at Internet Archive
8 out of 8 people found the following review useful: Lena Is Tops, 25 September 2000 Author: Schlockmeister from Midnight Movie Land
A great look at the black entertainment industry in 1938. A young Lena Horne shines in her performance as Ethel, a singer who makes her way to the 'big time'. Ralph Cooper plays her boyfriend Duke who is also involved in the entertainment business. As the film progresses, Duke and Erthel are separated and Duke throws his lot in with a travelling medicine show with the esteemed Doctor Dorando, played wonderfully by Laurence Criner. The time with the medicine show is one of this movies treasures as it gives the audience a rare look at how an actual medicine show operated around the South back then. Special musical guests are presented (great guitarist featured by the way...), the spiel is given and the medicine sells.As one of the stage performers shown on stage early in the movie, look for the fantastic moves of "Rubberneck Holmes". Don't worry, you will recognize him.A lot of these 'race movies' are a fantastic look at wonderful performers that were never presented in mainstream Hollywood. This movie is worth seeing.
5 out of 5 people found the following review useful: Lena Horne's debut and a showcase for Ralph Cooper, 30 January 2004 Author: Gary Imhoff (gary@dcwatch.com) from Washington, DC
The Duke Is Tops is a black version of the white show business and Broadway movies popular in the 1930's. It has the struggling broke producer, the young performer who becomes a star overnight, and the medicine show to Broadway (or in this case fashionable Harlem nightclub) plot. It is best known as the debut movie of a beautiful, 21-year-old Lena Horne, but its real star is Ralph Cooper, who gets a brief opportunity to show his singing and bandleading abilities, as well as to dance a few steps. Much of the acting is stiff and the film's editing is crude, but it has all the pleasures of an early black musical -- specialty singers, eccentric dancers, and pretty chorus girls in skimpy bikinis -- as well as a more substantial script than many other black movies of its day (or of today, for that matter).
4 out of 4 people found the following review useful: Lena Horne's screen debut, 14 February 2004 Author: zetes from Saint Paul, MN
This all black film was Lena Horne's screen debut. Made for black audiences, it was re-released after the cross-over success of her two great 1943 films, Cabin in the Sky and Stormy Weather. The Duke Is Tops is a typical film about stage performers, and it is certainly a B movie. Duke Davis (Ralph Cooper) and Ethel Andrews (Horne) are a songwriter/singer team. When Ethel gets bigger offers, Duke can't come with, so he breaks it off hard with her so she'll have no regrets. He travels to the South with an old friend who is selling cure-all elixirs from his wagon; meanwhile, without Duke's behind-the-scenes work, Ethel is a flop in New York. It's all fairly mediocre. Horne would become a much better actress in her later films. Fans of the singer will probably be disappointed anyways, as she is only in the film for about 15 minutes. Cooper is the star. But there are several wonderful musical performances that make the film much more worth watching than it otherwise would have been. For a much better film of the same time, definitely check out Stormy Weather, which is probably the pinnacle of the all-black films of this era. 6/10.
3 out of 4 people found the following review useful: Nickel and dime musical, 8 July 2003 Author: jaykay-10
Black cinema has done far better than this. Even allowing for the constraints imposed by a low budget, there is very little here of entertainment value. The story lacks originality, the acting is stiff and self-conscious, the direction devoid of imagination. A half-dozen "specialty" acts are no better than passable; a very young Lena Horne had yet to develop her star qualities. The chorus girls' costumes looked suspiciously familiar (Warner Brothers?), and the two or three steps they learned for their routines have likewise been seen elsewhere. I hope the price of admission was cut-rate, too. Otherwise, the audience was short-changed.
1 out of 1 people found the following review useful: an unusual film starring an all black cast, 3 January 2005 Author: cfl-1 from United Kingdom
An unusual film for an audience outside the USA. Lena Horne looks fabulous and so does Ralph Cooper. There is not added background of tap steps as in other musicals so you do not hear the beat of the taps which is great realism. Music is muted to hear what dancing steps there are. Acting is a little stilted and the casts speak slowly so that you think the movie is older than it is. Costumes are daring for the time in the dance routines at the end. Often feels like you are part of an audience at a stage show. What furniture you see is very modern which adds to the movies feeling of other worldliness. A must for all film buffs.
The Duke Is Tops is noted for being Lena Horne's film debut, 11 February 2008 Author: tavm from Baton Rouge, La.
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
The only reason The Duke Is Tops, one of several "race movies" made during the times of segregation, would be worth noting today is because it made the film debut of a 21-year-old singer named Lena Horne. She plays Ethel Andrews, a singer who has to leave her producer mentor Duke Davis (Ralph Cooper) in order to branch into the big time. Davis, however, has to fake having taken the money for her services in front of her so she won't feel sorry for having done so. He then teams up with Doc Dorando (Lawrence Criner) for a series of medicine shows throughout the south. Meanwhile, in New York, her new producers have bombed big time because they made her the whole show instead of simply the specialty act. Davis finds out from the radio and offers his services as producer and band leader to bring his lineup of other specialty acts, many of whom make their one of their few or only film appearances here, for his chance at the big time with Ethel next to him. Guess what happens? While the plot is the kind you've seen in thousands of other movie musicals during this time, the fact this was made for a certain audience makes this one of the more fascinating features I've seen during this Black History Month. Ms. Horne's singing is on good display here and it's interesting seeing her so young before her professionalism takes full hold later in her career. Among other supporting players there's an unconfirmed, according to IMDb, appearance by Lillian Randolph, Annie in my favorite movie It's a Wonderful Life and sister of Amanda Randolph who I just saw in the musical short The Black Network, as the woman with Sciatica who complains of not being cured after taking the Doc's medicine before Duke explains it's for the feet! And as a longtime Louisiana resident, I'd like to take note of two players from here in this movie: Joel Fluellen from Monroe as a tonic customer and Marie Bryant from New Orleans as the sexy dancer who appears near the musical climax. So for just Lena Horne alone, The Duke is Tops is worth seeing at least once.
Add another review
