The Student Prince

A remake of the 1927 picture based on the musical by Romberg and Donnelly and the straight play by Meyer-Foerster, this film is a pleasant trifle with some good musical numbers that were sung by Mario Lanza, but came out of the mouth of Purdom. Lanza had been scheduled to play the German prince, but his weight was always fluctuating, and when his temper began to rise and fall with the speed of his avoirdupois, the decision was made to toss him out and use Purdom. Since Lanza had already pre-recorded the tunes, that wasn't too tough, although the sound of the round tenor tones coming out of Purdom's slim chest does seem ludicrous, for a while. After the shock of it ...