Christmas and Musicals seem to become hand in hand. So, it'due south no surprise that i of the nigh dear Christmas movies of all fourth dimension happens to tackle both.White Christmas, the Irving Berlin-created musical follow-upward toHoliday Inn, is the crowning accomplishment of the Vacation Musical genre.

Starring icons such every bit Danny Kaye and Bing Crosby, the moving-picture show contains some of the flashiest choreography, catchiest songs, and near heartwarming moments of whatever Christmas film. It is a classic to be sure, only do you know everything behind the making of the moving-picture show?

ten Grade Clown

Though he played second fiddle to Bing Crosby in the moving picture, Danny Kaye was front and center on the set of the motion-picture show. Throughout filming, Kaye brought his signature wit and humor to every scene, occasionally going a little overboard.

Co-ordinate to many actors and coiffure, Kaye was such a goof on the gear up that they had to end and toss takes considering anybody kept cracking upwardly from his jokes. Unlike today, likewise many retakes can cost the studio a lot of money if too much film was wasted. Luckily, Kaye's talent and personality fabricated up for whatever lost motion picture.

9 Finale Redux

The finale of the pic is a Christmas retention seared into the minds of all who watch it. It is one of the almost iconic moments in whatever Christmas movie. Information technology was so good that the crew had to do a repeat viewing after the supposed last cutting.

Information technology turns out, the King and Queen of Greece had been visiting the set and had missed the filming of the concluding scene. So, the director made them "reshoot" the scene without any film. Crosby, who was tired of filming at this point, skipped out on the show for the monarchs and went golfing instead.

8 First Vista Vision Film

White Christmas is more than just a time capsule due to its age. The technology used in the moving-picture show was a fleck of a rarity at the time, as well as today. It was the showtime film to utilize the new technology of VistaVision, a semi-contemporary new way to capture the total scope of a picture.

This engineering allowed for higher resolution in the images by turning the 35 mm film in a horizontal direction. This resulted in a wider, more detailed version of the film. Though it wasn't equally groundbreaking as the wall to wall Cinemascope, it'southward still a fun and retro footnote in the history of filmmaking.

vii Is That Alfalfa?

Long before The Avengers, there was an thought: join some of the virtually iconic Christmas movies into one shared universe. Ok. Possibly there wasn't, but that doesn't mean that at that place isn't some spillover between a ton of these movies.

InWhite Christmas, Phil and Bob head downwards to Florida to run across the Haynes sisters perform. Mostly they do and so since they served alongside the girls' blood brother. When Betty and Judy show them a recent pic you tin come across it is none other than Alfalfa himself, Carl Switzer. Switzer can as well be plant at the Loftier School dance inIt's A Wonderful Life.

vi The Former Holiday Inn

For many fans of classic musicals, you lot'll know that before White Christmas, Irving Berlin created another classic vacation musical aslope Bing Crosby:Holiday Inn. The movie focuses on Crosby who opens upwardly a night club that is only open up on major holidays.

It turns out the set that was assembled to create the Vacation Inn was actually foundational for White Christmas. The Columbia Inn is only the same remodeled set from the first moving-picture show, inverse to look like it is in the mountains of Vermont and non upstate New York.

5 The Sisters Number Was Unscripted

It turns out that some of the antics between Crosby and Kaye really made it on to the screen. The iconic moment where the two don the Hayes Sisters' costumes and perform the Sisters number is 1 of the funniest and near memorable moments in the unabridged moving-picture show.

Plain, the scene was never in the script. Director Michael Curtiz caught the two actors joking around on set and decided that it was and so funny it had to be included in the final scene. The moment where Crosby begins laughing is his 18-carat reaction to the moment, not beingness able to gainsay the humour from Kaye.

four Reverse Historic period Gaps

The movie has a lot of weird plot points surrounding age. The general played by Dean Jagger is grappling with aging, while Betty and Judy have an older sister/younger sister dynamic. Funnily enough, a lot of the actor's ages are opposite to these plot points.

Bing Crosby, who is meant to be much younger than the "quondam human" Dean Jagger, was actually a whole vi months older than the role player. Rosemary Clooney, who played the older sister Betty, was actually vii years younger than Vera-Ellen, who played the younger sister Judy.

three Shared Studio Endeavour

Nowadays, studios battle among each other over the rights to something as silly as Spider-Human being. While they weren't all-time friends back in the day, at least they could occasionally share resource. For example, look at the railroad train sequence in the film.

Paramount didn't have a train set at their studio, so they had to await elsewhere. The only other ii studios in town that had one were 20th Century Fox and MGM. Paramount paired with Trick and utilized their stage for the sequences on the train cars.

2 Unscripted Snacks

Improvised scenes take a lot of well-working elements to pull off. The director needs to be willing to experiment, and the actors need to come up with a conceivable and fitting dialogue that matches the script.

Luckily, one actually slap-up scene fit the marking. In the picture, Bob and Betty run across in the kitchen for a midnight snack. Autonomously from the song, the lead-up dialogue to this moment was entirely improvised past Crosby. His monologue on food and the nature of dreams was never in the script.

1 Phenomenon In Vermont

Nosotros might take been making up the ChristmasAvengers, but this picture does contain a whole other Christmas picture cameo. In the film, Percy Helton appears every bit a train conductor who hounds Bob and Phil when they make it without a ticket.

Helton as well makes an advent in the love filmPhenomenon on 34th Street. In that movie, Helton plays the Santa Claus in Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade who drinks a little too much to wet his whistle beforehand. While he is donning a long white beard in ane movie, Helton's iconic vocalization can still be recognized.

Adjacent: 10 Things You lot Didn't Know About The Making Of A Christmas Story

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About The Author

Matt Berger (214 Articles Published)

Matt Berger is a writer, comedian, role player, Paddington enthusiast, and Corgi dad. He currently writes for Screen Rant, has written for Encarmine Disgusting, hosts the Film School Sucked podcast, and co-hosts the Macabre podcast. Matt is an alumni of Portland State University with a degree in English language and Film Studies.

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