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A request

zuzu

Probably a stupid one, but what the hell.

I’ve been earwormed with a bit of song that I know is from a movie, but I can’t place it. Here’s the line:

Moses supposes his toeses are roses.

Help me out, people: is this from Singin’ In the Rain? Some other movie? What was the scene?

28 thoughts on A request

  1. Yup, Singing in the Rain – the scene with the voice coach, with Donald O’Connor and Gene Kelly.

    “Moses supposes his toeses are roses
    But Moses supposes erroneously
    Moses, he knowes his toeses aren’t roses
    The way he supposes his toeses to be.”

  4. I remembered the song, but I forgot the dance…

    if that doesn’t make you want to learn tap just a little, you’re a stronger person than I.

  6. Ah man– good times. When I was a little girl I was in LOOOOVVVEEE With Gene Kelly and I thought that song was so funny 🙂

    Fun news for people with netflix— Singing in the Rain is one of the movies you can “watch instantly” online. So yeah, that makes for a good Friday night.

    I am a nerd…..

  7. man, i was just going to delurk for the express purpose of this post, but i’ve been beaten! eh, what the hell, i’ll still delurk 😉 i may not be a super expert on politics, but i know my singin’ in the rain! it’s one of the best scenes of a movie ever, as far as i’m concerned. closely followed by the “twist and shout” scene of ferris bueller. but yeah, donald o’connor is so awesome in singin’ in the rain… i could watch him forever. definitely makes me wish i had the coordination for tap!

  9. Thanks, all! I’ve been earwormed with that for like FIVE DAYS.

    Jesus, Gene Kelly made it look so casual, so tossed-off, didn’t he? Even more than Donald O’Connor, and he was a gifted physical comedian. The way Kelly moves reminds me in its athleticism of the way that John Wayne moves. That could be because I recently watched The Quiet Man; I’m particularly thinking of the first confrontation between Sean and Red Danaher in the pub, where Sean simply throws his coat over Red and slips out of the way to avoid confrontation.

    Vanessa, what was the paper about?

  10. Oh, and can I just give a shout-out to men’s fashion designers in the 40s (yes, I get that the movie is set in the 20s, but it’s not necessarily period-correct)? Because that cut of pants makes just about any man look good. And it didn’t hurt to have the entire military during WWII dressed that way.

    And even on the Axis side, by damn did the Nazis pay attention to fashion.

  12. Singing in the Rain for sure. One of my favorite old musicals and Gene Kelly is so gifted it makes me jealous sometimes. Man, I really need to watch that movie again soon.

    Oh, wait. I have Netflix. I can watch it online. Whooo!

  14. My daughter loves Singin’ in the Rain, although she prefers the actual Singin’ in the Rain scene and this one.

    tp://www.youtube.com/v/FW02c5UNGl0&rel=1″>

    But then I have the only second-grader in town who’s an Esther Williams fan. thanks to my mother’s inspired gift of the entire set of That’s Entertainment when my kid was about 4.

  15. I’ve not seen “Singin’ in the Rain” but I was taught the rhyme as a child, slightly differently to how it is quoted above:

    “Moses supposes his toeses are poses of roses
    But Moses supposes erroneously
    For nobody’s toeses are poses of roses
    As Moses supposes his toeses to be”

    –IP

  17. I love that movie! I wanted those pictures with the lips and vowels on them so badly when I was a kid…

    I was a weird kid.

  18. Vanessa, what was the paper about?

    How the film holds up the ability to cope with technological change by working together as a virtue. For instance, in the previous scene to this you see the villain struggling with the vocal coach, and then it fades to Gene having similar difficulties. Only when Donald O’Connor shows up and the two start playing around together does it become effortless for him, so much so that they break out in dance for the sheer joy of it.

    I talked about the “Good Morning” scene too. Where, when trying to deal with the problem of his stupid movie alone, Gene is all depressed and despondent. But only when they all start to play around together do they come up with a plan.

    (This was back in the 90s, during my first attempt at college when I thought I would be a film major.)

  19. Y’know, there’s this great website called google . . .

    But then we wouldn’t be having this discussion, would we?

  20. I believe the last line of the 1st part is “as Moses supposes his toeses to be”–and then there’s more really wonderful nonsense. The previous tongue-twister is “Simple Ceasar sipped his snifter, seized his knees and sneezed”. Ahhh, they don’t make ’em like that anymore.

  21. Oh, and can I just give a shout-out to men’s fashion designers in the 40s (yes, I get that the movie is set in the 20s, but it’s not necessarily period-correct)? Because that cut of pants makes just about any man look good. And it didn’t hurt to have the entire military during WWII dressed that way.

    And even on the Axis side, by damn did the Nazis pay attention to fashion.

    Gee, thanks, zuzu. You made me HAVE to go look stuff up in my costuming history resources. *sigh* 😉 Please disregard the following if you REALLY aren’t interested in fashion/costume history!!

    Men’s wear is harder to find documentation for than women’s, and I don’t have a male specific resource (yet!), but the ones I have tend to point to the costumes in at least the referenced scene as being a little more 1940s than 1920s. Pleated pants were still much the fashion at the time, and remained so until into the 30s. It MAY have been the fabric rationing in WWII that finally did away with pleated front pants for a while.* The sweaters that I saw in my docs also seemed to be longer waisted than the ones in this scene — the “at the waist” look seems to have come in later on, in the 30s. Spats were definitely out by the 40s, though, so they got that bit right, and bow/string ties were definitely still being worn, especially by older, more conservative men at that time, although a lot of other guys were going to what we’d consider a regular tie, and the rich guys/dandies were definitely wearing ascots, especially for more casual wear.

    And YES, the designers back then were awesome! 🙂 But some of it depended on people willing to be a little uncomfortable in order to look nice, too. 🙁

    May I also suggest “Thoroughly Modern Millie” as being a fun 1920s musical romp? Julie Andrews, Mary Tyler Moore, and Carol Channing. Raaaaaaaaaazz-Berries! *grin* Hmmmmmm, both versions of “Mame”/”Auntie Mame” are pretty good, too. Dang it! Now I want to watch musicals instead of work!

    *I personally happen to like pleated front pants assuming they fit correctly, which means that there is enough fabric in the pleats AND they are the correct size through the waist/hips so that they don’t pull open. And cuffs. *Loooove* men’s pants to be cuffed. 🙂 The men’s costuming in the first “Indian Jones” movie ROCKS.

  22. OMG Laurie. Be my friend.

    I may or may not have a tad obsession with costuming, though it has not graduated to anything past a hobby (and a few required classes for my major many moons ago.)

    another side note: is it weird that watching that clip makes my heart pitter patter and also makes me turn to mr. christina and say, “why can’t YOU tap dance?!” and, “will you say ‘oop-dee-doo-dee-doodle’ to me…just once? Pleeeease?”

    *sigh*

  24. Re: Make ’em Laugh

    I had the *huge-est* crush on Donald O’Connor as a kid! That particular scene played a big part in that. Nifty tidbit from IMDB with regards to him and that amazing piece of work:

    — For the “Make Em Laugh” number, Gene Kelly asked ‘Donald O’Connor’ to revive a trick he had done as a young dancer, running up a wall and completing a somersault. The number was so physically taxing that O’Connor, who was smoking four packs of cigarettes a day at the time, went to bed (or may have been hospitalized, depending on the source) for a week after its completion, suffering from exhaustion and painful carpet burns. Unfortunately, an accident ruined all of the initial footage, so after a brief rest, O’Connor, ever the professional, agreed to do the difficult number all over again.

  25. Christina:
    Of course I’ll be your friend! Costume junkies, unite! *grin* (or is that, ‘untie’?)

    and, nope, not weird at all about that clip making your heart go all pitter-pat. Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire were both AMAZING dancers, and I find them both terribly compelling.

    My. I think I need to go lie down with a cold compress now. Palpitations, y’know? *grin*

  26. I was totally crushed when I found out that “Make Em Laugh” was a complete rip-off of Cole Porter’s “Be A Clown”, and that Porter was too much of a gentleman to press charges. Ruins that whole scene for me. 🙁

  27. I now remember why I have to drop everything and watch this movie every time it is on PBS. Donald O’Connor! Swoon!

  28. I love ‘Singin’ in the Rain’. I’ve seen it *mumble mumble* times and it still makes me laugh. I’ve also had that silly tongue twister stuck in my head for days at a time, so I find myself singing ‘moses supposes his toes are roses’ etc. 🙂 Get more than few funny looks when that happens.

    I do have a sad story connecte to it, though, so Singin’ in the Rain is rather bittersweet. My grandma had Alzheimer’s. She died Xmas day 2003. I grew up with her right next door and there were times when I spent more time at grandma’s house than I did my own. 🙂 One summer, 1999, I was home from college and pretty much lived down there with her, only going home to change clothes. We knew she was getting sick, but at the time we didn’t know with what or how bad.

    One evening, I brought Singin’ in the Rain for us to watch and we had a blast with it. She could actually remember seeing it when it first came out. A couple nights later, it was still sitting on top of the TV and she asked me ‘what movie is that?’ I told her and she said ‘oh, it’s been so long since I’ve seen that!’ It had been two days, but she couldn’t remember that.

    I was devastated because we all knew what it meant that she couldn’t remember and for the longest time couldn’t watch that movie without crying. Now I watch it and think of her, just like I do when I crochet. It’s bittersweet, but I wouldn’t change it.

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