... this time with music, from 20th Century Fox and director irving Cummings. Helen Leonard (Alice Faye) hopes for a career in the opera, but is told her voice isn't good enough. However, since she's so stunningly beautiful, she should still get musical training for the traditional theater, because that's how that works. Theatrical producer Tony Pastor (Leo Carrillo) discovers her and, changing her name to Lillian Russell, he makes her a stage star. Her talent wins her fans the world over, as well as the admiration of many powerful men, such as Diamond Jim Brady (Edward Arnold) and songwriter Edward Solomon (Don Ameche), but her heart truly belongs to hometown reporter Alexander (Henry Fonda).
People spend a lot of time in this movie telling Alice Faye as Lillian Russell how beautiful she is. A lot of time, repeatedly warning her that her beauty is so magnificent that her life will be difficult because of it. Faye is told how gorgeous she is so many times that it starts to seem like a self-esteem exercise rather than a narrative. And I don't find Faye that pretty, to be honest, so it makes the repetition that much more noticeable. Ameche plays a grouch, and Fonda has to do his wide-eyed sincerity good-guy shtick, while Arnold hams it up repeating a role he had played in an earlier film, and Warren William is completely wasted. Fonda was said to have regretted this movie the most of any he did under contract to Fox.
The musical aspects are also lackluster, with no major musical numbers, just pieces of songs here and there, and a couple of minor full performances. Like many of these biopics, it's also an excuse for some nostalgia wallowing, this time with Eddie Foy Jr. Playing his father doing an old stage bit, and vaudeville comedy duo dinosaurs Weber & Fields doing some hoary bits. The movie earned one Oscar nomination, for Best Art Direction (Richard Day, Joseph C. Wright).
