Newleyweds George Brent and Joan Bennett find that marriage isn't easy, especially when confusion is abound among the marriages of New York society not made easier by a million dollar kiss that Bennett sold for war bonds. This kiss was pretty heated, coming from Russian opera star Mischa Auer who just happens to live in Brent and Bennett's swank Park Avenue apartment building with jealous wife Glenda Farrell. Another jealous wife (Una Merkel) demands that her husband move into another building, far away from Bennett, even though it's obvious that her husband (Ernest Truex) is about as interesting to Bennett as a lover as Hitler would be, and soon Farrell and Auer follow suit as well, moving into the very same building.
By chance, Bennett and Brent also move there too, and after a misunderstanding with his wife, Brent decides to return home to beg for forgiveness, ironically the very same night that Truex and a drunken Auer are in there as well. Will he discover, along with the jealous wives, the presence of these men in what should be his private abode? Fast moving sex farce provides plenty of time for a ton of innuendo and crazy situations which producer Edward Small was updating with several other old sex farces from the golden age of drawing room comedy.
"Up in Mabel's Room" and "Getting Gertie's Garter" were the other two, but this one probably ranks as the best, and certainly the most prestigious with its "A" list cast headlining with a bunch of comical supporting players. In addition to the bombastic Auer, the wise-cracking Farrell, the shrewish Merkel and the portly Truex, there's also Margaret Hamilton as the sarcastic housekeeper and Thurston Hall (obviously the influence for "Gilligan's Island's" Thurston Howell) as a salesman (of ladies' underwear) who encounters Brent on a train, chews his ear off, but somehow unknowingly manages to talk some sense into him.
Joan Bennett is at her most gorgeous here, somehow emulating Myrna Loy in a more risqué version of the types of comedy's Loy had been starring in at MGM with William Powell. Brent, considered by some to be a second-rate Powell, was perhaps one of the most underrated leading men in Hollywood. However, when you're constantly cast opposite the most famous leading ladies in Hollywood (Davis, Francis, Blondell, Chatterton, Loy, etc.), you must be doing something right. He always made everything he did look easy, and that is never really as easy as it sounds. This might not seem anything close to a situation which could really happen, but at under 90 minutes, it's frivolous farce, and certainly was a perfect distraction of war weary audiences who needed, and got laughs, in the few remaining screwball comedy's of the post-war years.
By chance, Bennett and Brent also move there too, and after a misunderstanding with his wife, Brent decides to return home to beg for forgiveness, ironically the very same night that Truex and a drunken Auer are in there as well. Will he discover, along with the jealous wives, the presence of these men in what should be his private abode? Fast moving sex farce provides plenty of time for a ton of innuendo and crazy situations which producer Edward Small was updating with several other old sex farces from the golden age of drawing room comedy.
"Up in Mabel's Room" and "Getting Gertie's Garter" were the other two, but this one probably ranks as the best, and certainly the most prestigious with its "A" list cast headlining with a bunch of comical supporting players. In addition to the bombastic Auer, the wise-cracking Farrell, the shrewish Merkel and the portly Truex, there's also Margaret Hamilton as the sarcastic housekeeper and Thurston Hall (obviously the influence for "Gilligan's Island's" Thurston Howell) as a salesman (of ladies' underwear) who encounters Brent on a train, chews his ear off, but somehow unknowingly manages to talk some sense into him.
Joan Bennett is at her most gorgeous here, somehow emulating Myrna Loy in a more risqué version of the types of comedy's Loy had been starring in at MGM with William Powell. Brent, considered by some to be a second-rate Powell, was perhaps one of the most underrated leading men in Hollywood. However, when you're constantly cast opposite the most famous leading ladies in Hollywood (Davis, Francis, Blondell, Chatterton, Loy, etc.), you must be doing something right. He always made everything he did look easy, and that is never really as easy as it sounds. This might not seem anything close to a situation which could really happen, but at under 90 minutes, it's frivolous farce, and certainly was a perfect distraction of war weary audiences who needed, and got laughs, in the few remaining screwball comedy's of the post-war years.