Tonight or Never

Nella Vago is an opera singer. She is Hungarian. Her voice is fine but something is missing on stage. Her coach tells her so. What he says is that there is no passion in her singing. The reason he gives is her own life. Nella has never been in love. Her career has stalled because of it. Then a man appears. His name is Jim Fletcher. Nella is drawn to him. What she does on stage begins to change. The film was Melvyn Douglas’s first screen role. Boris Karloff plays a waiter in it. Coco Chanel made the gowns Gloria Swanson wears. Samuel Goldwyn produced it. The eighty minute film opened on 17 December 1931, an American production Mervyn LeRoy finished that year.