“IRISH EYES ARE SMILING”

Dominion, Volume 39, Issue 27, 26 October 1945, Page 5

“IRISH EYES ARE SMILING”

The fact that none of the players or characters in this alluring film at the King's Theatre are Irish has little or no-

thing to do with its many angles of up proach to the heart. It is a capita example of what skilful direction and pro duction can do with thcutreproof uot-so new material, given the right people if , the cast. The picture is a tribute to Ern est It. Ball, the American writer of suet song hits as “Mother Machree, “A Littli Bit of Heaven.” “When Irish Eyes an Smiling,” and "Bet the Rest of the .World Go By,”, and other best-sellers ol a quarter of a century ago. Didi Haymes, not over-attractive, plays the character of the song-writer on rather blunt but sincere lines. It is when Ball, rather despondent, is feeling for a place in the sun, that he falls in love with Mary O'Brien (who is about as Irish as the Statue of Liberty), a battler in the vaude-ville-cum-cabaret wav. Both arc broke, but Ball declares that one day the world will listen to his songs. The two part. In New York, Ball is "plugging” at a night club with an indifferent song, when be gets "the, bird,” sits down and sings his . own song, "Let the Rest of the World Go By,” which immediately becomes a riot. He climbs to dizzy heights as a best-seller, and at last meets his Mary, paging at an hotel. It is this place that Edgar Brawley and Al Jackson, smarties, who seek to protit by Ball's success, enter into a silly wager. Brawley bets Jackson 25,000 dollars that he could in three months make a star out of the next woman iwho emerged from, the women’s retiring room. This wager and its consequences lead to no end of fun, for the girl proves to be Mary, and within three months she is a star in her own right, as several bright ensemble dancing splashes show. June Haver, a neat blonde of undoubted beauty, makes a lovely Mary, and Montv Woolley is always an eyeful, with bis severe white . beard and savage cynicism. The stage scenes, with their Irish songs and lively Jigs, are snapptly done, and the singing of Leonard Warren, baritone, and Blanche Tliebom. is vocalism on a grand opera scale. The contralto has an exceptionally powerful voice of appealing timbre, and her singing of "Mother Machree” is well worth hearing. "Irish Eyes are Smiling” is a technleolour picture for nil ages, tastes and nationalities—it is good theatre.