Du Barry Was A Lady (1943)

Of all the silly 40’s musicals I have seen, Du Barry Was A Lady (1943) must be one of the silliest. I happened upon it after discussing 18th century in the movies with Pimpinett and found that you can watch the whole movie on Youtube. Watching it was a bit of a revelation, because I had seen it before as a child. You see, when I saw Singin’ In the Rain as an adult I was very puzzled, because I had distinct memories of being largely an 18th century movie. Seems I had mixed the two movies into one- Gene Kelly stars in both of them, so perhaps it isn’t so strange. So I had great fun watching this movie!

The plot is very simple. Beautiful but poor singer (Lucille Ball) rejects true love with dashing, but equally poor dancer (Gene Kelly). Instead she plans to marry a newly rich washroom attendant instead (Red Skelton) instead. After a dream sequence where everyone is transported to the 18th century where Ball is Madame Du Barry, everyone realizes (despite that it’s Skelton’s dream) that true love is the most important after all.

Hairstyling how-to's

Would you like to make this 1946 hairdo? Well, look no further than under the cut to get the instructions. I do love this kind of instructions that show both how to set the pin-curls and how to brush the hair. It really shows how much different sets had an impact on the final hairstyle. I’m not sure how easy this is to do on yourself, but it’s still very interesting.