It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals.
In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 500. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals.

This week’s musical:
“When You’re in Love” (1937)– Musical #547

Studio:
Columbia Pictures

Director:
Robert Riskin

Starring:
Grace Moore, Cary Grant, Aline MacMahon, Henry Stephenson, Thomas Mitchell, Catherine Doucet, Luis Alberni, Gerald Oliver Smith, Emma Dunn, George C. Pearce, Scotty Beckett (uncreditd)

Plot:
Opera singer Louise Fuller (Moore) who is stuck in Mexico and needs to get back so she can hold a music festival that she promised her uncle (Stephenson), but she can’t get back into the U.S. Jimmy Hudson (Grant) is unable to pay his hotel bill in Mexico. Fuller and Hudson’s lawyer’s decide the two should get married so they can get home, Fuller pays Hudson’s debts and they could divorce after six months. Though they start off fighting, love blossoms.

Trivia:
-The world premiere of the film’s restoration was at the 2016 Turner Classic Movies Classic Film Festival.
-Director Robert Riskin wrote and directed the film. It was a very loose retailoring of “It Happened One Night” for Moore, The Merchant Prince of Poverty Row: Harry Cohn of Columbia Pictures by Bernard F. Dick
-Writer Robert Riskin’s only try at directing

Grace Moore and Cary Grant in “When You’re in Love”

Highlights:
-Grace Moore performing Minnie the Moocher

Notable Songs:
-“Minnie the Moocher” performed by Grace Moore
-“Our Song” performed by Grace Moore
-“The Whistling Boy” performed by Grace Moore
-“Vissi D’Arte” performed by Grace Moore

My review:
I’ve seen all of Cary Grant’s films–except for some of his early 1930s movies. Not only was it a treat to finally see this rare film, it was even more amazing to see it on the big screen and in all it’s newly restored glory, thanks to the Turner Classic Movies Classic Film Festival. I didn’t even arrive at the festival, thinking I would be getting a Musical Monday post out of it.

I really enjoyed “When You’re in Love.” While everyone knows Cary Grant as a huge star, at the time of this film he wasn’t as famous as his operatic leading lady: Grace Moore, a name many people don’t remember today. As I’ve watched musicals over the years, I’ve seen almost all of Miss Moore’s nine films made during her brief Hollywood career and I find her likeable. She’s beautiful and has a gorgeous voice.

Nicknamed the “Tennessee Nightingale,” Moore was a Ziegfeld Girl in the Ziegfeld Follies and had 16 seasons with the Metropolitan Opera. Her Hollywood films helped make opera popular with mainstream audiences. Sadly, Moore died in 1947 at age 48 in a plane crash near Copenhagen.

While watching this movie with an audience, I realized few of them were familiar with Grace Moore. When I saw that “When You’re in Love” paired Cary Grant and Grace Moore, I automatically knew it was a musical. But when leaving the theater, I heard some grumblings of “I didn’t know that was going to be a musical” from fans who only wanted to see Cary Grant.

Grant and Moore are both very funny, and there is a fun scene with Grace Moore performing Cab Calloway’s “Minnie the Moocher” while Grant plays the piano. Another favorite scene of mine involves Moore singing with a group of children and little uncredited Scotty Beckett is on her lap. There are close-ups of the various children’s faces and some of their reactions were hilarious.

But you can’t give all the credit for this film’s charm to the lead actors. The supporting cast is what really makes the film special, especially Aline MacMahon and Henry Stephenson who are always fantastic. One character actor, elderly George C. Pearce, had what I think was the funniest moment in the film: He answers the phone, asks them to hold on, puts on his glasses, and tells them to go ahead. Funny, because relevant to everyone’s life.

If you have the opportunity to every catch this film, do. It’s great fun and one that we haven’t been able to really enjoy for a long time.

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