RKO's They Made Her a Spy (1939) was not actress Sally Eilers' first stab at cinematic espionage. A discovery of Mack Sennett (by way of actress friend Carole Lombard, who provided the introduction), Eilers went on to be a WAMPAS Baby Star (Class of 1928, alongside Lupé Velez) and enjoyed starring roles alongside Buster Keaton in Doughboys (1930), in Quick Millions (1931) with Spencer Tracy, and in Frank Borzage's Bad Girl (1931), opposite James Dunn. She was called to Great Britain to play an actress ensnared by an international spy ring in Allan Dwan's I Spy (1931) but her popularity with moviegoers on both sides of the Atlantic waned by mid-decade, after which she stepped into character parts. Once dubbed "the most beautiful girl in movies" (both Sennett and Florenz Ziegfeld claimed coinage copyright), Eilers rebounded at RKO, where she starred in a few efficient B-pictures aimed at the bottom berth of a double bill. In Jack HIvely's They Made Her a Spy (1939), Eilers plays a comely civilian driven into government service by the death of her soldier brother at the hands of foreign saboteurs. As had his leading lady, second-billed Allan Lane had played prominent roles for the major studios earlier in his career but he eventually migrated to Republic Pictures, where he played cowboy hero Red Ryder before rebranding himself as Allan "Rocky" Lane for a ten-year run of signature shoot-em-ups; the actor later provided the voice of TV's favorite talking horse Mr. Ed, for six seasons on CBS.

By Richard Harland Smith