About the film
Wonder Bar is a 1934 American pre-Code musical drama film directed by Lloyd Bacon, with musical numbers choreographed and directed by Busby Berkeley. It is an adaptation of a Broadway musical of the same name that Al Jolson had starred in.
It stars Al Jolson, Kay Francis, Dolores del Río, Ricardo Cortez, Dick Powell, Guy Kibbee, Ruth Donnelly, Hugh Herbert, Louise Fazenda, Fifi D'Orsay, Merna Kennedy, Henry O'Neill, Robert Barrat, Henry Kolker, and Spencer Charters in the main roles.
For its time, Wonder Bar was considered risqué, barely passing the censors at the Hays Office. One musical number in particular, "Goin' to Heaven on a Mule", in which heaven was depicted with hundreds of Black People eating watermelon while they sang and danced, was considered in bad taste even in its day.
