ST Squeezita Thickly + Puttin' on the Ritz

[Robin Landseadel]

> On 05/03/2026 3:22 PM PDT Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
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> Thanks Robin,
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> And wonderful to read you again here....
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Thank you.
 
I've gathered over 60 movie or movie related references so far, still scrying them tea leaves. After the Black Cat, this is the next one, far as I can tell:

"Hicks has known, at least kept a mental file on, Stuffy Keegan since his early career as a petty offender and eventually MPD snitch who can be bought for a song, which is seldom "Puttin' on the Ritz."

ST 5

"Puttin' on the Ritz" was introduced by Harry Richman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Richman and chorus in the musical film Puttin' On the Ritz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puttin%27_On_the_Ritz_(film) (1930). According to The Complete Lyrics of Irving Berlin, this was the first song in a film to be sung by an interracial ensemble.[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puttin%27_On_the_Ritz#cite_note-FOOTNOTEKimballEmmet2001262-1 The title derives from the slang https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slang expression "to put on the Ritz", meaning to dress very fashionably. This expression was inspired by the opulent Ritz Hotel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ritz_Hotel,_London in London https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London.

TLDR, Stuffy's a cheap snitch. But, in addition to being a very early (if not the first) song written for a film, it was re-used later in what I consider to be the greatest love-letter ever filmed to the Pre-Code era, "Young Frankenstein". And considering the mashup of Pre-Code tropes in ST, ST itself could be considered something of an assembled creature. I find it all a bit "meta".

https://youtu.be/66km3m_UE_k?si=ispZtOzjSGfQjpBP

https://youtu.be/rHetse6nUT8?si=JpchLdf7LyyRfGl5

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