Madam Satan
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"Is Madam Satan a good movie? No. Will it bore you? Not if you can appreciate the suave verbal legerdemain of Roland Young during the first half, before the aerial outrageousness begins. Will you remember Madam Satan? Probably as long as you can enjoy the sheer audacity of Depression-era Hollywood.--filmfax" |
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Madam Satan (1930) was produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille as a musical drama for MGM, one of the few films DeMille made for the Culver City studio. It has been called one of the oddest films DeMille made and certainly one of the oddest films MGM made during its "golden age." The Brazilian drag queen Madame Satã base her persona on the female protagonist of this film.
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Production
The zeppelin sequences were originally filmed in Technicolor. The film, however, was released in black and white due to the backlash against musicals which made the extra expense of color superfluous. The same thing occurred with another MGM musical, Children of Pleasure (1930), whose color sequences were similarly released in black and white. The original color sequences to "Madam Satan" no longer exist.
Plot
Angela Brooks (Kay Johnson) discovers that her husband Bob (Reginald Denny) is cheating on her with another woman, Trixie (Lillian Roth). Learning that her husband intends to go to a costume ball on a moored dirigible in New York City, Angela disguises herself and attempts to "vamp" her husband. During the ball there are a number of exotic musical numbers. At the climax, a thunderstorm causes the dirigible to break lose and everyone is forced to parachute into the reservoir in Central Park.
Cast
- Kay Johnson as Angela Brooks
- Reginald Denny as Bob Brooks
- Lillian Roth as Trixie
- Roland Young as Jimmy Wade
- Elsa Peterson as Martha - Angela's Maid
- Jack King as Herman (pianist)
- Eddie Prinz Riff (banjo player
- Boyd Irwin as Zeppelin Captain
- Wallace MacDonald as First Mate
- Tyler Brooke as Romeo
- Ynez Seabury as Babo
- Theodore Kosloff as Electricity
- Julanne Johnston as Miss Conning Tower
- Martha Sleeper as Fish Girl
- Doris McMahon as Water
Crew
- Writing credits: Jeanie MacPherson and Gladys Unger
- Music: Clifford Grey, Elsie Janis, Herbert Stothart
- Cinematography: Harold Rosson
- Film Editing: Anne Bauchens
- Art Direction: Cedric Gibbons and Mitchell Leisen
- Costume Design: Adrian
Preservation
The original black and white release print is extant. The original Technicolor sequences exist only in this black and white copy.
