The Crowd Roars (1932)

Footlight Parade is an American pre-Code musical film released in 1933 starring James Cagney, Joan Blondell, Ruby Keeler, and Dick Powell. It was directed by Lloyd Bacon and written by Manuel Seff and James Seymour and features stunning musical numbers by the amazing Busby Burkley.

The story centers on Chester Kent (Cagney) and his secretary Nan Prescott (Blondell) in a rapidly-failing industry of creating “prologues”, which are short stage productions that prefix a movie and are basically an effort to keep live shows breathing when cinema is all anybody cares about.

Staying relevant in a quickly evolving media atmosphere is made worse when an insider begins stealing their ideas and selling them to rival companies.

It's a stellar production with outstanding musical numbers and features the knock-out pairing of Cagney and Blondell, who also teamed up in Sinner's Holiday (1930), Blonde Crazy (1931), The Crowd Roars (1932), and more.

Footlight Parade is exciting, racy, and funny. Although its Cluvie rating had to be bumped down because of the unfortunate portrayal of yellowface in the last scene of the film.