Only a good woman can save a man from the dangers of gambling, or Peaky Blinders: The Musical.
Gonna to be honest, for as iconic as Guys and Dolls is, my only exposure to it up until now was Frank Sinatra’s buttery voice belting out “Luck Be a Lady”, and Robert’s desire to play Sky Masterson on Grace and Frankie. When my friend Claire and I took a road trip this past October, we spent 9 hours in the car listening to showtunes like two totally normal people with great tastes in music. That was the first time I had actually listened to this show and sonically fell in love with Adelaide. Much like Leslie Ann Warren in Victor/Victoria and Ellen Greene in Little Shop of Horrors, if a blonde does a baby voice it’s absolutely over for me.
Seriously, stick a fork in me, I’m done.
Nathan Detroit (Frank Sinatra), New York City’s most infamous bookkeeper, is trying to arrange a saucy getaway with him and 20-30 of his greatest pals so they trade funds in a fun way. Because some mouthy brunette has been carting a marching band all over town singing “gambling is evil”, the police have picked up their pursuit of any illegal gambling practices putting Nathan’s operation further underground. The one place that will even consider housing Mr. Detroit’s shenanigans is asking for $1k up front to mitigate the risk of being caught, which of course Nathan doesn’t have. Thankfully for him, notorious gambler Sky Masterson (Marlon Brando) is in town, and Nathan gets the bright idea to make Sky take a bet he can’t possibly win to earn the start-up cash.
When Nathan’s initial attempt to turn donuts into dollars fails (in the most literal sense), Mr. Detroit suddenly gets the same idea Paul Walker did in She’s All That – Make a bet that Sky can’t convince the ugly girl who hates everything go to a trip to Havana with him. In 24 hours. Dick-swinging Sky can’t back down from the ultimate test of his romantic prowess and takes the bet. Nathan starts congratulating himself prematurely because the woman he’s chosen as a victim to this particular scheme is Howl’s own Grandma Sophie Sarah Brown (Jean Simmons), the uptight broad whose puritan values has been sticking a wrench in his well-oiled money making machine. Two birds, one stone.
Mr. Masterson is off to the races, immediately introducing his smarmy attractive face to Miss Brown at her place of employment. Brother Sky says he wants Sarah to reform him, and she’s smart enough to know that he’s fucking with her. Her colleagues are not as hip to his scheme, however, and go out of their way to try and snag a date for their sex-deprived leader. His proposal to eat dinner with him in Cuba immediately rings sex trafficking bells all down the street, and she rebuffs his advances by slapping him one good.
High off his apparent genius, Nathan rides his good feelings to visit his perpetual fiancé Adelaide (Vivian Blaine) at her place of employment, the Hot Box. Adelaide is as keen on Nathan’s gambling as Sarah Brown is, which causes Nathan to hide his extracurricular activities from her since since he’s seriously gun-shy about marrying her, stringing her along the last 14 fucking years. Adelaide copes with this in a totally normal way, by sneezing incessantly and inventing an entirely different life with 5 children, writing fanfiction to send to her mother every few months about her and Nathan’s happy marriage. When she finds out from her co-worker that Nathan’s crap game is still happening that weekend, she kicks that deadbeat out and reevaluates wasting all her time on a dude who’s constantly back on his bullshit.
Seriously, how do you betray a woman in cat ears that asks you to pet her poppa, pet her good? Nathan, you’re a moron.
Nathan tries to justify his heartbreak to his fellas by stating the entire world is pussy-whipped, and Sky does his best to disprove this theory by blackmailing Sarah Brown into going to dinner with him for Nathan’s money. Once Sky discovers the mission will close without some gen-u-wine sinners at the next midnight meeting, he reiterates his offer to trade dinner in exchange for delivering a roomful of repentant men Sarah can save for Jesus. With her feet against the fire, she reluctantly agrees to his terms. Nathan is sickened to hear his plan for quick cash is foiled because he just agreed to marry Adelaide in front of a cop in order to cover up the reason all his “best buddies” were loitering in a diner waiting to hear the location for his crap game.
Sky takes Sarah to Cuba and gets her drunk on milkshakes, which sounds TERRIBLE to someone whose drink of choice used to be white russians and has since learned to treat their stomach better. After they get into a bar fight cause Sky can’t keep his hands to himself, Sarah comes on strong to him, and instead of fucking the shit out of her, Sky admits the reason he dragged her there. Sarah is completely unfazed by this, probably because she has enough rum in her system to kill a race horse, and they fly back to New York where they confess their insta-love to each other.
While Sky and Sarah are riding high off of dairy farts, Nathan gets the bright idea to um… repurpose the mission to host his gambling weekend/bachelor party. This goes swimmingly until Sarah, Sky and the police find them, and they’re forced literally underground to continue their illegal activities. After breaking the news to Adelaide that Nathan isn’t going to marry her, again, Sky hunts down the scumbags to make good on his marker to Sarah. Two days on a gambling bender and these men are crawling in literal sewage to toss a few dollars on a dice game.
Sky makes the bet of a lifetime, 1k for each soul he needs to save repenting at the midnight meeting, on the outcome of one roll of the dice. We are then treated to Marlon Brando singing “Luck Be a Lady” and I feel cheated.
It’s not that I don’t like Marlon Brando – This movie was actually the first time I really experienced what I can assume is his charm. The only exposure I had to him before this was Don Juan DeMarco and Apocolypse Now, which I hate on principal because I was forced to read Heart of Darkness in high school. Sky Masterson is a real slimeball, but Marlon Brando’s expressive eyes make you forgive a laundry list of sins. But Marlon does the same shit that Rex Harrison does where he’s basically monologuing to a tune. And, y’know, Frank Sinatra is right there watching this whole thing go down.
I’m not saying Frank Sinatra should have been Sky Masterson, as I think his casting as Nathan Detroit was pretty spot-on. And without Marlon’s performance in Guys and Dolls Barbra Streisand might have never overcome her stage fright, so at least we got that out of whatever this is. On the other hand, it also sounds like he jerked Rita Moreno around for 8 years, so I’m not going to defend Marlon too much.
Sky ultimately is true to his word, funneling the entire sewer’s worth of rats into Sarah Brown’s School for Wayward Gamblers.
Y’all know how much I love Frankie, but Stubby Kaye delivers my favorite performance in the entire film with “Sit Down, You’re Rockin’ the Boat”. It comes out of nowhere and it’s executed perfectly – his voice is gorgeous and his facial expressions are so earnest they garner full belly laughs out of me. The way he picks up his hat so sheepishly and sits back down at the end of the song knocks me out every time.
Sarah is so turned on by Sky’s gesture she decides to marry him, and he presumably drags Nathan to the altar for Adelaide’s sake to make it a double wedding. While this is supposed to be read as redemption, I’m pretty sure Adelaide and Sarah are going to be in a world of hurt being chained to a couple of no-good gangsters for the rest of their lives. Adelaide, you deserved better.
Overall, I think Guys and Dolls is pretty entertaining and has some stellar performances from its featured cast. Vivian Blaine immediately grabbed my heart and I couldn’t help but feel for her every time Frank Sinatra let her down. But like, honestly, Sinatra plays embarrassment and guilt pretty well, and I hated myself every time I wanted her to forgive him.
Jean Simmons similarly does a great job at portraying Sarah, as she excellently tows the line between an ambitious religious zealot and a woman who wants to break free of the expectations placed on her and have a good time. While I didn’t exactly enjoy watching her profess her love to Marlon Brando, her performance of “If I Were a Bell” is the kind of infectious joy that gets stuck in your head.
And of course Stubby as Nicely-Nicely Johnson – GUYS SIT DOWN YOU’RE ROCKIN’ THE BOAT IS SO GOOD DON’T SKIP WATCHING IT.
Oh, and Marlon was fine, I guess, but I’m not super upset he didn’t pursue other musicals after this.