Une nuit d'amour

Even though this shimmering musical from the long ago year of l934 might seem like an antique to some, One Night of Love has a magical quality to it. I watch it regularly, along with the l914 The Cheat and the 1941 nice Girl! with Deanna Durbin. These muscials are all amazingly fresh and exuberent. Grace Moore portrays American Mary who goes to Italy to become a great Opera Star. She falls under the management of arrogant, impossible but charismatic Tulio Carminetti. Great musical excerpts from Carmen, Madame Butterfly, help move this movie into the classics. Filmed at tiny Columbia Studios, this is a masterpiece. The intimate, beautifully decorated and photographed sets enhances the story. Grace Moore is adorable. Earthy, striking, talented. She reportedly played the prima donna during the filming, slamming doors, breaking windows, stalking off the sets when things did not go her way. Audiences back then actually stood and cheered and screamed "Bravo!" after the big operatic numbers. And what do we have today? "Big Mama's House" and "Tom Cats."

After losing a radio contest, operatic singer Grace Moore (as Mary Barrett) decides to go to Italy and perfect her craft. Already quite impressive, she uses her vocal skills to win friends and influence the rent-collecting landlady. Working at a café, Ms. Moore meets singing maestro Tullio Carminati (as Giulio Monteverdi) and agrees to become his pupil. They move in together but agree not to have sex. "Business and love do not mix," asserts Mr. Carminati, who relinquished himself of attractive Mona Barrie (as Lally) when she wanted to make love...

The rejected woman re-enters the picture and handsome Lyle Talbot (as Bill Houston) is also around. He would like to marry Moore. All of this fluff is meant to showcase Moore, who acquits herself well after some less than blockbuster films for MGM. Moore received an "Oscar" nomination for her starring role. The "Academy" and "New York Times" also lauded co-star Carminati and director Victor Schertzinger. Moore's closing number is a highlight.

***** One Night of Love (9/5/34) Victor Schertzinger ~ Grace Moore, Tullio Carminati, Lyle Talbot, Mona Barrie

I have such lovely memories of Grace Moore in this movie which I first saw in 1968. I liked her subsequent films with Franchot Tone (The King Steps Out)Cary Grant (For You Alone) and Melvyn Douglas (I'll Take Romance) but One Night of Love is my favourite. I have a precious video copy from TV but hope Columbia will release it on DVD soon so that many more folk will perhaps share my liking for this singer who wasn't much of an actress but somehow in this film the character fitted her. And her singing is first class - her "One Fine Day" is so moving. Tullio Carminatti is very good as her singing teacher whom she falls in love with. Grace tragically died in a plane crash in 1946. Who knows, maybe Columbia will give us a box set of these 4 of her films.

One Night of Love proved to be a successful comeback picture of sorts for Metropolitan Opera Star Grace Moore. Having not established herself at an earlier outing in Hollywood with MGM, Harry Cohn and Columbia got her back with this film that showcased Moore's magnificent voice.

The film is your usual backstage story only with an operatic twist. Moore is an aspiring opera singer and as the picture opens she's singing the title tune which became a big hit at a radio station contest. The prize is a scholarship to study in Italy. Believe it or not, Grace Moore doesn't win, but she's determined and with her meager savings she goes to Italy and studies to become a great opera diva.

Along the way she gets involved with two men, voice teacher Tullio Carminati and American expatriate Lyle Talbot. Carminati also has a witch of an ex-pupil/girlfriend he's trying to dump, deliciously played by Mona Barrie.

But this is Miss Grace Moore's film and that's how she is billed here and would be for the rest of her film career. Grace Moore, who's all but forgotten today except for devoted opera fans, conquered four areas of entertainment; recordings, stage, grand opera, and finally film.

She was the best selling classical artist of her day. On Broadway in Irving Berlin's Music Box Revues she introduced several of his standards, most importantly the song Always. Her buxom beauty (she was a full-figured gal before Jane Russell made bra commercials) helped popularize opera for the masses. And after failing with MGM she finally did become a film star with this film.

Moore set off a couple of copycats in Hollywood with her success. 20th Century Fox signed Lily Pons and Paramount inked Gladys Swarthout to film contracts. Both these ladies fine singers that they were, never achieved even the limited success Moore had. The problem with signing opera singers is that you have to have them singing opera to show off their talent. That has a limited appeal and Moore too was finished in Hollywood in four years.

The film is curiously autobiographical in the same way Mario Lanza's That Midnight Kiss is. Moore plays a small town girl who wants to sing opera, just like the real Grace Moore. How often will the public go to see an opera singer, even a great one, play an opera singer? Moore played versions of Mary Barrett for the rest of her film career at Columbia.

Still the original is a tuneful treat. In addition to the title song and several arias, Moore also sings Ciribiribin which was a favorite song always requested at concerts and even at encores of her operatic performances.

More dated than Columbia's other big hit of 1934, IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT, this influential musical still seems light and bright because it never takes itself too seriously. Its success revealed the public's unsuspected hunger for opera, or more accurately, pretty snippets from operas. This certainly gave MGM ideas about how to showcase Jeanette MacDonald, and started a stampede to corral star sopranos [Lily Pons], budding divas [Deanna Durbin], and operatic guest stars [even Kirsten Flagstad sings in BIG BROADCAST OF 1938].

At the time, Grace Moore got all the attention, as much for her shapely figure and for stepping down from her Metropolitan Opera pedestal as for her actual performance. Playing a soprano who spends her savings to study with a famous maestro in Italy, the 33 year-old Moore seems a bit of a late starter, but bounces around with lots of vivacity. Singing the title song and the inevitable "Ciri-Biri-Bin", she mostly avoids the pearls-before-swine tone of opera singers when they stoop to popular song, although she still sashays [especially as Carmen] and waves her arms too much for modern tastes.

Many decades later, it is clear that much of the charm was supplied by Tullio Carminati, an appealing comic actor with a wry quality, something like an Italian Walter Matthau. As Moore's mentor/romantic interest, he has a kind of offhand sophistication and the expert timing to support Moore's occasionally shaky line readings [of course, she's the one who got the Oscar nomination].

Director Victor Schertzinger soft-pedals the high culture, and manages several Lubitsch/Mamoulian moments: one amusing conceit has a building full of musicians all practicing different instruments in discord, until Moore unites the tunes with her impromptu rendition of "Sempre Libre" from LA TRAVIATA. Another enjoyable sequence presents singing a quartet from LUCIA as a strategy to avoid paying the rent. When the plot enters the tiresome misunderstandings phase, Schertzinger keeps the pace going until the finale, a staging of a scene from MADAME BUTTERFLY.

Throughout, Joseph Walker, Columbia's maestro of camerawork, softly lights Moore to utmost advantage, and even gets in a couple of zoom shots [in 1934!]