They Made Her a Spy ** (1939, Sally Eilers, Allan Lane, Fritz Leiber, Frank M Thomas) – Classic Movie Review 12,084

‘UNCLE SAM CRACKS DOWN ON SPIES! A lone woman risks life – for love – and sweet vengeance!’

Director Jack Hively’s RKO Radio Pictures 1939 American black and white spy drama film They Made Her a Spy stars Sally Eilers, Allan Lane, Fritz Leiber, and Frank M Thomas.

Sally Eilers plays Irene Eaton, who joins the US secret service and goes undercover to find the culprits who killed her brother by sabotage in the mysterious explosion of a new field gun for the US Army. Frank M Thomas plays Colonel John Shaw, head of US Army Military Intelligence, who appoints Irene to root out the sabotage gang, and sends her to its headquarters, the Dome Café.

The screenplay, written by Jo Pagano and later Academy Award winner Michael Kanin (in his first screenplay), is based on a story by George Bricker and Lionel Houser.

It runs 69 minutes.

The film premiered in New York City on 29 March 1939 and was released on 14 April 1939 in the US.

It is Hively’s first film as director after five years as an RKO film editor. He directed three of The Saint films, with George Sanders.

In 1939 Michael Kanin got a screenwriting contract at RKO, where he met his future wife and collaborator Fay Mitchell [Fay Kanin]. With Ring Lardner Jr he won an Academy Award for Woman of the Year (1942), and received a best screenplay Oscar nomination (along with his wife) for the comedy Teacher’s Pet (1958). Kanin produced the popular Ronald Colman melodrama A Double Life (1947), written by his brother Garson Kanin and sister-in-law Ruth Gordon, and directed one film, When I Grow Up (1951).

Allan Lane and Lucille Ball.

Allan Lane [‘Rocky Lane’] became a prolific star of low-budget Westerns, mainly for Republic Pictures,

The films of Jack Hively: They Made Her a Spy (1939), Panama Lady (1939), The Spellbinder (1939), Three Sons (1939), Two Thoroughbreds (1939), The Saint’s Double Trouble (1940), The Saint Takes Over (1940), Anne of Windy Poplars (1940), Laddie (1940), The Saint in Palm Springs (1941), They Met in Argentina (1941), Father Takes a Wife (1941), Four Jacks and a Jill (1942), Street of Chance (1942), Appointment in Tokyo (1945) Are You with It? (1948), and Starbird and Sweet William (1973).

© Derek Winnert 2022 Classic Movie Review 12,084

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