Broadway Melody of 1940 Broadway Melody of 1940 Broadway Melody of 1940 is a 1940 MGM film musical starring Fred Astaire, Eleanor Powell and George Murphy. It was directed by Norman Taurog and features music by Cole Porter, including "Begin the Beguine". The film was the fourth and final entry in MGM's "Broadway Melody" series of films, and is notable for being the only on-screen pairing of Astaire and Powell, who were considered the finest film musical dancers of their time. Johnny Brett (Fred Astaire) and King Shaw (George Murphy) are a dance team so down on their luck they're working in a dance
I Love You (Cole Porter song) maintaining that he could never take a cliche title like "I Love You" and write lyrics that included the banal sentiment "It's spring again, and birds on the wing again" and be successful. Porter accepted the challenge with the result that the song eventually topped the hit parade. Porter remarked that the "superior melody overcame the ordinary lyric".<br> In 1945 Ira B. Arnstein sued Cole Porter for plagiarizing his work and filed a suit in the Federal Court. He had for twenty years been suing various songwriters and was considered to be a little eccentric. He claimed that Porter had