Hit Parade of 1943
Released 3/26/1943 (United States)
📖 Storyline
One of the many films made at Republic with a year attached to the "Hit Parade" title, which came from the "Hit Parade" radio program sponsored by Lucky Strike cigarettes. On re-issue, all of the entries underwent a title change from "Hit Parade of 19??" to, usually, a title of a song contained in the film, as happened in the case of this film when it was reissued as "Change of Heart" in 1949. Not re-issuing the film under the original title of "Hit Parade of 1943" had a two-fold purpose; the audiences of that era were not much interested in seeing a film twice, and a changed title - even when the original title was clearly shown in (very) small print in the ads and on the posters---had a chance of being seen again by that segment of the ticket-buying public who didn't read the small print. The plot here is just a trifle---Susan Hayward ghost writes songs for composer John Carroll, whose charms evidently outweighed his song-writing ability---played in and around some great singing and dancing numbers by, for its time, a large number of black performers including Dorothy Dandridge, Count Basie, dancing by the great Jack Williams and the team of "Pops and Louie" (Albert Whitman and Louis Williams) and others, including Spanish dancer Chinita Marin, billed as Chinita. The song "Change of Heart", by Jule Styne and Harold Adamson, was Oscar-nominated, and also became the title of the film on 1949 re-issue. Walter Scharf also was Oscar-nominated for Best Scoring of a Musical. Republic seldom got two nominations in any single year, much less two in the same film. —Les Adams <longhorn1939@suddenlink.net>