Adieu Paris, bonjour New-York

Don't be put off by other negative critiques. Forget that Lily Pons was a highly regarded opera singer, or that somehow she condescended to appear in a movie. I don't know for sure, but I suspect that Pons was offered a great deal of money by RKO to make the three movies she made.

She gives a fine performance both acting and singing. The plot is typical 1930s fare, and I thought it amusing and better than average. I find Pons's characterization very charming.

As for Pons being tall and willowy, the lady was a petite 5 feet tall (see IMDb bio), but she sure had a superior voice in that little body. The "pop" tunes she was given to sing in this film were written with an operatic voice in mind, requiring a large range to sing.

No other mention has been given to Lucille Ball's very, very funny comedic dance. Her character is sabotaged with a pair of soaped-up dancing shoes, causing her to slip and fall every time she tries to dance. I've watched this over and over and I laugh out loud every time I see it. It takes a very good, well-trained dancer to be able to fall down as much and as well as she did.

What works in this movie is the comedy of the four men, especially Jack Oakie but also Micha Auer, Frank Jenks, and Gene Raymond - and, in her soapy dance number, of Lucile Ball. Both when they play swing and when they crack jokes, they're funny, and often very funny. I just watched the movie again on TCM, and I came to the conclusion that this could have been a very fine comedy if Pons and much of her music had been replaced by someone else. But she not only does not add to this picture, her moments on screen often detract. And that is a real shame, because other than her, there is a lot to like here.

I enjoy Pons' operatic recordings, and have most of them, but she doesn't work well in this movie. She had neither the personality nor - to be honest - the looks of Jeannette MacDonald or Grace Moore, and at this point she was still having real problems with the English language. A comedy with a lead who isn't good with the language is a real problem. Contrast her with Herman Bing, who misused English to comic effect, and you see the difference. She was no dancer, at least in this movie, either. Her one real talent, that for which she was famous at the Met, was her high notes.

That causes problems in a movie made for a general audience. She is too often given music to show off her very high notes and her staccati. At the Met audiences appreciate that sort of thing, but it seems misplaced in what was meant to be a general audience movie. She should have been given more lyrical music, less fireworks. Think of Jeannette MacDonald singing "San Francisco" in the movie of the same name, which came out the year before, or Grace Moore singing "Ciriciribin" - much less "Minnie the Moocher" - and you see how such a soprano could have handled pop music effectively. Pons just doesn't seem at ease with it.

It's interesting to see how she performs "Una voce poco fa" in her Met Opera scene. If that's how she did the role on stage, she was not much of an actress even by the operatic standards of her day. She tilts her head to the music, and opens and closes her fan. That's about all there is to it. If you recall Risë Stevens doing the Habanera from Carmen in *Going My Way* you can see that more could have been done to make the scene interesting - if Pons had been willing.

This movie could also have used a better director, to make the comedy scenes even better, or perhaps to have helped Pons do a better job. I suppose RKO was not going to assign one of its better directors to this.

But the basic problem is that Pons was not movie material, at least not for this sort of general audience comedy. She doesn't sink the picture, but she doesn't add anything positive to it, either. On this latest watching, I do really feel that she messed up what could have been a fine film.

Footnote: The year after making this picture, the male lead, Gene Raymond, would marry Jeannette MacDonald, another lyric coloratura who was much better suited to the movies, and much better presented there.

Opera great Lily Pons plays a French singer who flees the altar looking for adventure and true love and ends up joining an American swing band (their hopped up version of "The Blue Danube" is a real treat). As charming as it is silly, the film is memorable for the way Pons bursts into song. Her version of "Una Voce Poco Fa" shows why she was such a magnificent stage presence. It's a shame that charisma did not quite make it on screen in the three movies she make for RKO (the other two being "I Dream Too Much" with Henry Fonda, 1935, and "Hitting a New High" 1937). Also notable is Lucille Ball's funny dance scene in which her character is sabotaged with soaped up dancing shoes, causing her to slip and fall every time she tries to dance; only a well trained dancer could have pulled it off.

If That Girl From Paris was made today there would be protesters at the screenings as Lily Pons is quite the illegal alien. I could just see the Donald leading a picket line protesting the fact that the heroine is a woman who stows away on ship to come to America and then is ready to get a marriage of convenience to stay here.

Not liking the arranged marriage she's been hammerlocked into Lily hooks up with a touring swing band consisting of Gene Raymond, Mischa Auer, Frank Jenks, and Jack Oakie. Of course all that doesn't sit well with Lucille Ball, affianced to Raymond and getting some of the best lines in the film.

Pons has some good numbers in all genres of music including a swing version of the Blue Danube Waltz and highlighting with her character's Metropolitan Opera debut in the Barber Of Seville.

This film was made right after Grace Moore scored such a success in One Night Of Love for Columbia Pictures. Studios went out and signed up opera singers, Lily Pons was RKO's catch. The vogue came and went quickly, this was Lily's second feature film after I Dream Too Much. She would do one more Hitting A New High and then she would return to the Metropolitan Opera for real.

But I'm glad some of these voices like Lily Pons recorded their art for posterity in films like That Girl From Paris.

Perhaps it made sense from a commercial standpoint: bringing a great lady of the opera, Lili Pons, to a level at which the public could more easily relate to her - perhaps even to identify with her in some respects. The result, ideally, would have been to create a leading lady in films who sang divinely as she was surrounded by "us." Miss Pons gave it her best try - here and elsewhere - but it just didn't work. Most unfortunately, the filmmakers effort to generate the common touch involved presenting her in the most commonplace outfits, makeup and coiffure, downplaying the "glamour" associated with grand opera. Supporting her with the buffoonery of Jack Oakie and his cohorts, having her hiding under blankets, climbing here and there, etc. doesn't register either. Though no beauty, Lili Pons can radiate elegance and charm (along with her great vocalizing), as she does, in full costume, when she sings "Una voce poco fa" in this picture. Her movies don't give us enough of the Lili Pons that made her a stage presence, and might have made her a screen presence. To have her play against (her own) type - here and elsewhere - was a mistake.