1. No less important in terms of the way the genre functions are the sequels-series, a possible fourth type. Sequels (e.g., Grease II [1982] and Staying Alive [1983]) are generally self-explanatory. Certain films function similarly to sequels but are properly called series since they follow the same patterns of other films but without necessarily addressing the activities of the same characters. (The most obvious examples are the Golddiggers and Broadway Melody films of the thirties.) Series films use an established formula and occasionally repeated material to take advan- soft

tage of earlier films' successes. However, unlike true remakes, which derive more or less from specific earlier films, series films use a broad array of antecedents. [BACK]

2. Silk Stockings and The Wiz (and a few other films, Sweet Charity among them) are complicated by an intermediary step: a Broadway musical version of which these films are screen adaptations. [BACK]

3. An alternate form of reinterpretation reverses the process and uses established songs but with newly developed narratives (e.g., Singin' in the Rain [1952] and Pennies from Heaven [1981]). [BACK]

4. In The American Film Musical Rick Altman proposes three subgenres—the fairy tale musical, the show musical, and the folk musical—each with its own semantic and syntactic elements. All three have had their share of remakes, but partially because it has been the site of considerable critical attention the show musical seems especially profitable to explore in the context of remakes. [BACK]

5. What Price Hollywood? produced by David O. Selznick, who also produced the 1937 A Star Is Born (directed by George Cukor, who also directed the 1954 remake), was clearly an inspiration for various scenes and moments in both the 1937 and 1954 films. The complicated romantic relationships of this film, however, as well as its attack on the press for invading a star's personal life, are so different from any version of A Star Is Born that it seems inaccurate to consider them specific remakes of What Price Hollywood? Patrick McGilligan suggests that "[i]ts tough storyline about the pressures of Hollywood stardom has been stolen from and remade many times" (80). [BACK]

6. The screenplay credits for the 1976 A Star Is Born cite only a story by William Wellman and Robert Carson as its basis. According to the credits of the 1937 film, the Wellman-Carson story was itself the basis of the original screenplay. (David O. Selznick's uncredited contribution has been much recognized; see Haver and McGilligan.) The tale of the writing of the 1976 film reveals a great deal about the preproduction process of remakes. John Gregory Dunne and Joan Didion wrote the first two drafts while quite proudly having seen neither earlier version; they were interested only in the title recognition as a way of getting studio support for a film about the rock and roll business (Dunne, 30). After a third draft, the pair left the project, and numerous other writers (fourteen, according to Dunne) contributed versions. Subsequently the director, Frank Pierson, showing some allegiance to the two prior films, "past[ed] bits and pieces of every draft starting from 1936 into the third draft by Joan Didion and John Dunne" (Pierson, 52). [BACK]

8. The decision to use CinemaScope, a patented system controlled by Twentieth Century-Fox, was made only after Warner Brothers had failed in numerous attempts to exploit its own kinds of wide-screen processes. In fact, the decision to continue

use CinemaScope occurred only after several days—and three hundred thousand dollars worth—of production on the film (Haver, 126-32). [BACK]

9. It is significant in this regard that Garland sings all the songs in the 1954 version; emphasis away from the male lead seems also the result of James Mason's being one of Cukor's alternate choices to play Norman Maine. Cary Grant—Cukor's first choice—adamantly refused, and Stewart Granger walked out after finding Cukor's methods incompatible with his own (McGilligan, 219-20). [BACK]

10. Other than the conflation of Gaynor-Blodgett in the 1937 film, there is no demonstration that this Esther-Vicki has the ability to play a leading role. Indeed, the only two "performances" in the film thus far would argue otherwise: First, at the party where Gaynor's Esther meets March's Norman Maine, she adopts various guises as she offers hors d'oeuvres to the guests; second, just prior to the discussion with him in the cafeteria, she practices different voices for her first speaking part. Both instances suggest that she has no individual persona. Except for the short scene shown at the preview, throughout the film there is only hearsay evidence that this character is worthy of the designation star . [BACK]

11. A further affirmation of Barbra Streisand's own acclaim by a concert audience—and perhaps an even greater blurring of the function of audience in this version of A Star Is Born— lies in the fact that the outdoor concert scenes of the film were filmed as part of a real concert for a crowd of fifty thousand who paid admission for an all-day performance. On the morning of the concert, Streisand, initially apprehensive about her reception by the audience ("These are rock and roll kids. They'll hate me. They'll boo me off the stage. What do they know about what I do?"), walked onstage, "looked at the crowd and said, ' Holy shit! ' They went crazy. Crazy . She owned them from that point on" (Graham and Greenfield, 374-75). [BACK]

12. Robert Lang's American Film Melodrama provides a full discussion of the relationship between women's identity and patriarchy as fundamental to melodrama (3-13). [BACK]

13. Wade Jennings asserts that the film itself had been re-released several times between 1937 and 1954 and that the film had also been adapted for radio on more than one occasion—not just in 1942 with Judy Garland (327). [BACK]