Next Time I Marry

Next time I Marry stars Lucille Ball and any ensemble cast – it's just like an episode of her TV show – it even has a silver air stream trailer in which she would make the "The Long Long Trailer" almost twenty years later with Ricky. In the usual RKO mixed up love story caper, the rich girl must marry a common everyday guy (the dashing James Ellison) before she gets her family money, but she has many secrets and tricks up her sleeve, most of which don't work out as planned. Ellison's best-known role was Buffalo Bill in "The Plainsman" 1936, along with parts in many westerns. Lee Bowman plays a foreign count whose accent comes and goes in an un-convincing supporting role. As with most Lucy roles, as long as you buy into the story, you'll have a fun time. Look for Richard Elliott, the short jolly mayor from Andy Griffith, as the Justice of the Peace. Story is credited to Thames Williamson, but movie buffs will recognize a similar plot from four years before this. Also appears to be the second movie that Garson Kanin directed. Fun but a little silly!

The plot to "Next Time I Marry" could have worked really well. However, whoever wrote the film really missed the mark when it came to Lucille Ball's character, Nancy. It strongly impacted how I liked the film...especially since it's supposed to be a romantic comedy.

When the story begins, Nancy stops at the side of the road and begins offering various men $500! Anthony (James Ellison) could use the money and he accepts...especially when she raises the money to $1000! So what does he need to do for the money? Marry her...a woman he just met!! Why would she do this? Apparently, she's an heiress but can only collect the money if she marries!

As I said, this idea could have worked. But the writer made Nancy unredeemingly selfish and cruel...to the point where it sure wasn't very funny. First, after marrying, she asks him to go get her some cigarettes in a store...and then drives away without him! Second, when he finally learns who he's married and where she lives, he shows up and she tells him to get lost....with no explanation why she did any of this!! To make it worse, Anthony had a dog in the car with her and she just dumped the animal at a kennel. When asked where, she basically said it wasn't important and she couldn't recall the place's name!! But it gets worse. Friends saw her being whisked away by Anthony (after he wants his dog!) and call the police. When the cops see the car and stops them, she claims she was kidnapped and he almost went to jail. But he is able to prove she's his wife....and the police let him go. Then, because she's angry at him and doesn't want to go with him (although he's done nothing wrong), she lights his trailer on fire!!! Why?? All this just makes Nancy seem evil and completely self-centered....and you really feel sorry for her poor husband. Can the film get better and overcome this huge problem as Anthony drives this 'lady' to Reno for a divorce?

This is an odd film and it reminds me of another Lucille Ball film where she played the most vicious person..."The Big Street". In it, she might have even been meaner and more self-centered! I am a person who can like her other films or TVs but still admit she made a few stinkers....and I can't see how either film would help her image with fans. However, I noticed that reviewers for both films totally ignored her nastiness and loved the films. I honestly feel as if they are more affirming their love of Ms. Ball than the films themselves because a rom-com simply is ineffective if you late the leading lady! Had they softened her characters in both, it would have helped tremendously.

So despite its faults is it worth seeing? Yes, but only as a time-passer. Had they softened Nancy more and made her change of heart less abrupt and inexplicable, I could have seen giving it a 6 or 7. As it is, a 4 seems reasonable.

By the way, I saw several reviews that talk about the racism in the film. I just didn't see it this way. Yes, Mantan Moreland plays a chauffer....so what?! Are they suggesting there should be no black characters in the film? I am just very confused by this...especially since, sadly, back in 1938 a job like this or a maid was pretty common for black Americans.

Heiress Nancy Crocker Fleming (Lucille Ball) grabs a random guy on the WPA ditch digging line and pays him $793 to get marry. Anthony J. Anthony has only his dog and his car trailer. Nancy's dead father had left his fortune to her only if she marries a "plain American". She intends to divorce Tony as soon as the money comes in and end the secret fake marriage. Foreigner Count Georgi is eager to marry her. When she accidentally drives away with Tony's dog, he come looking for her. The cops are called in and he's arrested for kidnapping.

The humor is definitely of its time. At least, Lucille Ball is allowed to do some physical comedy. Lighting the trailer on fire is something akin to I Love Lucy. The movie stays in that pocket of weird quirkiness. The subject matter is weird. Nancy and Tony could do a funnier meet-cute. The start is rushing too quickly. The first meeting would work better if Nancy's dilemma is explained at the top. Comedy is in the eye of the beholder. Time and culture has a way of making jokes not funny. I try to keep this in mind. This is a comedy of its time.

This odd little movie sets out to prove that any white American male, randomly selected off the street, can easily outsmart a team consisting of a foreigner, a woman and a black person.

Lucille Ball's recently-deceased father insists, in his will, that she must marry a "plain American" to inherit his fortune. So she offers money to various "plain American" men on the street in return for agreeing to marry her, and finally one accepts. After she marries the man, Ball sets off for Reno in the company of the foreign husband she really wants to marry and her black "yowza, ma'am" chauffeur, to get a divorce and collect her father's inheritance. But our smug and somewhat smarmy "plain American" blocks her at every turn, which includes forcibly putting her over his shoulder and kidnapping her, soaking her with a hose, and locking her in a trailer while driving recklessly through rough terrain, until she flees in panic and is nearly raped by two passers-by. Yeah, quite a laugh riot, all right.

But on the plus side, being saved from a near-rape seems to cause Lucille Ball to fall in love with the "plain American." So there you go.

The phrase "mighty white of you" makes its appearance just minutes into the film, and a string of "yowzas" emerge from the black guy a little bit later. While I promise you I'm in no way a member of the Politically Correct squad, the whole movie made me cringe, and really prevented any enjoyment I may have gotten from it. Were things that much different in 1938? Maybe so, but I'm glad we've moved to where we are now.

This short (65 minutes) comedy is one of the better "B" movie variations of "It Happened One Night" from the 1930's. Lucille Ball stars as a heiress whose father's will requires her to marry an American. Trouble is she is in love with a penniless count who is basically just interested in her money. Lucy concocts a plan to marry and divorce ditch-digger James Ellison, offering him a thousand to marry her. Ellison needs $793.00 to pay off a bill so he goes along with it - but then is angry when he feels she played him for a sap when she informs him she's going to Reno to divorce him immediately. Ellison is determined to beat her there and file for divorce himself and the duo fight across the country on the way to Reno. If you wonder how it ends you haven't seen many romantic comedies.

Lucy is very beautiful in this, her first starring film and proves she already was a wonderful comedienne in this comedy made some 13 years before the debut of I LOVE LUCY. She also proved she was unafraid to get into unglamorous and physical comic situations even at this young age (27) quite unlike most attractive actresses. (Like the much later THE FULLER BRUSH GIRL, this movie shows Lucy is drop dead gorgeous soaking wet, maybe they should have dunked her in all her pictures.) Leading man James Ellison is quite good too as the down-to-earth Joe dubbed "Cinderella man" by the press for his marriage to the wealthy heiress (Ellison also looks pretty good soaked). I don't think I've ever seen Ellison before - his career was basically divided into three parts, first bit player, then "B" movie leads like here, and finally starring in low-budget "B" westerns. Ellison is good-looking in a low key way, quite tall, and has an athletic build and is very good here but perhaps his career didn't take off in part because either because of his strong resemblance to Joel McCrea or the fact that very few handsome men became major stars back then. The movie is so short not much attention is given to character actors, quite unusual for comedies of the period, Lucy, James, his over-sized dog, and the count are pretty much the whole show. Fans of Lucy's later movie hit THE LONG LONG TRAILER will enjoy seeing Lucy in similar situations on the road with a travel trailer here. This is a good little movie, a must for Lucy lovers and those who enjoy the comedy romances of the era.