james cagney be best know for his tough character and gangster role but he have also play quite a lot oft character in his career . this musical be one of them and it be the first but not the last musical movie cagney would star in . cagney be even do a bit of sing in this one and also quite an amount of dance . and it need to be say that he be not bad at it . he play the role with a lot of confidence . he apparently have some dance job in his early life before his act career start to take off big time and so it actually isn not a weird thing that he also take on some musical acting role in his career . he obviously also feel at ease in this totally different genre than most people be accustom to see him in . the movie be direct by lloyd bacon and who be perhaps among the best and most successful director within the genre . his early 30 musical pretty much define the musical genre and he also be responsible for genre movie such a 42nd street . his musical be always light and fun to watch and more comedy like than anything else really . 30 musical never be really about it singing and this be something that more featured in 40 and later make musical and mainly from the mgm studio . a usual it have a light and simple story and set in the musical world and that of course be also predictable and progress in a formulaic way . it nevertheless be a fun and simple story that also simply make this an entertaining movie to watch . so do the character and actor that be portray them . sort of weird though that that the total plot line of the movie get sort of abandon toward the end of the movie and when the movie only start to consist out of musical number routine . the musical moment toward the end of the movie be also amuse and well do and even though i be not a too big fan of the genre itself . once again the musical number also feature a young billy barty . he often play little boy or baby or mouse and whatever more early on in his career and include the movie musical gold digger of 1933 and of one year earlier . a recommendable early genre movie . positive .