Bühne frei für Marika (1958)

Two years ago, former dancer Marion Müller divorced her husband, the well-known composer Michael Norman, in Reno, America. She could no longer bear having to lead an insignificant life in her husband’s shadow, especially since she had given up her dancing career for him. After the divorce, she founded a talent agency, but it has had little success. Mümmelmann, the in-house agent at the local Palace Theatre, does support her and occasionally brings her a client, but he turns away from her too when a band Marion had heavily promoted turns out to be an amateur outfit. Now only one person still stands by her: as he did last year, her ex-husband Michael asks her right on the anniversary of their divorce whether she will marry him again, since he still loves her. Once again she refuses, insisting that she must first become successful before saying yes to him again. When Michael hears that Frank Flemming, the boyfriend of Marion’s secretary Inge, has recently become a gossip columnist for the local newspaper, he comes up with a plan. Over the next few weeks, Frank is to keep writing about Marion in his gossip column, creating artificial publicity that will lead to bookings and make Marion genuinely famous. The whole talent agency would benefit—not least Michael, who would then be able to marry Marion again. To keep the deception from being exposed, Marion is to appear under the stage name “Marika Karoly.” Marion does not know that the whole thing is Michael’s plan. He wants Marion to dance to his music, and finds Walter Brand, a man who will pass himself off to Marion as the composer of Michael’s pieces. Michael, in turn, blackmails Marion, threatening to reveal the truth about her false identity publicly unless she presents him as Marika Karoly’s husband. She agrees, since now she can show him what it is like to be the insignificant spouse of a star. In fact, the major theatres are clamoring to book the mysterious Marika, whom no one has seen dance but whom everyone is talking about. She signs a contract with the Palace Theatre. Frank’s newspaper stages a grand reception at the railway station, and everyone is charmed by “Marika’s” Hungarian accent, wit, and charm—and by the way she repeatedly puts her husband firmly in his place. Rehearsals are under way, but the in-house agent Mümmelmann soon realizes that Marika is none other than Marion. Out of wounded vanity, he reveals her true identity to the theatre director because Schühlein had hired Marika behind his back. A scandal seems imminent, but it is averted: Frank Flemming in particular convinces the theatre management that the sold-out premiere should go ahead, since what matters is not so much the name as the performance. When Michael Norman admits that he himself wrote the revue’s music, the management can now put another big name on its posters as well. Shortly before the premiere, Marion is kidnapped by Elvira Schühlein, a former revue dancer and now the frustrated wife of the theatre director, but Mümmelmann frees her and is finally granted the share of Marika’s profits he has long wanted. The revue is a great success, and Marika finally agrees to marry Michael again. In the end, however, this proves unnecessary, because the divorce in Reno was never legally valid due to an error. They will get married anyway, since Frank Flemming has also successfully proposed to his girlfriend Inge.