A struggling writer finds success writing scripts for a radio comic at the expense of his high-brow ambitions.A struggling writer finds success writing scripts for a radio comic at the expense of his high-brow ambitions.A struggling writer finds success writing scripts for a radio comic at the expense of his high-brow ambitions.
Jackie Searl
- Robin Figg
- (as Jackie Searle)
Donald Mills
- Donald Mills
- (as The Mills Brothers)
Harry Mills
- Harry Mills
- (as The Mills Brothers)
- Director
- Elliott Nugent(uncredited)
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaJimmy Durante and Lupe Velez were borrowed from MGM and Norman Foster was borrowed from Fox for this film.
- GoofsWhen meeting Moxie, Robin replaces his hat on his head twice between shots after getting slapped and kicked by his mother.
- Quotes
[Moxie is introduced to a child actor of the "legitimate" stage]
Moxie Slaight: Well I'm glad he was legitimate once.
- ConnectionsReferences Mädchen in Uniform (1931)
- SoundtracksSwing It Sister
(1932) (uncredited)
Music by Burton Lane
Lyrics by Harold Adamson
Played and Sung by The Mills Brothers
Featured review
Pleasant little time passer about early radio
This movie may star Jimmy Durante, but he isn't front and center most of the time. The film is about a radio star, Moxie (Jimmy Durante), who can't find any good gag men. Enter Nick (Norman Foster), an unemployed writer who really wants to be a poet. His wife Sylvia (Marian Marsh) has caught the eye of agent Georgie (William Gargan). Georgie does Sylvia a favor by convincing Moxie to hire Nick as a gag man, a job that Nick excels at - for awhile. The problem isn't so much that Nick gets a big head, but that Moxie's girlfriend Vera (Lupe Velez) tries to get her claws into him. She can't do this very well with Nick sober, so she gets him drunk with somewhat anticlimactic and ambiguous results that could only happen at the transition from the precode to production code eras, which is when this film was released.
This may sound like it has the makings of a melodrama when in fact it is pretty much played as light comedy. There are some numbers by Durante, a rather humorous number with Velez and Durante together, and the somewhat rare occurrence of Durante playing a rather irascible fellow. He even has two bodyguards to follow Vera around and beat up anyone who flirts with her. Marian Nixon, who did quite a bit of heavy melodrama over at Warner Brothers, doesn't get much screen time here, but when she does she is the loyal and supportive wife even when you wish she wasn't.
This film was made by RKO, not Durante's home studio MGM, and you get the feeling they really didn't know what to do with him or Velez, although of the two she comes off best. Neither laugh out-loud funny nor hand-wringingly tense at any point, it would be a nice film to show people who are recovering from a nervous breakdown and can't take any excitement but still want to be entertained. Not Durante's best but a fun way to pass 70 minutes or so of time.
This may sound like it has the makings of a melodrama when in fact it is pretty much played as light comedy. There are some numbers by Durante, a rather humorous number with Velez and Durante together, and the somewhat rare occurrence of Durante playing a rather irascible fellow. He even has two bodyguards to follow Vera around and beat up anyone who flirts with her. Marian Nixon, who did quite a bit of heavy melodrama over at Warner Brothers, doesn't get much screen time here, but when she does she is the loyal and supportive wife even when you wish she wasn't.
This film was made by RKO, not Durante's home studio MGM, and you get the feeling they really didn't know what to do with him or Velez, although of the two she comes off best. Neither laugh out-loud funny nor hand-wringingly tense at any point, it would be a nice film to show people who are recovering from a nervous breakdown and can't take any excitement but still want to be entertained. Not Durante's best but a fun way to pass 70 minutes or so of time.
helpful•61
- AlsExGal
- Apr 22, 2012
Details
- Runtime1 hour 11 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
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