In the summer of 1943, Travilla was engaged by Paramount producer Boris Morros to create the costumes for his lavish Broadway-bound opera The Waltz King. Based upon composer Johann Strauss's life, Travilla was to design for the dance sequence starring Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo prima ballerina Tatiana Riabouchinska. The production's investors included Jack Benny, Bing Crosby, Walt Disney, Deanna Durbin, Joan Fontaine, Betty Grable, Cary Grant, Barbara Hutton, Jeanette MacDonald, Otto Preminger, Basil Rathbone, and Paul Robson. The show premiered in September at the Philharmonic Auditorium. The show moved to Long Beach, then the Chicago Civic Opera House, by the end of October. Broadway still on the horizon; until Morris had closed the show Thanksgiving weekend, with unfulfilled plans to return to Hollywood and turn it into a film.
Variety found Travilla's "gorgeous ballet" costumes "fresh and chic."
Unknown to most, but not J. Edgar Hoover, Morris was a card-carrying Communist. Three weeks after closing the show, he became a spy for the Russian government. Four years later, he became a double agent, which Morris wrote about in a 1959 autobiography, but no mention of The Waltz King.
Travilla worked with Claire Trevor again in another Western film called The Woman of the Town.
With film work slow, socialites, studio wives, and actresses bought exclusive Travilla designs from Drew Tetrick's Rodeo Drive salon. Among the dresses, gowns, suits, coats, hostess gowns, and pajamas available, film comedian Judy Canova's maternity dress, "A navy blue little boy sailor suit costume with a cleverly designed loose top," earned a mention in Frances Seully's fashion column.
He was announced as the designer for Leonard Stillman's New Faces of 1945 to begin filming at Republic Studios before 1944 ended, which didn't happen, and production started in July and the title morphed into An Angel Comes to Brooklyn. The absurd plot revolved around an angel from Actor's Heaven who returns to Earth to help a Broadway producer put on a show with a group of untalented youngsters so that a struggling young actress will have a job.
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