Live, Love and Learn

It is someone amusing and ironical that MGM which had for its slogan Art for Art's sake in Latin did a comedy based on just that premise. Live Love And Learn stars Robert Montgomery as the Bohemian artistic type and Rosalind Russell as the society girl who falls for him. They marry and he goes about trying to get people to notice him.

When critic Monty Woolley does notice him Montgomery and his work get taken up by the rich and famous. In the process though he loses his muse and Russell. Around to catch him is Russell's society pal Helen Vinson playing one of her patented 'other woman' roles.

A cast of familiar players step into roles like Vinson that are easily identifiable. Such wit that is in the script is provided by Robert Benchley as the hero's perpetually inebriated friend who seems to have moved right in with them.

Today Benchley's character would be treated exactly as he is, gay. A closeted gay to be sure as this was the era of the newly adapted Code in Hollywood. His character seems to have deliberately been put in the film in order that someone get to say witty things. If you've seen the film Remember? that starred Robert Taylor and Greer Garson also from MGM Lew Ayres was playing a similar role to Benchley's.

Montgomery and Russell starred in Night Must Fall which won for Montgomery critical praise and an Oscar nomination. But the public stayed away in droves. I'm guessing that Louis B. Mayer wanted to showcase his stars in more traditional roles for them when he assigned them Live Love And Learn.

Tradition was preserved.

"Live, Love and Learn" is a 1937 MGM film starring Robert Montgomery, Rosalind Russell, Robert Benchley and Monte Wooley. Surprisingly, it's not very good. Russell is an heiress who marries poor artist Montgomery, only to see him become successful and interested in money -the very thing she was trying to escape.

With better direction and a stronger script, this film might have had more of a "Holiday" feel to it, but it doesn't. It's part comedy, part drama, and because it doesn't know what it's supposed to be, neither does the audience. The two forms aren't integrated enough.

One scene that shows the innocence of the times is one in which Montgomery hires a little boy to pose for him in a loincloth. A very discomfiting scene when watched today, yet then, it was supposed to be funny. However, this is toward the end of the movie, which had dragged on too long, so the scene wasn't terribly amusing.

The acting was okay. Frankly, it's kind of a waste of time, despite the good cast.

Although Robert Montgomery and Rosalind Russell are two of my favorite performers, I couldn't accept most of what was happening onscreen. The writers tried hard to make this a zany romantic comedy, and it starts out that way, as artist Montgomery meets socialite Russell when she takes a spill while on a fox hunt, right into his easel, and faints after some exchange of words. In the very next scene they're at a justice of the peace getting married! The writers didn't believe in long (or even short) courtships. They are both penniless (Russell throws her purse out of the window of a bus to be at Montgomery's poverty level) and have to extort groceries from grocer Charles Judels, by threatening to yell from the rooftops that he overcharges his customers. So what do they do when her rich uncle sends a $2,000 check, afraid she could not cope with poverty? They frame it and use it for a dartboard. What starving artist would do that? Robert Benchley is sort of a hanger-on, seeming to live with them and drunk most of the time. He's in the film for his witty comments, but seems witless most of the time. After Montgomery's painting causes a riot by sailors and marines in Central Park, gallery owner Monty Woolley (in his first film) becomes interested in Montgomery's work and goes to see him. But the trio has been so inundated by reporters because of the riot, they think he is one of them. In perhaps the funniest scene in the film (if you can ignore its viciousness), they snip his tie, cut his suspenders and pour a pitcher of water on his head. Still, Woolley makes him famous with a special showing of his work, and Russell's friend, Helen Vinson, gets him commissions to make him rich. Russell, however, is unhappy at the change she sees in Montgomery. I winced (as did Montgomery) when she suggests at the gallery showing that they start snipping ties of the patrons. He doesn't paint anymore for pleasure, she complains, but sold out his principles for crass commercialism. She asks for a divorce and leaves him, but they are both unhappy. Well, Montgomery lived and loved, but will he ever learn that making money is not as important as doing what you enjoy most?

I can imagine Robert Montgomery's quandary circa 1935. "Here's a script where I am a handsome boat builder who refuses to live off his rich theatrical agent wife's money! Here's another where I am handsome artist who refuses to live off his rich socialite's money! How about this one, where I am a handsome advertising executive who refuses to live off his madcap heiress wife's money! Which one should I choose? God, they're all so exciting!" And so it was with "Live, Love, and Learn." Rosalind Russell is a socialite who gives it all up for bohemian artist Montgomery, because he has nonvulgar ideals and his idea of success is more than just making money, and it doesn't hurt that he's a full-on hottie. They meet cute (she flies off her horse and directly through his canvas) and in the next scene are standing before a justice of the peace while Bob tries to talk Roz out of it. Clearly, some time has gone by, but wouldn't it be funny if this were just hours later? Maybe in 1930 but not 1937.

I saw some in-jokes here that I must comment upon. Bob brings Roz home to his starving-artist garret. His drunken friend comes by to pay his matrimonial respects and passes out. They bundle him onto a couch, push him out into the hall, and cover his face with a painting rag. Bob says, "Now he looks like a decapitated corpse," which, in fact, was much the plot of "Night Must Fall," which Bob and Roz played the next year (I wonder which was filmed first?). Later, the couple sneak behind a group of journalists trying to get an interview with the now-infamous artist. They are listening to his blustering friend (Robert Benchley, mostly wasted here). When the journalists notice, Benchley says "He wants to be alone," which even in 1938 was associated with Garbo. Helen Vinson is good fun as the "friend" who promotes the artist's work but also wants him in the Biblical sense.

I did love the scene where the trio, tired of reporters trying to get an interview with the artist (who caused a riot in Central Park), mistake Monty Wooley (great here as he always would be), a genuine art critic, for one of them and proceed to play comic assault upon him. Later, when Bob gets true success, Roz still wants him to play the foolish zany and start cutting suspenders at a showing of his work, where all the people seems fake to her. He resents her implication that his work is not legitimate enough to be truly good. He feels his success will enable him to finally support her in the style she deserves. She thinks he's sold out for a quick buck and is quite happy to live in the garret and put up with his continually dropping-in friend. (By the way, I can also imagine Roz's complaints to the makers of the picture: "Women don't clean in heels and a dress. Please! Can't I wear something more appropriate?" "Roz, baby, people don't pay good money to see Rosalind Russell clean her hubby's hovel in rags! They want to see her in a dress, even when it doesn't make sense! After all, this is MGM!") Somewhat disturbing to our 21st century minds in the scene where Bob arranges with a flower seller on the street to take her son home to paint him. Of course, she's Italian (must have those stereotypes) and she says, "What color?" He takes the kid home and attempts to capture his free spirit by dressing him up in a fig leaf configuration and posing him with a lamb. The pedophilic overtones of this are truly shudder-inducing. I suppose in 1937 this was not given another thought…

Anyway, the central theme of this picture is, I suppose, that one can live and love easily but it is somewhat harder to adjust to the expectations of those we do love. This isn't a bad film but a mediocre one, and the actors are simply hampered by the inane story. Roz would later go on to great success in sharply written screwball comedies and I suppose this was a baby step in that direction. Bob, though, was continually hampered by the noble, handsome lover roles he did so well in the early 30s and was still playing in the late 30s. He must have fought hard to play the psychotic killer in "Night Must Fall," but it didn't seem to lead to other worthy roles. It is truly lamentable that he didn't latch on to, say, a role like Nick Charles in the Thin Man series. He would have done smashingly in something like that. Getting back to this film, he and Roz have great chemistry together and make it a pretty enjoyable 90 minutes.

"Live, Love and Learn" is a thoroughly wacky film, from start to finish. That doesn't mean it's all funny - it's just a wacky plot. The first half is all Bohemian with Robert Montgomery, Rosalind Russell and Robert Benchley setting up house together - which the first two don't mind. The last half departs from the Bohemian and seems to be a critique of the bane of the Bohemians - wealthy living and how it isn't really living. But this is a somewhat dark and meandering and much too long- lasting stretch of the film that loses the comedic touch of the first half.

Montgomery's Bob Graham is the ultra-Bohemian painter (although in his standard duds of the time, he doesn't strike one as Bohemian in dress). And, if his apartment is a bit too neat and tidy for such a lifestyle, let's just say that he is at least thoroughly Bohemian in his mind and way of thinking. Russell's Julie Stoddard immediately falls for the guy when she literally falls over a horse jump and lands in his painting setup. Benchley is his best friend, a perennial sot who comes to pass out in Bob's apartment when he's well into his cups. At least that's the message conveyed from the first and only time the film shows him that way. The rest of the time, he's the source of good barbs, jabs and witticisms. That provides most of the comedy.

It's hard to take Graham's sudden change in character once he comes into the dough. And, the film's long dwelling on him in that state is a downer. Monty Woolley has a couple of nice scenes as Mr. Bawltitude, and Mickey Rooney has a short part as Jerry Crump. Montgomery's Graham isn't very likable, and Russell gives the best performance in the film.

One can't say how many movie buffs might enjoy this film. It's borderline to think of it as being enjoyable. I stretched to give it six stars, but those are for Russell's, Benchley's and Woolley's contributions to the film.