This isn't very good but it's OK. And can anyone imagine a movie for general release, today, centered on the world of opera? With arias included? Adolph Menjou is the title character. He is a notorious ladies' man -- like the character in the opera being performed: "Don Giovanni." He and Irene Dunne meet cute: In his stateroom on a ship, he tosses off the first line of "La ci darem la mano." And she responds.
They misplace each other, they meet up again, she gets him to wrangle an audition for her. His understudy is an old beau of hers but she wants a career and he doesn't want her to work. So -- She gets to play Donna Elvira in her Met debut. Maybe I got this wrong, but it seems that in that role she again sings "La ci darem la mano" -- which is somebody else's duet.
We hear Gounod and Wagner. Olga Baclanova is jealous and tries to sabotage the whole thing -- little knowing what lay a couple years ahead in "Freaks." It creaks but it's intriguing. Oh, and much as I love Irene Dunne: a Mozart soprano she was not.
They misplace each other, they meet up again, she gets him to wrangle an audition for her. His understudy is an old beau of hers but she wants a career and he doesn't want her to work. So -- She gets to play Donna Elvira in her Met debut. Maybe I got this wrong, but it seems that in that role she again sings "La ci darem la mano" -- which is somebody else's duet.
We hear Gounod and Wagner. Olga Baclanova is jealous and tries to sabotage the whole thing -- little knowing what lay a couple years ahead in "Freaks." It creaks but it's intriguing. Oh, and much as I love Irene Dunne: a Mozart soprano she was not.