Balalaika

Balalaika (1939)

Where there's wine, women, and song!

A Russian prince disguised as a worker and a cafe singer secretly involved in revolutionary activities fall in love.

Date of release
1939-12-15
TMDB
5.3 / 10 (6)
Runtime
1h 42m
Genres
Romance, Music
Director
Reinhold Schünzel

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Awards: 0 · Nominations: 1

Balalaika is a 1939 American musical romance film based on the 1936 London stage musical of the same name. Produced by Lawrence Weingarten and directed by Reinhold Schunzel, it starred Nelson Eddy and Ilona Massey.

Production notes

Various sources agree that MGM was planning to make this film two years before production actually began. Filming started in June 1939, although Eddy and Massey spent the four weeks prior to shooting pre-recording their musical numbers.

Miliza Korjus was offered the role of Lydia but "thought it was a joke." She turned it down on the assumption Eddy would again be teamed with Jeanette MacDonald, apparently unaware that both Eddy and MacDonald were demanding solo star roles from the studio, or that the studio had agreed. She was devastated to learned that Ilona Massey had accepted the role, losing the opportunity to work with "that gorgeous hunk of baritone".

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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