Rodgers and Hart’s “Blue Moon” was originally written as “Prayer” for Jean Harlow in the MGM film, The Hollywood Revue of 1933. According to Richard Rodgers in his autobiography, Musical Stages: An Autobiography, Harlow’s prayer was to become a movie star, and the lyrics started out as “Oh, Lord, if you’re not busy up there, I ask for help with a prayer/ So Please don’t give me the air...” Unfortunately, because of a series of production personnel changes, the revue was scaled down to a spoof starring Laurel and Hardy, the Three Stooges, and Jimmy Durante. There was no Harlow and no “Prayer.”
The Rodgers and Hart song’s next incarnation was as the title track for the 1934 film, Manhattan Melodrama, starring Clark Gable, William Powell, and Myrna Loy. Before the film’s release, however, the title was changed yet again, this time to “The Bad in Every Man,” and it was sung by Shirley Ross.
It was not long after this that music publisher Jack Robbins offered a “deal” to the songwriting team: If Hart would write a more commercial lyric, Robbins would “plug it from one end of the country to the other.” Robbins suggested the song should be one of those Tin Pan Alley love songs with the words June, moon, and spoon. Just to show he could do it, and with a large measure of cynicism, Hart wrote the lyrics to “Blue Moon.” Although he did not personally like the song, it soon became a number one hit, a million-seller in sheet music sales, and, in the end, his most popular song.
In its final form, “Blue Moon” was for Rodgers and Hart their only hit not associated with a Broadway show or a Hollywood film. While its success and popularity are both irrefutable, because of the simplicity of its construction it is not critically ranked among the top Rodgers and Hart compositions*
* via: www.jazzstandards.com |
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