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Kay (Andrea Leeds) has come to New York City with the intention to become an actress, and she thinks the one letter of introduction to acting superstar John Mannering (Adolphe Menjou) is all she needs - actually she believes in it so much that she runs into a burning building to save the letter, only to have to be saved herself in return - by handsome young Barry (George Murphy), whom she pretty much immediately falls in love with, and vice versa. But her faith in the power of her letter was well-placed, as it identifies her as Mannering's illegitimate daughter - and he, reading that letter is totally moved by it, as he didn't until now know he even had a daughter, and he wants to make up for everything he missed out on over the years. But he insists they keep her being his daughter a secret as it could hurt his career (even if four marriages and divorces apparently didn't) and instead claiming he's his protegée - which though only leads to problems in both their personal lives, as Mannering's fiancée Lydia (Ann Sheridan) dumps him pretty much on the spot when catching him with Kay only days away from their wedding, and Barry, seeing her spend too much time with Mannering, decides to go on a lengthy tour with his dancing partner Honey (Rita Johnson) with the intent of marrying her on the road. Both Kay and Mannering that it in stride and don't really mind that they become prime fudder of the gossip press. Eventually, Mannering tries to get Kay a role in a Broadway play, but as everybody he talks to is more interested in him than her, he agrees to take his first stage role in twelve years as long as Kay gets a lead as well. And at the end of the premiere, he plans to tell everyone the truth about Kay's identity. But he gets the jitters, and before curtain he gets so roaringly drunk that he forgets his lines once on stage and ultimately stumbles over furniture which causes the play to shut down mid-performance. Kay's mad at him, and understandably so, and guilt-ridden as he is, in addition to being drunk, Mannering runs into traffic and is knocked over by a car soon therafter. Kay sees Mannering for one last time on his death bed, and he dies just before he can reveal their secret to the reporters present at the hospital. She decides to not go public with the story, but finally tells Barry, who just happens to be in town, and of course he ultimately gets the girl after all ...

Edgar Bergen and his dummy Charlie McCarthy have sizeable supporting roles, but don't do anything to actually further the story.

A well-acted melodrama - that just never really manages to take off. For one it's probably because it never finds the right balance between comedy and drama, instead suffers from tonal shifts that hurt the film's build-up, but the more important reason is that the conflict of the film just isn't really palpable - basically if Kay and Mannering had the decency of telling those closest to them about their actual relationship, then everything would be resolved already - but apparently they intentionally choose not to, and by their choice (as it is just that), they make the stakes in the film rather unimportant, to a point where one questions whether it's really Kay who deserves the happy ending with Barry rather than Honey (who's pretty much suddenly written out of the movie when she's no longer needed). That's not to say the film's all bad, and if vintage melodramas are at all your thing and you're not too particular about a perfectly developed plot, you might like this one, it's just a film that doesn't by any means live up to the quality of its cast.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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