An opera prima donna leaves the Metropolitan to form her own company with Tibbett as leading man, then leaves this company too, which means Tibbett and company must carry on without her.An opera prima donna leaves the Metropolitan to form her own company with Tibbett as leading man, then leaves this company too, which means Tibbett and company must carry on without her.An opera prima donna leaves the Metropolitan to form her own company with Tibbett as leading man, then leaves this company too, which means Tibbett and company must carry on without her.
Photos
George F. Marion
- Perontelli
- (as George Marion Sr.)
Rafael Alcayde
- Specialty Dancer
- (uncredited)
Eric Alden
- Chorus Man
- (uncredited)
Ernie Alexander
- Page Boy
- (uncredited)
Jessie Arnold
- Landlady
- (uncredited)
Violet Axzelle
- Chorus Girl
- (uncredited)
Kenny Baker
- Chorus Man
- (uncredited)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe last film under the Fox Film Corporation banner before its merger with 20th Century Pictures to form 20th Century Fox.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Twentieth Century Fox: The First 50 Years (1997)
- SoundtracksFaust
(1859) (uncredited)
Music by Charles Gounod
Libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré
Excerpt played and sung on a radio and partially sung by Lawrence Tibbett
Featured review
A bad script saved only by some great Tibbett performances
The script for this movie is really bad, a collection of tired clichés. And that's a shame, because there is enough talent here to have made a good movie.
Lawrence Tibbett was unquestionably one of the great singers of the first part of the twentieth century, and definitely one of the first American stars of opera, along with Rosa Ponselle and Grace Moore. He was a handsome guy who could act, and he had real stage presence, which you can see in this movie.
And that is what saves this movie from being a total loss. Several of Tibbett's signature roles - Tonio in Pagliacci, Escamillo in Carmen, Figaro in the Barber of Seville - get captured here, so that we can see why he delighted opera audiences for two decades at the Met. The opera excerpts are never presented or explained, however; they just get performed, leaving most of the audience to appreciate the music, if they can, without any idea what Tibbett is singing so well. That was expecting too much, I suspect, and it's a shame, because the three excerpts are good performances that could have been integrated into the script a lot better.
We also get to see Tibbett sing two popular numbers, and they are perhaps the most striking in the movie: a setting of Kipling's "On the road to Mandalay" and the spiritual "De glory road," with both of which Tibbett does a great job. Again, however, there is no effort to integrate them into the plot. At one moment, Tibbett sings them as examples of "beauty" to other musicians. Then they're over.
There isn't much else to notice in this movie. If that is Virginia Bruce doing Micaela's aria from Carmen, she does a good job of it.
The rest is all clichés. Why, you might wonder, does the movie start with Tibbett's character leaving Bruce's character stranded in the countryside with a broken down car? That should have aggravated her to no end. Instead, she falls in love with his voice.
It never gets any better.
This marked the end of Tibbett's movie career, and you can see why. But in this case the fault was not Tibbett's. The script was the villain!
Lawrence Tibbett was unquestionably one of the great singers of the first part of the twentieth century, and definitely one of the first American stars of opera, along with Rosa Ponselle and Grace Moore. He was a handsome guy who could act, and he had real stage presence, which you can see in this movie.
And that is what saves this movie from being a total loss. Several of Tibbett's signature roles - Tonio in Pagliacci, Escamillo in Carmen, Figaro in the Barber of Seville - get captured here, so that we can see why he delighted opera audiences for two decades at the Met. The opera excerpts are never presented or explained, however; they just get performed, leaving most of the audience to appreciate the music, if they can, without any idea what Tibbett is singing so well. That was expecting too much, I suspect, and it's a shame, because the three excerpts are good performances that could have been integrated into the script a lot better.
We also get to see Tibbett sing two popular numbers, and they are perhaps the most striking in the movie: a setting of Kipling's "On the road to Mandalay" and the spiritual "De glory road," with both of which Tibbett does a great job. Again, however, there is no effort to integrate them into the plot. At one moment, Tibbett sings them as examples of "beauty" to other musicians. Then they're over.
There isn't much else to notice in this movie. If that is Virginia Bruce doing Micaela's aria from Carmen, she does a good job of it.
The rest is all clichés. Why, you might wonder, does the movie start with Tibbett's character leaving Bruce's character stranded in the countryside with a broken down car? That should have aggravated her to no end. Instead, she falls in love with his voice.
It never gets any better.
This marked the end of Tibbett's movie career, and you can see why. But in this case the fault was not Tibbett's. The script was the villain!
- richard-1787
- Aug 22, 2014
- Permalink
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Diamond Horseshoe
- Filming locations
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $21,711
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $7,554
- Aug 9, 2015
- Runtime1 hour 19 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content