Kansas City Princess

Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell found enough roles between them as wisecracking dames who've been once around the track too often and have learned that they seemed at times to be in every Warner Brothers urban picture for a while in the early 30s. So no matter the quality of the film itself they're always fun to watch and more fun to listen.

The two are like peas in a pod here, a pair of manicurists from Kansas City. One of them is engaged to gangster Robert Armstrong and the other still has oats to sow. But when Farrell loses the engagement ring, both manage to con their way to New York and then Paris. The girls do their manicuring thing on the ocean liner after they're caught without tickets. Armstrong too is resourceful and he hooks up with eccentric millionaire Hugh Herbert. That last sentence is a redundancy.

No use to tell any more of the plot it's pretty fast moving, but also goes off in all directions and becomes incoherent at times. Note also the presence of Osgood Perkins as a phony French private eye.

For fans of Blondell and Farrell, you folks should see Kansas City Princess.

The IMDB synopsis describes this movie as "two wisecracking manicurists flee an irate gangster". That's a better precis than I could manage. William Keighley doesn't seem able to do much with a complicated script; only Hugh Herbert (as a millionaire on his way to confront his wayward wife) and Glenda Farrell as the inciting manicurist are very good. Robert Armstrong is ok as the irate gangster, but Joan Blondell is unaccountably rote, trying to make sense of her lines in what should be a high-speed farce.

That's rather a disappointment to me. In just shy of 50 years of film performances, it's rare to see Miss Blondell not be great.

Kansas City Princess (1934)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Rosie (Joan Blondell) decides to go out with a man after her best friend (Glenda Farrell) says that her gangster boyfriend (Robert Armstrong) doesn't deserve her. Once out on the date the man steals a valuable ring from her that was given to her by the gangster. Fearing for their safety, the two girls head to New York but of course the gangster finds out and goes after them. No, this isn't a hard-hitting drama from Warner but instead it's a "B" comedy that starts off well but quickly falls apart into a disastrous second half. Blondell and Farrell are so good together that the film actually starts off on a very good note. I thought the two actresses had some nice chemistry together and we get a pretty funny sequence where Farrell is teaching Blondell what to say in order to get a rich man. There's also a pretty good dinner sequence where the two ladies and their dates end up in a bad situation. Once the girls jump on the train and head to New York, the entire film just comes crashing down. As others have pointed out, it really does seem as if the screenplay wasn't completed so the actors, director and others just showed up and starting making things up as they went along. There's really not a single thing in the second half of this picture that makes any sense and for the life of me it just seemed like a bunch of characters talking at one another in order for the running time to reach past the hour mark. Before long additional characters are brought into the chaos and it still doesn't make any sense. The only ones who are going to want to check this out are fans of the two ladies. Both are good in the film but even their charm can't save this stinker.

"Kansas City Princess" is a film that sure looks as if the script was not even close to being finished when the movie was shot. So much of it seemed vague and incomplete that I just can't recommend it no matter how much I enjoyed the actors.

Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell are two hucksters who manage to get themselves onto a cruise ship despite having no money. Through conniving and lying, they manage to ingratiate themselves to a dippy rich guy (Hugh Herbert). Additionally, Blondell's boyfriend (Robert Armstrong) also manages to get hired by this dippy rich guy. What happens next just seems random and silly...which it was.

I like Joan Blondell films. She played a great dame and Farrell was also quite good. The problem is that they had no script to work with and I kept waiting for the story to materialize...which it never did! Overall, enjoyable but severely lacking when it comes to story.

Rosie Sturges (Joan Blondell) and best friend Marie Callahan (Glenda Farrell) are manicurists in Kansas City. Marie does not like Rosie's gangster boyfriend Dynamite Carson (Robert Armstrong). There is a ring, girl scouts, and plenty of situational comedy.

This is a gangster screwball comedy thriller. The situation is convoluted. I was expecting more from the girl scouts. There is potential for greater comedy. The concept suggests some more outrageous fun but it doesn't quite get there.