This slight & silly operetta from Paramount, made to introduce popular Polish tenor Jan Kiepura, along with Metropolitan mezzo Gladys Swarthout, didn’t come off. (Kiepura’s glamorous soprano wife Mártha Eggerth had much better luck stealing Gene Kelly away from Judy Garland in FOR ME AND MY GAL/’42.) Yet, forgotten and hard-to-find, it holds a lot of interest in the career of iconic Golden Age Hollywood composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold, to say nothing of five original numbers written for the film with lyricist Oscar Hammerstein. Korngold, brought from Austria to Warner Bros. to handle the mishmosh of Mendelssohn used in scoring Max Reinhardt’s version of Shakespeare’s A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM/’35 (an enormous hit at the Hollywood Bowl/a money pit on film), Korngold then pit-stopped at Paramount to write & record NIGHT just as Warners desperately needed a score for the pricey CAPTAIN BLOOD/’35, first of the Errol Flynn/Michael Curtiz swashbucklers. So, while finishing ‘post’ on his film operetta, Korngold had exactly three weeks to compose BLOOD. As things turned out, NIGHT came out after BLOOD hit big (very big), and Korngold never had another chance on a full blown Hollywood operetta.* This one, under Alexander Hall’s direction is okay (though what a voice Kiepura had, perfect for Korngold’s operatic triumph DIE TOTE START), but feels awfully truncated at 1'17", including 40 minutes for song with quite a lot of plot to get thru. Kiepura’s a happy Italian fisherman (yes, with a Polish accent) who sings to his catch (heck, the whole village sings). Heard by an opera composer who want to replace ageing tenor Alan Mowbray (very funny) he’s offered a job. Only Momma; Momma she wants him to stay at-a home. While fetching soprano Swarthout sees a new stage partner (maybe more). Little does she know that her composer wants to propose with a just written love song sung to her by Kiepura! Well, it’s that sort of thing. But as a Hollywood road not taken, there’s considerable ‘what-if’ musical interest.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *While never doing full-fledged lyric theater on film, Korngold was able to put plenty of vocal elements in his scores. Check out the sailors bursting into song as they finally head for home in the middle of THE SEA HAWK/’40.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: *M-G-M’s delirious operetta THE GREAT WALTZ/’38 doesn’t credit Korngold for putting all the Johann Strauss, Jr. music together which he did for the original B’way run in 1935. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2015/04/the-great-waltz-1938.html
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