Girls About Town

Lilyan Tashman could sit and read the telephone book and make it funny. Someone needs to give this woman, and her tragically short career, a retrospective. This time she's got a sumptuous Paramount production, George Cukor at the wheel, everyone's favorite clotheshorse Kay Francis as co-star. Not enough? How about the great black actress Louise Beavers, whose entrance in the film is a scream (I'll say no more, lest I ruin it). It's a witty piece of art deco comedy, with Tashman and Francis as ermine-caped gold diggers, and Eugene Palette (not quite yet obese) and handsome Joel McCrea as the latest targets. Like so many Paramount films of the early 30s, its still fresh and contemporary, thanks to its grown up, pre-Code script. And those opening credits--couples dancing over the new york skyline--just icing on the cake. Don't miss this.

No one says it in the picture and it's not in anyone's review, but aren't the girls in the title hookers? Thought so. Of course, this is a pre-code film and I guess it was acceptable to depict them rather than actually come out and declare same. I wasn't alive in the 30's, but that's how I read it.

That said, "Girls About Town" is a very funny picture with a good script and an even better cast. Kay Francis is one of my favorites, very feminine and demure, even as a, well, I already covered that. She was ably assisted by Lilyan Tashman, a comedienne who had a tragically short career in movies. Lots of energy and not bad looking. Joel McCrea is window dressing as he sleepwalks through his part but Eugene Palette holds up the male side of the fun. Louise Beavers is on hand with a bigger role than she is usually given. Tough luck for her she was a black in Hollywood in the 30's.

The picture gets a little far afield towards the end. I always get the impression writers come up with a clever idea for a story but often can't figure out how to end it and go for a predictable lameness, Exhibit A being "Harvey". But in my book "Girls About Town" had already earned its spurs, to mix a metaphor.

We follow a couple of girls - Kay Francis (Wanda) and Lilyan Tashman (Marie) - as they are given different escort assignments by their agent Alan Dinehart (Jerry). They work as a pair and share an apartment obviously paid for by the wealthy clients who have made payment to them. You get what I'm saying? Things change for one of them when assigned as escorts onto a boat containing wealthy Eugene Pallette (Benji) and Joel McCrea (Jim).

The film is a comedy and the lead women are good in their roles. Pallette is sometimes inaudible and incomprehensible with that peculiar squawking he does, whilst McCrea is there for eye candy. There are a couple of side plots going on and all-in-all it is an enjoyable film.

This one remains a favorite pre-Code with Kay Francis and Lilyan Tashman playing a couple of party girls who work with Alan Dinehart to bilk the out-of-town rubes who come to New York City for a good time. Lots of zippy one-liners as the "girls" parade around in plunging gowns and dripping with jewels. After they ditch the boys from Des Moines (George Barbier, Robert McWade) they go on a yachting party and get involved with Joel McCrea and Eugene Pallette from Lansing. While Kay falls for McCrea, Lilyan tangles with Eugene and his wife (Lucile Gleason) to wrest some needed jewelry from cheapo Eugene. Great fun. The film takes a dramatic turn toward the end when Kay's discarded husband (Anderson Lawler) shows up on the mooch. Louise Beavers has a funny role as the girls' maid and Frances Bavier appears as one of the party girls.

Not to be missed!

'Girls About Town' is a fascinating example of the winking immorality that prevailed in Hollywood in the early 1930s, causing the public uproar that led to the Production Code.

Lilyan Tashman and Kay Francis play a couple of ... well, it's not quite clear how these ladies earn a living, as they sleep until 5.30pm (Lilyan sleeps in her makeup) and then they spend all night at parties with wealthy businessmen. They live in a penthouse and wear $4,000 fur stoles in 1931. (Depression? What Depression?) Kay Francis's character is named Wanda, but Lilyan keeps calling her 'Matilda' and 'Annabelle' and other such names.

Now get this. Wanda is a good-time girl who doesn't WANT to be a good-time girl. She'd trade it all for a white picket fence and a husband. Actually, she's already got a husband (played by Anderson Lawler), but she'd rather have a husband who looks like Joel McCrea. That decision is the only thing in this movie that's remotely believable. When I saw Louise Beavers's name in the cast list, I expected her to be lumbered with her usual typecast role as the chucklin' black maid. Well, she DOES play the maid ... but this time Beavers gets to do an amusing visual gag, impersonating Whistler's Mother. And she has a clever line: 'There comes a time in every woman's life when a man needs five dollars.'

This film is directed by George Cukor, not usually thought of as a Paramount director. The opening credit sequence is very impressive, and there are some good montages. I wish they'd left out the tight close-up of Eugene Palllette's puckered lips. At the climax, there are some very effective jump cuts to several pieces of jewellery worn by Lucile Gleason ... in fact, this is the only time I've ever seen an impressive performance from James Gleason's wife.

Lilyan Tashman does a bad job of singing 'Ben Bolt' while slinging wisecracks. I dislike her outright. My feelings towards Kay Francis are more ambiguous. In real life, Kay Francis was well-liked in the film industry and active in charity work. So, I respect her as a person but I dislike her as an actress. She studied diction under Elmer Fudd. She apparently orders her mascara by the tankload (because that's how she wears it), and she keeps doing this weird gesture where she pronates her right hand while she places it way up high on her hip. I liked this movie, but I would have liked it better with two other actresses.

One of my favourite character actors, Alan Dinehart, is wasted here. It's not precisely clear what his character does for a living, but he seems to be the (erm, ah, well) 'agent' for the party girls. Much of the action takes place aboard a yacht, presumably anchored outside the three-mile limit where Prohibition had no jurisdiction. I was impressed by a travelling shot of McCrea swimming, with the camera just above water level, yet with no water splashing on the lens to remind us of the camera's presence. Much of the dialogue is by Raymond Griffith, a silent-film comedian who later became a successful producer at Fox.

With all the clothes and jewellery and booze on display here, I'm sure a lot of movie-goers in 1931 watched this film with their tongues hanging out. I'll rate this movie 7 out of 10.