Andrés de Segurola — He Has an Operatic Past (1928) 🇺🇸

A man who cannot retire.

That is the predicament of Andrés de Segurola, who gained fame as an opera singer. But when he gave up a singing career to pass the remainder of his days in peace and comfort, he suddenly found himself dragged into the limelight again, with prospects of remaining there for some time to come.

De Segurola was a leading bass-barytone at the Metropolitan Opera House, in New York, at the time he resigned, in 1920. He refused to wait until his voice should fail and be asked to retire. So he proceeded to follow his whims — as an impresario, taking his own company to Havana each year for a season of opera, and sponsoring a series of Artistic Mornings at the Plaza Hotel, in New York.

Gloria Swanson was selecting the cast for her first independent picture, The Love of Sunya, and was looking for an actor to play the rôle of an impresario. As a last resort she turned to her old friend, De Segurola, and begged him to do it. He stepped in and gave a striking performance.

That ended De Segurola’s retirement. He was immediately besieged by other producers, and finally found it necessary to come to Hollywood last year to follow his new career. He has brought his voice on the screen in “Glorious Betsy,” the Napoleonic picture, in which he sings the Marseillaise over the Vitaphone.

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Collection: Picture Play Magazine, June 1928