The Great Lover (1931 film)

Not to be confused with Die große Liebe (The Great Love) (1931 film).

The Great Lover is a 1931 American pre-Code romantic drama film directed by Harry Beaumont and starring Adolphe Menjou and Irene Dunne. The supporting cast includes Ernest Torrence, Neil Hamilton and Olga Baclanova. It as produced and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and based on the 1915 The Great Lover by Leo Ditrichstein. Dunne was loaned from RKO for the film.

The Great Lover
Directed by	Harry Beaumont
Written by	Gene Markey Edgar Allan Woolf
Based on	The Great Lover 1915 play by Leo Ditrichstein Fanny Hatton Frederick Hatton
Starring	Adolphe Menjou Irene Dunne Ernest Torrence
Cinematography	Merritt B. Gerstad
Edited by	Helene Warne
Music by	Charles-François Gounod
Production company	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date	July 18, 1931 (1931-07-18)
Running time	71 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

Plot

Jean Paurel is a famous opera star, who agrees to help Diana Page her career, in order to take advantage of her. But instead he finds himself falling in love with her.

Cast

• Adolphe Menjou as Jean Paurel
• Irene Dunne as Diana Page
• Ernest Torrence as Potter
• Neil Hamilton as Carlo
• Olga Baclanova as Savarova
• Cliff Edwards as Finney
• Hale Hamilton as Stapleton
• Roscoe Ates as Rosco
• Herman Bing as Losseck
• Elsa Janssen as Madam Neumann Baumbach
• Lilian Bond as Mrs. Loring

Production

An earlier version, also based on the 1915 play, was The Great Lover (1920), starring John Sainpolis and Claire Adams.

The 1949 film The Great Lover starring Bob Hope was similar in title only.

Bibliography

• Gehring, Wes D. Irene Dunne: First Lady of Hollywood. Scarecrow Press, 2006.
• Goble, Alan. The Complete Index to Literary Sources in Film. Walter de Gruyter, 1999.

External links

• The Great Lover at IMDb
• The Great Lover at AllMovie
• The Great Lover at the TCM Movie Database
• The Great Lover at the AFI Catalog of Feature Films