Still image from the 1942 film I Married an Angel.

I Married an Angel

Directed by Maj. W. S. Van Dyke Ii

A playboy drops his many girlfriends when he falls in love with a grounded angel.

1942 1h 24m Musical TV-G

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CAST
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Maj. W. S. Van Dyke Ii, Director
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Maj. W. S. Van Dy..
Director

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Jeanette Macdonald, Anna [Zador]/Brigitta
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Jeanette Macdonal..
Anna [Zador]/Brigitta..

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Nelson Eddy, Count [Willie] Palaffi
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Nelson Eddy
Count [Willie] Palaff..

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Edward Everett Horton, Peter
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Edward Everett Ho..
Peter

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Binnie Barnes, Peggy
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Binnie Barnes
Peggy

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Reginald Owen,
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Reginald Owen
"Whiskers" [Herman Ro..

FULL SYNOPSIS

At Budapest's venerable Palaffi Bank, Count Willie Palaffi is warned by his advisor, Herman "Whiskers" Rothbart, that the institution's largest depositors are tired of Willie's playboy lifestyle and inattention to business, and may start a run on the bank. Marika Szabo, Willie's secretary and one of his many girl friends, tells Herman that Willie is throwing a big costume party for his birthday the following week, and Herman insists that Anna Zador, a winsome young typist in the bank, be invited. At Willie's lavish party, the glamorous guests laugh when Anna arrives in a cheaply constructed angel costume. After a brief dance with Anna, whom he had never noticed during her six years with the bank, Willie sneaks upstairs to his study. Herman scolds Willie for being unmarried and advises him to find a virtuous woman. When Herman leaves, Willie dozes on the couch and has a dream: A real angel, Brigitta, appears in the room and tells Willie she has come from heaven to marry him. Literally walking on air, Willie and Brigitta go to Paris and are married. At Willie's Paris home, Brigitta announces her intention to return to heaven for the night, but Willie's kiss changes her mind. In the morning, Brigitta awakens to discover that she has lost her wings. Willie takes her shopping, and Brigitta offends the couturiers by refusing to wear anything with feathers or fur, but when Willie explains that she is really an angel, they hasten to assemble a suitable wardrobe. They ...


VIDEOS
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Original Trailer
Trailer

ARTICLES
It took nine years to get I Married an Angel (1942) to the screen, with a detour via Broadway to prove the material commercially viable. But after all that effort, it turned out to be a rare musical flop for MGM. And although it contains some charming musical sequences, particularly an out-of-character jitterbug for star Jeanette MacDonald, it's now largely remembered as the picture that ended her on-screen romance with Nelson Eddy. Songwriters Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart first worked on the script, with playwright Moss Hart, in 1933. Even then, the story was hardly new. It was an adaptation of a Hungarian play by Vassary Janos that had been a success in Europe. From the start, they envisioned it as a vehicle for Jeanette MacDonald, who had just triumphed on-screen as the star of their Love Me Tonight (1932). They pitched the project to MGM, where MacDonald had just signed a long-term contract, but were turned down by studio head Louis B. Mayer. Not only did he dislike the story's fantasy element (a devil-may-care banker saves his family business by marrying the only woman good enough for him, an angel), but the censorship problems in a story about an angel giving up her wings to wed and bed a mortal seemed insurmountable. Not ready to give up on the project, Rodgers and Hart finally got the story packaged for Broadway, where it scored a big hit in 1938. Singing stars Dennis King and Vivienne Segal headlined the cast, with prima ballerina ...

NOTES

Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart adapted Vaszary Janos' play for the screen in 1932, and according to a Hollywood Reporter news item, M-G-M beat Paramount in a bidding war for the rights. According to information in the file on the film in the MPAA/PCA Collection at the AMPAS Library, however, the screenplay was emphatically rejected by the Hays Office, which considered the story of a man who marries an angel "blasphemous and sacrilegious." Rodgers and Hart then adapted I Married an Angel as a stage musical, and after the show's successful Broadway opening in 1938, M-G-M again acquired the rights and assigned Bob Wright and Chet Forrest to rework Hart's lyrics. The musical number "Little Workaday World" was cut from the released film.
       September and October 1941 news items in Hollywood Reporter announced that George Cukor would direct the film, and that Marie Wilson had been cast in a leading role. Hollywood Reporter news items include Max Lucke, Roland Varno, Frances Carson, Bess Flowers and character actress Doris Day (not the more famous actress-singer of the same name) in the cast, but their appearance in the final film has not been confirmed. Director Roy Del Ruth was replaced by W. S. Van Dyke on November 4, 1941, several weeks into production. Janis Carter was borrowed from Twentieth Century-Fox for the production. According to a Hollywood Reporter news item, portions of the film were shot on location in Sherwood Forest, CA. The film was re-edited after trade screenings in March 1942. I Married an Angel was producer Hunt Stromberg's last film at M-G-M; he launched his career as an independent producer with the 1943 film Lady of Burlesque (see below). This also was the last film that Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy made together.

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