What is it with the fake suntans?

Risible mix of gangster plot and showbiz drama. Great music but weird atmospherics. Notable for the appearance of Elia "Rat Fink" Kazan as the clarinetist. The acting is pretty gauche, but most incomprehensible is the makeup, which seems sometimes to verge on blackface. Check out Will Osborne as the leader of the Guy Hesier orchestra -- he looks like Zonker Harris. The Hesier orchestra number is from another planet. Yea Betty Field, a femme fatale if there ever was one. Drop some windowpane and watch the crackup montage -- the combination will make it all seem normal. High on the enjoyably weird scale but not a movie to go to for making sense.