Frank Luther, a popular tenor on 1930s radio programs and an incredibly prolific recording artist who sang on hundreds of phonograph records, covering literally every genre then in existence, was the lead performer in a number of 1-reel and 2-reel short subjects filmed in New York before going to California in the latter part of 1936 to star in "High Hat." The feature, released by Imperial Pictures and based on a novel by the prolific Alma Sioux Scarberry, deals with radio - a major competitor for the attention of potential theater patrons in the 1930s - and presents Luther as Suwanee Collyer, an admired singer of pop music, who tries to persuade lovely Elanda Lee (Dorothy Dare) to cease her efforts to perform highbrow music and to give the public the swingy tunes of the era.
Lona Andre, Gavin Gordon, Ferdinand Munier, Harry Harvey, Franklin Pangborn, Esther Muir, and Clarence Muse perform supporting roles effectively, but the focus is on the radio station and the presentation of programs geared to the public's taste. Frank Luther's excellent singing and the dancing/singing of lovely Dorothy Dare are well worth the admission price, and for those unaware of how big an attraction radio was in those pre-television days of the Depression, "High Hat" pleasantly takes the viewer back to an era never to be again.
Luther went on to literally dominate the field of children's recordings in the 1930s and '40s, and appeared on both radio and television as an entertainer specializing in performances for young audiences through the 1960s, recording new material in stereo through the 1970s. He richly deserves the star bearing his name on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. After "High Hat," however, he made no other theatrical film.
