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All Baba Goes to Town (Twentieth Century-Fox) transports taw-eyed, prancing little Eddie Cantor to ancient Bagdad, where he physics the ailing realm of Sultan Roland Young with panaceas borrowed from the New Deal. Haroun-al-Cantor's venture into political satire is tuneful, gay, imaginatively written, generously produced. The cumulative effect of its guying would not nettle even the income tax bureau, for Funnyman Cantor pokes lightly at an array of straw men.
The authors (Gene Towne, Graham Baker, Gene Fowler), borrowing the Connecticut Yankee formula, have brought it aptly up to date. Cantor is a star-struck autograph hunter on his way to Hollywood for a rubberneck vacation among the famous faces. He stumbles on the desert location of a cinema company making an episode from the Arabian Nights, becomes an extra, falls asleep in the jar reserved for Ali Baba.
His dream takes him to old Bagdad, where he is received by the Sultan and Sultana (former Strip-Teaser Gypsy Rose Lee). Eddie earns the gratitude of the harassed Sultan by setting up a New Deal, with himself as Prime Minister. Some of his projects: improved breadlines (one for rye, one for whole-wheat), a tax on wives, bridges for riverless Bagdad* (the rivers to be dug later), dancing lessons for the masses, filling stations for camels.
When things have come to such a pass that the Sultan turns commoner and runs for president, Eddie to his horror is made a write-in opposition candidate, campaigns against himself to no effect: he sweeps the country except for the outlying provinces of Maino and Vermontash. The nine old councilors declare the election unconstitutional, and Eddie leaves town on a magic carpet, which he controls by a cantrip—"inflation" to go up, ''deflation" to come down. Eventually the carpet burns away from under him,* and he comes to earth with a thud, wakes to find himself in Hollywood, goggling at the passing stars.
Cantor joined Twentieth Century-Fox in September 1936 under a three-picture arrangement for a reputed $1,000,000, after having spent the previous seven years with Samuel Goldwyn and United Artists. He bought his release from the Goldwyn contract when Goldwyn failed to buy Three Men on a Horse for him. AH Baba Goes to Town is his first film under the Twentieth Century-Fox agreement.