After watching the clip from The Great Ziegfeld I do agree that it shows a brighter perspective of life. At this time in history people all over the United States were dealing with extreme financial hardship. When they watched this they were shown a lifestyle of opulence and entertainment. For example, Ziegfeld gives the door man such a large sum of money without questioning it. Later in the clip he sends an extravagant arrangement of orchids to Anna Held. At first she has no interest in Ziegfeld, but the expensive flowers peak her interest just enough to think about meeting with him. Instead of highlighting the disparities that the viewers are experiencing this production aims to transport them to a place where there is no need to worry about money.
If this musical has been filmed before the motion picture code was enforced I think Anna Held would have been far more sexualized, but she might have been given more character development. In the clip she is presented as a very beautiful and demure woman that is apologetic for her lack of fluency in the English language. I have only seen this clip of the musical, but I doubt that Anna Held gets to do a lot of critical thinking before picking a producer. A pre-code production may have allowed for more of an internal struggle. However, with this musical being filmed during the Depression-era that is the exact thing producers wanted to stay away from. No one wanted to see a main star struggling. They wanted a light-hearted and playful musical about a woman who was being swayed with expensive gifts.
