Swing Time Dances Well But Has Two Left Feet Otherwise

John "Lucky" Garnett (Fred Astaire) is a dancer with an affinity (read: addiction) to gambling and its that affinity that ends up seeing him entirely forgot about his marriage to Margaret (Betty Furness). Eventually, John remembers that he was supposed to walk Margaret down the aisle and, in a distraught fashion, races to Margaret and her Dad to apologize. Margaret's father gives John a deal: if he can make $25,000 in the next few months, John can regain Margaret's hand in marriage. In order to get all that cash, John hightails it to New York City with his pal Pop (Victor Moore), where he accidentally stumbles into a dancing gig alongside Penny (Ginger Rogers).

Katherine Hepburn and Ginger Rogers Share Delightful Chemistry In Stage Door

One shouldn't be surprised to learn that Stage Door originated as a stage play, its heavy emphasis on tight-knit dialogue exchanges set over a minimal amount of different locales certainly makes that abundantly clear. Though certain stage shows have had trouble translating into the world of film, Stage Door manages to achieve a smooth translation mainly by taking advantage of all the opportunities the artform of film has to offer. For instance, feature films, by their very nature, bring the viewer much closer to the characters in visual terms, there's really no way to accomplish a close-up in a stage show. This means the movie version of Stage Door can incorporate more tiny details in costumes and props dealt with by ancillary characters that may never get seen properly in a stage version of the same story.