Rio Rita (musical)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses of Rio Rita, see Rio Rita (disambiguation).

Rio Rita is the name of a very successful 1927 stage musical by Florenz Ziegfeld, which originally united Wheeler and Woolsey as a team and made them famous. In 1929, Radio Pictures (later known as RKO) purchased the rights to film this lavish musical. The film was the biggest and most expensive production for Radio Pictures for 1929 and it proved to be a huge success. The last portion of the film was photographed in Technicolor. The film re-launched Bebe Daniels and John Boles into stardom and both of them starred in a number of musicals in the years following. They proved to be so popular with audiences of the day that they were both hired by RCA Victor to make a number of phonograph records. Based on the success of this film, Wheeler & Woolsey were also given contracts to star in a series of comedies.