This Time
The other day, I saw that a 1947 movie, It Happened in Brooklyn, was going to be shown on Turner Classic Movies. I’d vaguely heard of it, but never watched – however, the description looked like light-hearted fun. It starred Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Durante, Kathryn Grayson and Peter Lawford – and had songs by Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne, which was a major selling point for me. I love their work, both together and separately. So, I recorded it.
It was light-hearted and fun enough, but also turned out to have two songs I knew. One was a sort of novelty song that Jimmy Durant later occasionally used in his act, “The Song’s Gotta Come from the Heart.” And the other was one of my all-time faves, one of the best classics from The Great American Songbook, the wonderful “Time After Time.” (No, not the same-titled song by Cyndi Lauper.) They actually sing it twice in the film, once by Sinatra, and later by Kathryn Grayson.
What shocked me was that when I looked it up, it not only didn’t win the Best Song Oscar, it wasn’t even nominated. Often, something terrific doesn't get nominated because there are simply better nominees – but I only knew one of the nominees the year it was eligible, “Buttons ‘n Bows.” A very good, fun song, though not nearly at the level of “Time After Time,” for my taste. And it certainly hasn’t lasted in popularity, like “Time After Time” has. The other four nominees, as I said, I didn’t even know. I only had one guess what might be the case and, doing some more research, that seems to be what occurred. Though the song is listed everywhere as being from It Happened in Brooklyn, it appears to have been released as a single the year before, in recordings by Sinatra and also Sarah Vaughn. And if that’s the case, then it wasn’t eligible for an Oscar.
By the way, Sammy Cahn had 31 Oscar nominations, and won four Best Songs: “Three Coins in a Fountain” (written with Styne) and others written with Jimmy Van Heusen – “All the Way,” “High Hopes” and “Call Me Irresponsible.” (And among his many others, I’ve always been partial to “My Kind of Town (Chicago Is)”. And Jule Styne, who later went to Broadway, wrote the scores for shows like Funny Girl, Gypsy, Bells are Ringing and (half the score of) Peter Pan – not to mention the animated classic, Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol. (Fun Fact: for the musical Bells are Ringing, Styne wrote another classic “Time” song -- “Just in Time.”)
But here is “Time After Time” in the film. And it’s wonderful.
And just to fill out the full picture, here’s the later scene with the song, performed by Kathryn Grayson.
Knowing the set-up helps understand what’s going on dramatically in the scene – and a lots going on, but all subtly. As background, Sinatra had briefly met Peter Lawford in London at the end of WWII, when Lawford was a very shy, stuffy composer. When back in the U.S., Sinatra took the heavy-laden music of one of Lawford’s pieces and livened it up, while adding his lyrics, becoming “Time After Time.” Later, Lawton visits Brooklyn. There, Sinatra lets him hear the song for the first time, and has his girlfriend, Kathryn Grayson, sing it. But unbeknownst to Sinatra, she’s started to become interested in Lawford – and shyly, he starts to like her, but wants to avoid it, knowing she’s seeing Sinatra. Though things work out, I won’t say how, in case you want to see the movie. But all this adds a lot of poignancy to this second version.
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