This featherweight Warner Brothers boxing comedy stars John Payne as a singing waiter who loses his job when he decks a heckler - a choice that leads to a second career when fight promoters Walter Catlett and Charles D. Brown see a goldmine in the "golden-voiced terror with a lullaby in each fist." Only a few years into his film career, Payne's wholesome handsomeness and plummy baritone binging voice got him assigned to such lightweight fare as Tin Pan Alley (1940), Weekend in Havana (1941), and Sun Valley Serenade (1941); at this point the actor was still a decade away from his career-making turn in the Fox holiday perennial Miracle on 34th Street (1949) and subsequent starring roles in such film noir classics as Kansas City Confidential (1952) and 99 River Street (1953). Also on deck for greater glory was leading lady Jane Wyman, then newly married to actor Ronald Reagan and a few years shy from her own career turning point, playing Ray Milland's understanding fiancée in The Lost Weekend (1945), from an Academy Award nomination for The Yearling (1947), and from earning Oscar gold playing the title role in Johnny Belinda (1948). First-time director George Amy was better known in Hollywood as an editor, having cut such films as Doctor X (1932), 20,000 Years in Sing Sing (1932), and Kid Galahad (1937), about a hotel bellhop who becomes a reluctant prizefighter.

By Richard Harland Smith