A struggling actor, badly needing publicity, a publicity man, ready to anything for his studio and its stars, a naive girl, catapulted in limelight as the fresh new face, and the system, for which humans don't matter, the money they bring it does, and there can be no wrong methods,if it can spin in money. That in brief is what the movie was about. Did I like it? Frankly no, since the plot was too near reality, and who likes reality ? When one watches off beat movies, one is mentally prepared for that, but not in these type of movies. This dislike of course shows,to me, that the movie was well made and there were not many irritants, which would have brought it into the fantasy zone, and I would have dismissed it. Of course it was all well, till the ending. naturally I won't like the black-guard to go with the reward. There was that steady Lyle Talbot, who unfortunately almost always got the role of the sacrificial lamb, this was no exception. In this case, he could as well had been the winner, since the change of heart of the heroine wasn't called for since (a) there is the steady man (b) She at least considers herself to be in love with some one (c) there is a third person, who might be in love with her, but for her, he didn't exist, till the director told her he did, on rebound, she would have rather hated him, than being in love.The ending was rather forced and unnatural. It was made to make a hero of hero. Probably the hero could have been the one who stayed home, like in say Bucking Broadway (1917). I don't think a girl would reverse the affection. That is the other factor of my not being high on the movie.

I don't believe this is a movie that needs serious content evaluation. It was served up as a fun showcase for two of Hollywood's most popular stars and as a celebration of the tuneful talents of Irving Berlin. It delivers on all counts as far as I'm concerned. Henie is always enjoyable with her sparkling skating routines, fresh, unstudied acting approach and lively, dimpled face. In '39, the year Second Fiddle was released, Tyrone Power was by popular vote named "King of Hollywood." He also starred in 2 out of the top four highest-grossing films in that Magic Movie Year, 1939. Power created quite a PR storm having just married Suez co-star Annabella after a string of red-hot PR-promoted affairs with among others, Sonja Henie. Second Fiddle, on the one hand is a send up of the over-the-top publicity surrounding the search to find the perfect Scarlett O'Hara, while equally on the other hand it skewers Golden Era Hollywood's overheated PR habit. I would imagine that for audiences fed on gossip columns and fan magazines of the time you couldn't have done better than to star Henie and Power in a vehicle about "the big Hollywood build up." Viewed from that perspective it is a very funny inside joke indeed. Tyrone plays Jimmy Sutton,the PR wiz, in an easygoing and charming way. He is a natural and partners superbly with the excellent veteran character actress, Edna Mae Oliver. Both are consummately professional yet they really seem to be having fun with each other. Which is why, IMO, their comedic scenes together are as delightful as any put on film. Second Fiddle is full of great Berlin tunes that are imaginatively staged. Co-stars Rudy Vallee and Mary Healy do nicely and contribute to this fun golden oldie. Bubbly and light as air, King Lear it surely was never intended to be!

Suggested by the making of "Gone With The Wind", this one promises to be a very pleasant Irving Berlin musical. It certainly opens with all flags flying, and features a very inventively staged rendition of "An Old-Fashioned Tune". With the introduction of Miss Henie, however, the story settles down into the usual romantic complications. These are a little hard to take, since Ty Power is hardly God's gift to young women. With this fact staring everyone in the face, it seems incredible that such disappointingly little use is made of Harry Losee's shooting ensembles. Instead, Leon Shamroy's camera keeps on tracking back to Ty Power. This undoubtedly worked back in 1939, but it makes the movie of little interest to today's audiences. Fortunately, Berlin's pleasant melodies do save the day and, as noted above, I was particularly pleased by the staging of "An Old-Fashioned Tune".

This is a pleasant enough diversion which pokes gentle fun at the search for an 'unknown' to play the eponymous role in a film adaptation of a best selling novel. Someone actually gave this more than the customary ten seconds thought because it was released in 1939, the same year as Gone With The Wind, a film that had hogged headlines around the world via its search for the perfect heroine, Scarlett O'Hara; Scarlett was a Southern belle and in Second Fiddle the fictitious novel is The Girl From The North, the North carries connotations of snow and Sonja Henie came from a Northern country, Norway and was herself associated with both snow and ice and as if that were not enough, in Second Fiddle she is a resident of Bergen, Minnesota and Bergen is also, of course, an island off the coast of Norway. So, was it worth all this care. More or less. Publicist Tyrone Power is sent to bring Henie to Hollywood and naturally he falls in love with her but his job obliges him to engineer a 'romance' between Henie and Rudy Vallee, another studio 'property' in need of publicity; we now have a touch of the Cyrano's as Power is not only buying the flowers and candy that Henie thinks is coming from Vallee but is also writing the billed-doux and even goes so far as to compose a ballad, I Poured My Heart Into A Song, ostensibly written by Vallee. Edna May Oliver is also on hand to lob the odd droll asides into the mix and it all ends happily. A diverting 80 minutes or so.