 Mighty Joe YoungWhen I was a kid growing up in New York, they had this TV show called Million Dollar Movie, and they'd run the same movie over and over all day long for days. Along with Godzilla and others I can't remember, Mighty Joe Young was a regular feature. It's basically a King Kong knock-off, but has a couple of striking aspects. One was the theme song, Beautiful Dreamer, which was sung to the baby Mighty Joe Young and continues to have a calming effect when he grows gargantuan. It was my first exposure to Stephen Foster. Second was a climactic scene featuring the heroine in evening dress at some fancy concert hall playing a florid arrangement of Beautiful Dreamer on a slowly revolving grand piano (look out Liberace!). Gradually the piano and woman ascend on a platform and it is slowly revealed that the works are supported by the aforementioned Mr. Young. As you can well imagine, this had a lasting effect on the imagination of a 3 year old – it might have been then that I decided I wanted to get into the music business. |
