Summary
Lockwood takes Kathy’s hand and leads her into a dark studio stage and tells her that this is the proper setting. “Well, it’s just an empty stage,” she says, confused, but Lockwood goes and turns on a projection on a nearby backdrop. It depicts a beautiful sunset. He pulls another lever and a machine emits plumes of mist and smoke. When he pulls yet another lever, the couple is bathed in colored lights. He takes Kathy’s hand and leads her over to a ladder which she climbs, and Lockwood begins to describe a fantasy scenario, in which a young woman stands on her balcony overlooking her garden. He points a purple light at Kathy, meant to signify moonlight, then a number of other lights behind her, then a fan meant to simulate a “soft summer breeze.” Kathy asks Lockwood if he is ready to say what he wanted to say now that the setting is right, and he begins to sing to her. The song’s chorus is, “You were meant for me/and I was meant for you,” and he approaches the ladder and sings it tenderly to Kathy. Kathy and Lockwood dance romantically on the stage under the lights.
The scene shifts and we see a newspaper headline that reads “Big Bonanza for Diction Coaches.” The camera then zooms in on the office door of a Diction Coach named Phoebe Dinsmore. We see Lina taking a lesson with Phoebe Dinsmore, her voice unchanged by the diction training, still shrill and unrefined. The scene then shifts to Lockwood in a diction lesson with a male diction teacher; he is faring better than Lina. Cosmo enters the room and listens as the diction coach leads Lockwood through a particularly perplexing tongue twister. The diction coach gets increasingly excited by the tongue twisters and begins doing them theatrically for Lockwood, as Cosmo stands behind the coach and makes funny faces. When the diction coach hands the book of tongue twisters to Lockwood, Lockwood and Cosmo begin to say the tongue twister together, but in a syncopated rhythm.
Their playful uttering of the tongue twister becomes yet another song. Lockwood and Cosmo, the two lifelong friends, perform a playful riff on the simple tongue twister, using the perplexed and shocked diction coach, eventually standing up on a desk and doing a complex tap routine. The tap routine continues as the diction coach watches. They end the number by picking up a nearby diction flashcard poster for “The Letter A” and singing “A!” together. The scene shifts to a recording studio. Lina and Lockwood are back to reshoot the film in which they wear the powdered wigs, this time with sound. Dexter calls for quiet on the set, then goes into the recording booth. A sound man laments the fact that Lina is not talking into the microphone so is inaudible, so Dexter goes out and calls cut.
Dexter approaches Lina and reminds her to use the microphone in the nearby bush. Lockwood tries to cover for Lina by insisting to Dexter that everyone is nervous on their first day of shooting. Dexter goes back into the recording booth and Lina and Lockwood try the scene again. Lina is still moving her head back and forth as she speaks, ruining the sound and obscuring her vocal performance. Dexter once again storms out of the booth and tells Lina she is inaudible, and when she tells him there’s nothing she can do, Dexter decides that they will have to think of something else. The scene shifts to another day of shooting, as a sound consultant fastens a body microphone to Lina’s costume. Lina is distraught and exclaims, “Everyone is picking on me!” Dexter tells Lina that now that she has a body microphone she will be audible. Once Dexter is in the booth, they try the scene again, but this time the microphone is picking up Lina’s heartbeat.
The scene shifts yet again to Dexter re-fastening the microphone to Lina’s costume, this time on her shoulder. He urges her to be careful, begging her to talk into the microphone without making any quick movements, then goes back into the booth. Just as they begin the scene, Simpson comes into the studio and notices the strange wire connecting Lina’s microphone to the recording equipment. Deeming the wire dangerous, he picks it up, which sends Lina flying backward onto the ground. Dexter cries out about his botched take.
Later, we see Lockwood and Kathy arriving at a screening and greeting Cosmo. Cosmo warns them not to walk in together, as Lina is there. Kathy assures Lockwood that she’ll go to the balcony to avoid any drama. Inside, Cosmo, Lina, and Lockwood all sit down in a box together to watch the film, The Duelling Cavalier. The film begins: in it, the movement of Lina’s pearl necklace can be heard as she walks towards the camera, because the microphone is situated close to it. When Lina pronounces a certain sentence in her usual shrill and distinctly American pronunciation, the crowd laughs uproariously. When Lockwood enters the shot, he throws his baton down with a crash and the audience laughs even more. Lina speaks to Lockwood, her head moving back and forth, away and towards the microphone fastened to her dress. In their booth, two producers bemoan the poor quality of the film as the audience continues to roar at the two silent film actors’ over-the-top performances and the outrageous sound mixing. Outside the theater, patrons have walked out of the screening discussing how horrible the film is.
As the film continues, the sound gets mismatched with the action of the film, and Simpson orders Dexter to go and fix it. Suddenly the sound gets way out of whack and slows down. The scene shifts to the lobby of the theater, after the film has ended. Patrons file out, making fun of all of the problems with it. “We’re ruined!” Simpson says to Lockwood, Lina and Cosmo. When Lockwood tells his producer that they cannot release the movie, but Simpson assures him that they must, as they have made deals with several movie theaters to release it. More patrons walk out, discussing just how horrible and disappointing it was. Lockwood skulks out. The scene shifts to Lockwood’s home. It is raining, and Lockwood, Kathy, and Cosmo all sit at his dining room table discussing the film.
“I’m no actor. I never was, just a lot of dumb show,” Lockwood says, going into the kitchen. Cosmo and Kathy try and cheer him up by offering suggestions of several regular jobs he could take on. Cosmo then suggests that they do their old vaudeville act again, which gives Kathy the idea that Lockwood ought to make a musical. Cosmo agrees, suggesting that he turn The Duelling Cavalier into a musical in the six weeks before it’s released. This reinvigorates Lockwood, who agrees that that’s what he ought to do.
Analysis
Enduringly, Singin’ in the Rain is about entertainment and show business and the alternately ridiculous and magical repercussions of make-believe. Lockwood tells Kathy that he cannot express his feelings for her until they are in the right circumstances, and then brings her to an empty stage and manipulates various technical elements to create a romantic atmosphere. The backdrop becomes a technicolor purple, he pretends that a simple stage ladder is a balcony, a fan becomes an evening breeze, and he becomes her doting suitor. Romance and the growing intimacy between Lockwood and Kathy depend on their entering into the same fantasy, singing the same song, dancing alongside one another. Thus, while show business can hide a great deal of pettiness and contradictions—as in the case of Lina and Lockwood’s contrived relationship—it can also make the mundane into something magical—as in the dance shared by Kathy and Lockwood in the empty studio.
This section of the movie starts to look more and more like a musical. Everyday occurrences begin to turn into magical musical moments instead of dramatic scenes. Lockwood’s profession of love for Kathy takes the form of a romantic dance, and words are replaced with movement, song, and longing gazes. So much romantic emotion is expressed non-verbally, through gestures and choreography. The stage itself becomes a place in which to make confessions, to be emotionally honest, to get carried away, and to embark on intimacy. The theatrical nature of the sound stage does not so much suspend reality as heighten it, and the couple are empowered to come together through the magic of a shared imaginative journey. In this way, dancing represents love, in that it is a shared, collaborative modes\ of being together, which require both trust and a little dose of magical thinking.
While Lockwood is highly capable of conjuring an evocative mood, of creating magic where he needs it, and of envisioning happiness for himself and others, his talents in the talking picture, The Dueling Cavalier, prove to be a laughable failure. While he resented Kathy's insistence that he wasn't a real actor upon their first meeting, her proclamation seems to have proven true, and Lockwood has no facility with the drama of the studio's attempt at a serious period drama. Lina too is exceedingly ill-suited for dramatic acting. While she is undeniably beautiful, the elegance of her appearance does not match her crass speaking style and inability to use a microphone. The film proves to be a miserable failure with the test audience, and Lockwood and Lina's careers hang in the balance as everyone wonders if they are up to the task of transitioning into talking pictures.
The solution to their quandary is, unsurprisingly, the utilization of Lockwood's immense gifts for dancing and singing. He may not be a classical actor, but he has the charisma of a movie star, a silver voice, and impeccable dancing skills. At the beginning of the film, Lockwood seeks to cover up his vaudevillian, low-brow past to the masses by exaggerating his resume, but now he finds that his authentic talents and background serve him well in the transition into movies with sound. While his knack for singing and dancing didn't do much for him in silent film, the transition to talking pictures marks the birth of the movie musical, a genre in which his (and Cosmo's, and Kathy's) vaudeville experience can go a long way.
While the film deals with some high stakes—Lockwood fears his career may be over and he will be left penniless—it always does so with a light touch. A true classic Hollywood musical, Singin' in the Rain operates under the logic that a spell of bad luck can always be improved with a little imagination and a positive outlook. When things get tough or tense, there's always dancing, and if a character cannot say it, they can always sing it. The tone of the whole film is always light and malleable. Things can be improved and circumstances can change in an instant. This makes for a fast-paced and upbeat film, one which aims to make its audience smile.
