Word: keel
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Ankles Aweigh (music & lyrics by Sammy Fain & Dan Shapiro; book by Guy Bolton & Eddie Davis) made a few miscalculations. It used a thoroughly uninspired score. It settled for extremely commonplace lyrics. It paid little attention to the dancing. Its book floats, on a rusty keel, all over the Mediterranean and unloads benumbing wheezes at every port of call. Nor are Betty and Jane Kean among Broadway's leading leading ladies. Betty can be funny, and both at moments are fun, but theirs is distinctly a rationed, or nightclub, charm...
...main features of later soul ships. On its deck is a cabin to shelter the soul of the dead Pharaoh. Pottery vessels hold food and drink for his royal feasts, and plates and eating utensils are ready for his use. The ship's keel is accurately pointed parallel to the equator, so that it will sail in the right direction when it starts to follow the sun on its journeys around the earth. Later Egyptians were careless about this detail of astronavigation, but not the pious First Dynasty forefathers...
...story, a sort of musical cutoff on The Road to Rome, by Playwright Robert Sherwood, is an amiable bit of pig Latin. Esther is cast as Amytis, betrothed of Fabius Cunctator (George Sanders), the Roman dictator, in 216 B.C. But Esther is bored. Then all at once Hannibal (Howard Keel) crushes the Roman legions and marches on the city. "Ah," cries Esther, "wotta day!" She sneaks out to meet the enemy on her own terms. Hannibal orders her put to death. Esther takes off her cloak. He orders her put to bed. The tactical problems she presents are so engrossing...
...helicopter.* With this experience behind him, he says, he had no trouble at all. The little VTOL, with its engines turned downward, rises easily off the ground. Speed of ascent is controlled by varying the speed of the engines, and the plane is kept on an even keel by juggling the air jets. When it is clear of obstacles, Pilot Howe gets his nose down and picks up flying speed. Then he swivels the engines so that their thrust is directed backward. This maneuver takes about 15 seconds, and when it is complete, the VTOL is flying horizontally like...
...when it ends he has made the big time. This thread of a story sews together some patches and snatches from Romberg shows (Maytime, The Desert Song, etc.), most of them super-duper production numbers. Among the performers: Rosemary Clooney, Gene Kelly, Jane Powell, Vic Damone, Cyd Charisse, Howard Keel, Tony Martin. All the same, 132 minutes of spectacle is more than any audience can comfortably watch, and it takes all of Ferrer's electric charm and versatility to keep the moviegoer looking at the screen...