Before I go any further, you need to understand something before you accept my review without question. While I adore films from Hollywood's Golden Age and I think I was born at the wrong time, I never have particularly liked the style of films that Jeanette MacDonald made--particularly those with Nelson Eddy. A while back, I gave a bad review to one of their very old fashioned films and I was beset with angry fans. Who was to know that anyone alive today actually LIKED these operettas?! So, to be fair, understand they just aren't my cup of tea, so to speak.

Now another thing you should know is why, in spite of this, I still watched the film. Well, while I generally don't like them, I really, really liked two of the films Ms. MacDonald made with Maurice Chevalier (THE MERRY WIDOW and LOVE ME TONIGHT)--probably because of his charming performance.

Unfortunately, while I preferred having Ramon Navarro in the film instead of Nelson Eddy (uggh--the combination of him and MacDonald is too much for me),this isn't saying much as overall I didn't like the film but at least I am intellectually honest enough to give the film a 6 for technical merit.

As for what I didn't like, the list would probably be very long, so I'll try to cover the major points. First, while Navarro was a capable leading man in the silent days, his transition to sound wasn't great due to his strong accent. While it got easier to understand him in some later sound films, here it is quite difficult for my American ear--perhaps others might have an easier time of this and it would have helped if the videotape had been close captioned. But what was apparent regardless of this was that Navarro couldn't sing well at all and couldn't come close to keeping up with Jeanette. Second, there was just too much singing. While I sometimes enjoy a good musical, there was so much singing and stage productions near the end that I tended to speed through some of them. Third, the Technicolor used on one small sequence at the end of the film looked just awful. I can't blame the people who made the film but those who released it on video, as it desperately needs restoration. It was fuzzy and garish and I doubt this was Technicolor's fault--particularly as I have seen Two-color Technicolor films that look a lot better and it's a much more primitive process than the Three-strip Technicolor used here.

Now there were a few things I liked. Charles Butterworth seems totally out of place in the film and just wanders about saying inane things. This actually IMPROVED the film and kept me laughing--particularly when the prima donna of the opera turned out to be very old and Butterworth suggested they change the plot to make it the love between a man and his mother (instead of his girlfriend)--even though it was clearly a romance! He said that perhaps people wouldn't mind and were broadminded about the whole thing!!!

DO NOT READ FURTHER--MAJOR SPOILER ALERT!!

STOP READING NOW!! I MEAN IT--KEEP YOUR LITTLE ILLUSIONS AND STOP READING!!

THIS MEANS YOU!!

STOP!!!

WELL, DON'T SAY I DIDN'T WARN YOU!!!

The romance between Navarro and MacDonald was difficult to believe for me and other lovers of film trivia because although I have read that Mr. Navarro was a wonderful man, he was also quite gay. Sorry to spoil the illusion, but I did warn you!! On the other hand, since it appears that the two are cohabiting in part of the film, this might make some a bit more comfortable since they weren't married.

Between her first film at MGM which was her last with Maurice Chevalier, Merry Widow, and Naughty Marietta which was the debut film of her partnership with Nelson Eddy, Jeanette MacDonald did a film adaption of Jerome Kern's and Otto Harbach's Broadway show The Cat and the Fiddle. She co-starred with Ramon Novarro and while the results were interesting and entertaining there was no demand for more MacDonald/Novarro screen pairings.

The Cat and the Fiddle ran for 365 performances during the 1931-1932 season, something of a miracle for a show to run that long. Most of the score remained intact from the Broadway show. Some big hits for the Kern-Harbach team that came out of that show were She Didn't Say Yes, The Night Was Made for Love, I Like to Watch the Love Parade, and Try to Forget all sung nicely enough by Jeanette and/or Ramon.

While Jeanette's career was on the rise, Ramon was on the downhill slide being propelled like a toboggan by Louis B. Mayer. He was living as openly gay a life as a star could back in the day. Right around this time another gay star William Haines was being given the heave ho by MGM and the Code was on the horizon. Novarro would soon be leaving the USA for Europe and his native Mexico.

The plot concerns two music students in Brussels, American Shirley Sheridan and Victor Florescu presumably Rumanian. Like the usual awkward beginning associated with MacDonald/Eddy movies they are soon at work and in love. However producer/impresario Frank Morgan has designs on Jeanette and Ramon has caught the eye of former diva Vivienne Segal.

This was Vivienne Segal's last film in an otherwise disastrous fling in Hollywood. Making her debut in 1915 she was a leading musical comedy star of Broadway and like a whole lot of Broadway players went to Hollywood when pictures began to talk. She didn't fare well at all in her films and in this last film she's supporting Jeanette. But she sings New Love is Old and Well and being The Cat and the Fiddle is out on at least VHS, it is the only way today's fans can see one of Broadway's leading stars.

Funny how situations can be played for either drama or comedy. A bum check is played for laughs in the Marx Brothers film Room Service. Here in The Cat and the Fiddle the plot calls for Novarro to write a bum check in order to keep his show going for five days after Segal's husband pulls her out of the show. That could have been real serious.

Are you curious as to what happens?

There's little chemistry to be felt between Ramon Novarro as a broke songwriter out to get his operetta produced and Jeanette MacDonald as a singer who is obviously the right choice for the lead. They seem more like arguing siblings than a passion-driven couple, lacking what worked with MGM's then rising team of Myrna Loy and William Powell. Still, the MGM gloss is working overtime here, even if MacDonald isn't in possession of someone like Maurice Chevalier, her oft co-star at Paramount with whom she would make her MGM debut opposite in the huge smash "The Merry Widow". I have mixed feelings about her chemistry with Nelson Eddy; It was obviously present in some yet sorely lacking in a few of their co-starring roles, but never was it as flaccid as the pairing here.

No matter how masculine and virile Novarro tries to be, he's never convincing, and a rather high-pitched voice defiles his attempts at masculine wooing of the leading lady. When producer Frank Morgan, in agreement to produce the operetta, takes an interest in Jeanette, you know he could swat Novarro out of the way instantly, so no amount of script tinkering can make the pairing work. Charles Butterworth gives his typically droll performance, coming off like Stan Laurel's slightly more sophisticated uncle, while Jean Hersholt is his usual wise, kindly adviser. Henry Armetta is very amusing as the horn-tooting taxi driver, while Broadway musical veteran Vivienne Segal (in one of her few film appearances) is seen briefly as a diva who threatens to take on the lead before MacDonald finally steps in.

An out-of-the-blue color finale comes on just minutes before the film ends which is rather jarring the way it suddenly appears. There seems no real purpose to it other than to get some easy publicity for its inclusion.