Sweet Adeline

For the second of two songs from the 1929 Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II operetta, with an elaborate shot from director Mervyn LeRoy and cameraman Sol Polito, we find the title character (Irene Dunne) testing out a new tune by her beau Sid (Donald Woods), cueing a tiff, in Warner Bros.’ Sweet Adeline, 1934.

In a Hoboken, NJ German-style beer garden ca. 1898, Irene Dunne (title character and daughter of the owner) aims to impress the U.S. Army recruiter and (Spanish-American War) hero Major Day (Louis Calhern), with a song from the original 1929 Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II operetta, in Warner Bros.’ Sweet Adeline, 1934.