Song plugger Bill Spencer is fired and starts his own music-publishing business. He hires secretary Miss Murphy and gains a partner in Freddy Lee, a young man from Texas, with whom he peddles a song that piano player Chester Dooley has written. When they hear that singer Terry Martin is performing with trumpeter Harry James at a club, they visit the club to pitch the song to her. Bill had met Terry's sister Liza, who is also in the act. in an earlier awkward encounter.
Freddy annoys Terry but the girls like the song "I'll Get By" and agree to record it, making them huge successes. Before a benefit in Hollywood, when the actress Jeanne Crain asks to perform the song, Bill refuses because he had promised it to Liza. Without Bill's knowledge, Freddy allows Crain to sing it. Liza is furious and leaves Bill, refusing to listen to his attempts to explain.
The boys are drafted into the Marines, and when they report to a San Diego base, they encounter Miss Murphy, who is now stationed there as an officer. After the boys leave on duty, Miss Murphy explains to Liza and Terry what had happened with the song. The girls embark on a USO show tour to the South Pacific where the guys have been sent, and they all are reunited.
Production was halted in May 1950 after star June Haver collapsed on the set during a strenuous dance scene. She was brought home in an ambulance and was later rushed to the hospital in critical condition with a painful abscess in her side that required surgery. Haver's return was repeatedly delayed by her doctors.[5][6][7] With no timetable for Haver's return and at least one more dancing scene to be filmed, the studio elected to shoot additional scenes. The two-month postponement cost the studio as much as $200,000.[8]
Reception
In a contemporary review for The New York Times, critic Thomas M. Pryor wrote: "There is so much vocalizing and instrumental activity on the sound track that the story doesn't stand a chance. Just as well, perhaps, because the romantic drama is nothing to write home about. The screen play serves merely as a prop to keep the music going round ... The most incredible thing about the picture is that no less than five people are listed in the credits as having contributed to the screen play. One is prompted to ask, 'How come so much labor and so little results?'"[2]
Critic John L. Scott of the Los Angeles Times called I'll Get By "an engaging film with engaging people" and wrote that a "slight story framework holds together long enough to get its performers to the last sequence".[1]
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