I agree with others that Bing Crosby shouldn't have been in the lead but rather in a supporting role. However, when you have your own production company and procure the rights to the Philadelphia Story, you can plop yourself down in the plum role and that's that.
shareOOOOHHHHHHHHHH that explains so much. Bing Crosby is so wrong in the part of Dexter, he should have played George. Frank is more appropriate as Dexter he is just so much more the "real man" type like Cary Grant, he comes across so sexy and strong and Bing is just a guy in a sweater smoking a pipe.
shareFrank Sinatra is totally wrong for the Dexter role. His personna is totally street wise New Yorky. Bing always played the kind of sarcastic romantic and I think he was perfect in this movie. The little sailboat he gave her (A replica of their large sail boat "True Love") was the most romantic present I have ever seen. Love this movie!
shareTotally agree with Teandoranges. While a case could be made for having someone else play Dexter (although I can't think of who might be the right person at that time), Sinatra couldn't pull off the Dexter role. He just didn't ooze the suave and debonair (Cary Grant type) aura that this part needed. Crosby, though maybe not the best choice, was better suited for the role than Frank IMO, he was perfectly cast in the Mike role.
shareFirst of all, Bing Crosby's production company did not procure the rights to The Philadelphia Story. That was a property already owned by MGM. The decision to make a musical based on The Philadelphia Story was totally MGM's idea. The original casting choice for Dexter was Howard Keel. It was only after Bing Crosby expressed an interest in the project that he and his production company got inolved.
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When an actor has his own production company, sometimes vanity get the better of you.
Its that man again!!
The bigger problem was that the role of Dexter was expanded throwing the story off-kilter. Instead of taking the (really excellent) script of Philadelphia Story and making it leaner to work in songs, they made it more cumbersome and clumsy.
"The good end happily, the bad unhappily, that is why it is called Fiction."
That's true. When I watched PHILADELPHIA STORY for the first time in about 20 years, I was struck by how few scenes Grant appears in. Now he makes the most of it, but the Dexter character was much less prominent in PS.
"We're fighting for this woman's honor, which is more than she ever did."
A leading man who is considerably older than his leading lady is par for the course in Hollywood. Take the following years Pal Joey with Sinatra part of a love triangle plot-not only was he around 20 years older than Kim Novak, he was also older than Rita Hayworth who was playing the wealthy 'older woman'
Grace Kelly of course played Bing's wife a couple of years before HS in The Country Girl.
For me High Society is a highly entertaining film for 3 main reasons-the Cole Porter songs,Louis Armstrong and (most of all ) the chance to see Sinatra & Crosby working together so in that sense it was perfectly cast. Judged against the classic film musicals it falls short and it certainly isn't in the same class as The Philadelphia Story. However it is one of my favourites although as a huge Sinatra fan I am probably biased.
I like Crosby as both an actor and entertainer but you're right, he's way too old for the part. I know he really liked working with Grace Kelly and they had worked together before to excellent effect in The Country Girl.
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