Tula Belle (Mytyl) Robin Macdougall (Tyltyl) Edwin F. Reed (Daddy Tyl) Emma Lowry (Mummy Tyl) William J. Gross (Grandpa Gaffer Tyl) Florence Anderson (Granny Tyl) Edward Elkas (Widow Berlingot) Katherine Bianchi (Daughter) Lillian Cook (Fairy Berylune) Gertrude McCoy (Light) Lyn Donelson (Night) Charles Ascot (Dog) Tom Corliss (Cat) Mary Kennedy (Water) Eleanor Masters (Milk) Charles Craig (Sugar) Sammy Blum (Bread) S.E. Potapovich (Fire).

The 1918 Famous Players-Lasky Corp. silent BLUE BIRD was directed by the French Maurice Tourneur (1873-1961) a noted ‘artistic’ director who arrived in the US in 1914. With a strong aesthetic sense of atmosphere and composition, he was a perfect choice to bring Maeterlinck’s symbolist play to life. The film is filled with both naturalistic and impressionistic photography and sets (preceding CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI by a year) and nicely done costumes, makeup and special effects (including lap-dissolve and stop-motion).

While generally faithful to its theatrical source, it takes some minor liberties, eliminating the forest scene and repositioning and abbreviating the grandparent visit. Tourneur also sets up some exposition at the beginning with neighbor Old Mother Berlingot (played in drag by Edward Elkas) requesting the pet bluebird from Tyltyl and Mytyl (livelily played by Robin Macdougall and Tula Belle) to ease the unhappiness of her sick daughter (they refuse her). Later Mummy Tyl (Emma Lowry) tells her son not to “hurt” his dropped scarf. The youngsters wonder jokingly: “can it feel things? Has it got a Soul?” and proceed to inquire about the “souls” of water, fire, bread and sugar.

The dream fantasy is made more obvious than the play with the appearance of the “Fabric of Moonbeams,” two angelic forms who hover above the sleeping children, who “awaken” and gaze at the neighboring rich children’s Christmas celebration (silhouettes and the windows of a puppet-theater house). Berylune (in Berlingot crone form) appears and hands Tyltyl the magic diamond hat. After Berylune’s transformation and the embodiment of the household spirits, the fairy (Lillian Cook) announces the quest and warns them that “they will all die at the end of the journey.” They all fly up and over the paper cut out rooftop,ala Peter Pan. At the Fairy’s palace, the Cat (a male as in the play, here played by Tom Corless) hatches subterfuge with some of the party but is opposed by his canine nemesis (Charles Ascot).

The Palace of Night is presided over by a veiled Theda Bara type vamp (Lyn Donelson). Tyltyl searches her vaults for the Blue Bird, past the doors of Ghosts, Sicknesses, Wars, Shades and Terrors. He eventually locates many such birds that unfortunately prove short lived. Next on the itinerary is a visit to the graveyard (garden past midnight) and the home of the deceased grandparents (and flock of dead siblings) who give them another bluebird, which soon vanishes.

Accompanied by Light (Gertrude McCoy) the companions are almost waylaid by a cavorting mob of feasting Luxuries (dispersed by the diamond of truth) and enter the Temple of Happiness, home to Grecian-garbed spirits of Joy and the spirit of Maternal Love (played by the actress who also portrayed Mummy Tyl). The scene shifts to the Kingdom of the Future (also somewhat abbreviated from the play; the unborn brother doesn’t mention his impending demise). Time and his female attendants sort out the unruly souls before they can depart on a sailing ship, first shown as a moving platform, then a miniature model at sea.

The journey ends birdless, and the spirits fade away. Before losing their “true” forms, the dog whips the cat in battle, although the latter’s scheming and rebellion has been less effectual than in the play, without much activity after the Palace of Night episode. Light promises to watch over her charges in all her earthly manifestations. The children awake from their dream filled with joy and appreciation for everything in life.

When the neighbor Berlingot returns, the newly enlightened pair offers her daughter (Katherine Bianchi) their now blue bird. After the girl’s cure and bird’s flight, Tyltl sooths her, declaring that internal happiness is sufficient and we should look within “WHERE IT IS MOST APT TO BE FOUND!”

This well-done and attractive production received extremely positive reviews (“a master work of photographic interpretation of life’s deepest values” raved one). However, it was not a box office success. In 1920, director Tourneur blamed the lack of public taste and especially theater exhibitors who gave short shrift to quality films. “I remember how delighted I was when I read what reviewers had to say about my ‘The Blue Bird.’ Do you know amongst the hundreds of exhibitors in New York, how many showed it? To my knowledge, Mr. [S.I.] Rothapfel and a few fellows uptown.”

Besides this, it seems that (with some notable exceptions) children’s fantasy was not the most popular of motion picture genres during this period. Audiences preferred more down-to-earth dramas and comedies to delicate symbolism-tinged stories. Fed up with an uncreative industry which straight-jacketed directors, Tourneur continued to direct films until he left Hollywood and the US in 1926.

For many years the 1918 BLUE BIRD was as hard to find as its avian namesake. A print was discovered and then restored (with much damage still extant) by the George Eastman House in 1990. Videocassette releases became available during the late 1990s and a DVD release by Kino in 2005. The film was recognized in 2004 by the US National Film Registry as a "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" work and worthy of preservation.

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THE BLUE BIRD

Shirley Temple (Mytyl) Spring Byington (Mummy Tyl) Nigel Bruce (Mr. Luxury) Gale Sondergaard (Tylette) Eddie Collins (Tylo) Sybil Jason (Angela Berlingot) Jessie Ralph (Berylune) Helen Ericson (Light) Johnny Russell (Tyltyl) Laura Hope Crews (Mrs. Luxury) Russell Hicks (Daddy Tyl) Celia Loftus (Granny Tyl) Al Shean (Grandpa Tyl) Gene Reynolds (Studious Boy) Stanley Andrews (Wilhelm) Frank Dawson (Caller of Roll) Sterling Holloway (Wild Plum) Thurston Hall (Father Time) Edwin Maxwell (Oak) Ann E. Todd (Little Sister)

Twenty-two years after Tourneur’s ill-fated venture, a new $1.5 million BLUE BIRD landed in 1940. It was the result of 20th Century Fox’s desire to create a fantasy vehicle for their #1 star Shirley Temple that would rival MGM’s just-released THE WIZARD OF OZ. Despite the obvious, Fox executive Daryl F. Zanuck straight-facedly insisted that “OZ is a musical comedy without any drama or sentiment…[this] is strictly a dramatic fantasy…we do not intend to copy OZ as to theme, or the mistakes that were made.”

As has been pointed out, Bird not only cribbed the theme from the supposedly drama and sentiment-free OZ (happiness needn’t be pursued, but is already nearby or within) it also includes features like black and white to color reality/fantasy changeovers, and variants on characters Glinda the Good (Light) and the Cowardly Lion (Tylo). Temple’s stardom is seen in the primacy of sister Mytyl, rather than her (now younger and wimpy) brother Tyltyl (Johnny Russell, who never receives the truth telling diamond hat).

The screenplay eliminates almost all the spirit characters beside Light, Tylo and Tylette, the latter two depicted as completely human, rather than as anthropomorphic animals. Tylette is appropriately played by Gale Sondergaard as a slinky villainous menace in a black dress; Eddie Collins’ annoying lederhosen-clad Tylo is no match for Bert Lahr’s Cowardly Lion.

Uncharacteristically for Temple, Mytyl is unpleasantly self-centered, selfish, discontented and dishonest. Poaching a bird belonging to the local ruler, she refuses to even loan it to sick little Angela Berlingot (Sybil Jason). On Christmas Eve Daddy Tyl (Russell Hicks) is called up to fight against Napoleon. He explains to his miserable family that war is the result of greed and selfishness (the 1918 family are poor but happy). When Berylune (Jessie Ralph) arrives (as a crone only, she doesn’t become a beauty nor does she resemble their neighbor Berlingot) with her Blue Bird quest, it is Mytyl’s own unhappiness (not Angela's) that the symbolic bird must cure. As before, the faithless feline plots to frustrate her owners, so not to return to being “a dumb slave of Man” the being faithful Tylo sees as the “Master who must be obeyed.” Tylette’s villainy is much more consistent and important in this version than its predecessor.

The first stop is the graveyard. Tylette attempts to lose the children there, but the midnight garden transformation occurs, and in the absence of any frightening ghosts (who might have enlivened the proceedings somewhat) they realize that “nobody really dies.” This leads to the Land of Memory and the dead grandparent encounter (Tylette secretly follows, attempting sabotage). Mytyl sings the film’s first song (“Lady-O”). Not surprisingly, the dead siblings are eliminated. Mytyl and Tyltyl return with a bird that turns black and the search continues. The Palace of Night has been removed in this version and the cat urges the two to visit the Land of Luxury (Light, played by Helen Ericson demurs).

There are no throngs of merry-makers in the Land, only gouty old Mr. and Mrs. Luxury (Nigel (“Watson” Bruce and Laura Hope Crews). Tylette enjoys herself, but the unfortunate Tylo is kenneled. At first, the youngsters are glad to have “everything you like, do anything you like”, but they soon become spoiled and cranky. Mr. Luxury refuses to act like a loving parent, and it’s obvious that this is no place to find happiness in any form. The lonely pair and Tylo make a quick and comic escape when the treacherous tabby “accidentally” rouses the household. The Luxuries admit that their visitors are “too young to appreciate luxury, and we’re too old to escape from it.”

The children and Tylo rest. Light decides to take a stroll and Tylette secretly visits the Tree spirits (an unusual fidelity to the play). She warns Father Oak (Edwin Maxwell) that if the Blue Bird is found “our world will come to an end.” The angry trees not only wish to hinder the children, but avenge themselves against their woodcutter father. They summon a lightening storm to destroy them (it’s not clear why they do this, as they will destroy themselves as well). In the resulting inferno (the film’s most effective scene) the perfidious pussycat is trapped and perishes, while the heroic Tylo helps the children escape in a conveniently found rowboat.

Light returns and accompanies Mytyl and Tyltyl to the Kingdom of the Future where they encounter the usual inventors, lovers etc. One very overage looking pensive youth (Gene Reynolds) is a would-be future political/social liberator (Abe Lincoln?) who grieves that in the end “they will destroy me”. They also meet their unborn sibling (a girl this time) who does mention her future demise. When Father Time (Thurston Hall) arrives, the child-spirits are announced alphabetically grade-school style, and set sail singing the second (and final) musical number. The special effects are done as in the earlier film.

As before, there is no bird, and Light bids them farewell and fades away as does the human Tylo. Back in waking reality, the pair is overjoyed to see their Mother (despite no Spirit of Maternal Love to inspire them) and the familiar surroundings. Best of all, a treaty has been signed (shades of Chamberlain at Munich?) and Daddy won’t spend the holidays at war after all ("a stroke of the pen is better than the stroke of the sword"). The “real” cat Tylette, is still alive (eight lives more to go) but still game for her dog opponent. No longer unhappy and selfish, Mytyl gives the purloined bird (now Technicolor-blue) to Angela (whose recovery scene was cut so not to upstage Temple). When it flies away, Mytyl (not her brother) faces us beaming: “We know where to look for it – don’t we.”

So ends Shirley Temple’s first box office flop. The reviews were unkind (“leaden”, “dull” and “hideous kitsch”) and it was mocked as “the Dead Pigeon”, leading to the end of Temple’s lucrative career at Fox. Reasons for the commercial failure are obvious: audiences who loved Shirley Temple as a cheery optimistic moppet were not happy to see her as a selfish unhappy pre-adolescent. Furthermore, the film itself lacks a light touch and is too “Hollywood slick.” The latter charge might perhaps be leveled against THE WIZARD OF OZ, whose message it shares, but that production had a sense of fun along with truly catchy songs (a third song “Somewhere You’ll Find Your Bluebird” was written but not included). Those remembering the play or earlier movie might be disappointed in finding none of Maeterlinck’s concern with souls in nature or most of his creations. Finally, the simplistic pacifist message may not have gone over well in a world in which the European war was going from bad to worse. The 1940 BLUE BIRD was released on videocassette by Fox Video in 1989 and on DVD in 2007. Despite its faults, it is still worth watching at least once.

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THE BLUE BIRD / SINIAIA PTITSA

Elizabeth Taylor (Mother/Witch/Light/Maternal Love), Jane Fonda (Night) Ava Gardner (Luxury) Cicely Tyson (Tylette) Robert Morley (Father Time) Harry Andrews (Oak) Todd Lookinland (Tyltyl) Patsy Kensit (Mytyl) Will Geer (Grandfather) Mona Washbourne (Grandmother) George Cole (Tylo) Richard Pearson (Bread) Nadezhda Pavlova (Blue Bird) Georgi Vitsin (Sugar) Margarita Terekhova (Milk ) Oleg Popov (Laughter) Leonid Nevedomsky (Father) Valentina Ganibalova (Water) Yevgeni Shcherbakov (Fire), Pheona McLellan (Sick Girl)

The 1976 Lenfilm/20th Century Fox musical version of THE BLUE BIRD is as much a historical curiosity as it is a case of cinematic misadventure. After two box office failures, there was little demand for another rendtion of the story. Nevertheless, other circumstances came about. The 1970s were a period of US-USSR ‘détente’, and among other cultural exchanges, it was felt that a joint Soviet-American motion picture co-production would be an effective means of building goodwill (and perhaps even earning some money). In view of the political sensitivities involved, an unreal and non-controversial theme was needed and Maeterlinck’s story was popular enough in the USSR (if not the US) to warrant yet another round of bird hunting.

What ensued during the production has been detailed elsewhere (notably in the 1985 book The Hollywood Hall of Shame): how an all-star US/British/Soviet cast was assembled (headed by Elizabeth Taylor in four roles) and how separate non-communicating English and Russian-speaking film crews coped with a myriad assortment of difficulties and delays before and during the filming. These problems may be seen in the $12 million feature’s lack of a professional look and feel of a US film (mismatched shots, unconvincing sets) that sometimes gives it the look of a low budget fairytale movie shot in 1950s Europe. However, while it might seem to damn the effort even further with faint praise, it should be noted that the film (directed by Hollywood veteran George Cukor) has some points in its favor (the music – if not the songs - and outdoor scenery are pleasant enough) and it is nowhere as overwhelmingly awful as some critics make it out to be. At any rate it is reasonably faithful to the play.

The credits and much of the film’s transitions from scene to scene are held together by artistic designs by British artist Brian Wildsmith (who designed the sets as well). We meet the latest Tyltyl and Mytyl (played by American Todd Lookinland and British Patsy Kensit). The mismatched accents of the supposed brother and sister, along with other actors are jarring (although not in the Soviet version, which was dubbed into Russian). They wordlessly pass by the sick girl (Pheona McLellan) and tread over a rickety bridge. The latter action angers the mother (Taylor). As in 1940, the writers seem to feel that some household stress is needed to get the plot going.

The children are lectured and sent to bed without dinner. Upon awakening, the two leave their cabin to witness the rich neighbors’ holiday festivities. Once home, they meet old Berylune (Taylor again) who needs the Blue Bird for her girl (again no relationship to the sick neighbor). Tyltyl is given the magic diamond hat revealing Berylune to be the lovely rhyme –speaking, buxom spirit, Light (Taylor Role #3, Berylune and Light being combined as one character). Again, the spirits are roused (Brits and Americans for the major speaking parts, Russian dancers for the less wordy ones). The costumes are not particularly inspired, particularly that of Tylo (played by George Cole, who replaced an ailing James Coco who can be glimpsed in a short Russian-language featurette on the DVD).

Tylette (Cicely Tyson in a tight brown Catwoman style costume) proceeds with the familiar treachery as brother and sister head off to the grandparents (“Grandpa Walton” Will Geer and Mona Washbourne ), who sing how dull the afterlife is before handing them their first disappointing Blue Bird. They release the black bird and after it inexplicably turns (animated and) blue again, the companions warble the regrettable “Blue Haloo!” song. At the Palace of Night (Jane Fonda, first appearing in a headpiece resembling a black dinner platter) they encounter Night’s Ghosts (zombies out of wax museum) and noisy spirits of War.

The ‘real’ Blue Bird (personified by young ballerina Nedezhda Pavlova dancing in a theatrical set) is ignored by the searchers and the birds retrieved all die. After another song, Tyltyl is found by Luxury (Ava Gardner) who brings him to her combo circus/ballroom. As in the play, Tylette leads the other characters (except Light) in succumbing to their hedonistic desires. And as before, the diamond of truth sweeps away the Luxuries. The only spirit of Joy revealed is Maternal Love (Taylor in Role #4) who confusingly looks exactly like Light. She points out yet another animated Blue Bird in the distance.

There follows the play’s Forest scene with the Cat inciting the trees and misunderstood Tylo defending against them. Suddenly Light arrives and saves the others. In the Kingdom of the Future, Light and the children engage in encounters closely following the play (we encounter the dead brother and his ‘gift’ of three diseases and the future King of the Three Planets). Unfortunately, there didn’t seem to be enough money or expertise to build even a mock up of a boat, so Father Time (a singing Robert Morley) dispatches the unborn to earth in a flower-like contraption. The animated Blue Bird follows the young passengers, but Time forbids the bird’s capture.

Back home, Light assures the tearful youngsters that perhaps happiness cannot be caged, but found only when free (something she should have thought of in the beginning). The spirits depart. After fussing with Tylette, Tylo takes leave of his master who promises to listen to what the dog “says” from now on. Light makes her usual departure speech, and out of the dream becomes the mother again. The children are happy and refreshed, the parents surprised and the pet dove is a very pale blue. The sick little neighbor is sitting outside her home. She arises when given the bird. Tyltyl kisses her and as the bird flies away, he asks the gawking neighbors to find it, as he and his new friend (as in the play) “need him for our happiness later on”. After an out of focus shot of the neighbors, the camera pans up to the clouds to where the animated Blue Bird departs amongst the credits.

Inevitably, the film flopped badly in the United States. After gala premiers in Washington DC and New York City’s Radio City Music Hall, critics moved in for the kill (“senile and interminable”, “a mixture of Soviet ineptitude and the American belief that the grotesque expenditure of dollars can set anything a-right”). The US release was short-lived (no British release was even attempted) and it was quickly forgotten by the studio with no American broadcast or home video release (total earnings: $887,000). It did get some play in the USSR, the Eastern Bloc and elsewhere and won the Honorary Diploma at the 1976 Tehran International Festival of Films for Children and Young Adults. Videocassettes were distributed in Japan, along with the Russian dubbed version in that country. It wasn’t until 2005 that a Region 1 DVD finally provided American viewers with a chance to see what the film looked like (including English and Russian soundtracks; credits are in Russian only).

Examining the unfortunate fate of the production it seems clear that even a well-made children’s release would have had tough going in the mid-1970s. Musical features like Stanley Donen’s THE LITTLE PRINCE (1974) had earned little, and even Disney focused on comedies like the HERBIE and APPLE DUMPLING GANG series. The European, Mexican and independently made kiddie matinee features of the 1960s were also becoming a thing of the past.

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Not surprisingly, there hasn’t been a theatrically released live action BLUE BIRD since. This is perhaps a good thing, as weary audiences have been spared the spectacle of an overproduced CGI-laden fowl descending upon the local cineplex. The story is perhaps best suited to the less literal confines of the stage. On the screen, critical and especially box office success has proven to be as elusive as the titular Blue Bird itself.

Marc Berezin

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Sources:

The original play:

Wikipedia article on Maeterlinck

Wikipedia article on the play

text of the play on Gutenberg.Org

The Children's Blue Bird:

text of the story

1918 film version:

Waldman, Harry. Maurice Tourneur : the Life and Films. Jefferson , NC : McFarland. 2001.

Maurice Tourneur page

Articles by Maurice Tourneur on directing

Reviews:

a Review

a Review

1940 film version:

Edwards, Anne. Shirley Temple, American Princess. NY: Morrow. 1988.

Stillman, William. “The Blue Bird: 20th Century-Fox’s Wizard Imitation.” The Baum Bugle Autumn 1990.

Temple, Shirley. Child Star: an Autobiography. NY: McGraw Hill. 1988.

Edwards, Anne. Shirley Temple, American Princess. NY: Morrow. 1988.

1976 film version:

Medved, Harry & Michael. The Hollywood Hall of Shame : the Most Expensive Flops in Movie History. NY: Perigree. 1984.