| It Happened in Brooklyn | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Richard Whorf |
| Produced by | Jack Cummings |
| Written by | Isobel Lennart J.P. McGowan |
| Starring | Frank Sinatra Peter Lawford Kathryn Grayson Jimmy Durante |
| Cinematography | Robert Planck |
| Editing by | Blanche Sewell |
| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Running time | 104 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
It Happened in Brooklyn is a 1947 MGM musical romantic comedy film directed by Richard Whorf and starring Frank Sinatra, Kathryn Grayson, Peter Lawford, and Jimmy Durante and featuring Gloria Grahame and Marcy McGuire. It Happened in Brooklyn was Sinatra's third film for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
The film contains six songs written by Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne.
A post-World War II feel-good movie, the various plot-threads in It Happened in Brooklyn revolve around characters making good on their non-proletarian dreams: in Sinatra's case to become a singer/musician rather than a shipping clerk, in Lawford's case to break out of his extreme shyness to gain a wife and a career as a songwriter, and in Grayson's case to break out of her schoolteaching job to star in the opera (this last is not shown coming to pass, but she presumably lives happily ever after as she is brought to England as the fiancee of the Lawford character, who is heir to a dukedom). The film's tagline was "Happy songs! Happy stars! Happy romance!". Lawford dances while singing a song, a performance that was particularly well received by both critics and public, outshining future fellow Rat Pack member Sinatra.
It Happened in Brooklyn was generally well received, Variety noting that: "Much of the lure will result from Frank Sinatra's presence in the cast. Guy's acquired the Bing Crosby knack of nonchalance, throwing away his gag lines with fine aplomb. He kids himself in a couple of hilarious sequences and does a takeoff on Jimmy Durante, with Durante aiding him, that's sockeroo."