Peach-O-Reno

The family of Joseph Cawthorn (Joe) and Cora Witherspoon (Aggie) are sitting down to a meal to celebrate their 25 years of marriage. Included at the family meal are the couple's daughters Dorothy Lee (Pru) and Zelma O'Neal (Pansy). Well, shortly after a toast to the happy couple, things descend into all-out warfare with the parents vowing to divorce and heading to Reno as quickly as possible to make it a reality. Cue W + W who specialize in divorcing couples. They have a rival company that works across the road - Jackson, Jackson, Jackson & Jackson - and there is an ongoing one-upmanship for business. W + W have the upper hand as they arrange for busloads of customers to be collected from the train station as soon as the unhappily married individuals arrive in Reno. Both Joseph and Cora arrive at the office of W + W but their daughters chase after them as they don't want the divorce to go through. Will things end happily? Well, what do you think?

It's a comedy with a couple of entertaining dance segments that includes a catchy song performed by Wheeler and Lee, but it is the dancing that really entertains. Watch Lee - she is brilliant! The dance performed by W + W is also very entertaining. I've watched a few W & W comedies and this is my favourite so far. Wheeler makes a very good woman in drag - I usually hate films where men dress up as women but Wheeler pulls it off on this offering and is funny with it.

Their lawyer business turns into a successful nightclub in the evenings with the push of various buttons and female office administrators becoming nightclub hostesses. It is very impressive. And funny. Unfortunately, some of their jokes are too obvious and the end courtroom sequence is too drawn out so falls a bit flat after the good work that had been done up to that point.

I guess humor, like beauty, is in the eye (ear) of the beholder. Wheeler and Woolsey are two of my favorite funnymen but Peach-O-Reno contains some of the oldest and stalest jokes ever put on film. I'll bet they were funnier in 1932, but here it is 2011 and some of the material fell flatter than a pancake despite their best efforts and that of the supporting cast.

Joseph Cawthorn and Cora Witherspoon are the old married couple trying to get a divorce, after a hilarious scene at their 25th wedding anniversary party which turns into an argument and a trip to Reno. They are excellent and very funny when on screen - maybe they should have given these two old pros more screen time. Bert Wheeler and Dorothy Lee have a good song and dance number and Wheeler himself is quite good impersonating a floozy to aid Cawthorn's cause for divorce.

There is some good fun here and there and I have a hard time knocking Wheeler and Woolsey in any case, but maybe "Peach-O-Reno" should have been seen in 1932 and then stored in a vault somewhere. It came as a two-fer with "Girl Crazy" - maybe I'll have better luck with that one.

Joe and Aggie Bruno get into a terrible fight at their 25th wedding anniversary. They both decide they want a divorce and separately go to Reno. There they both end up at the law office of Wattles (Bert Wheeler) and Swift (Robert Woolsey), where the boys dispense marital justice in bulk.

In most Wheeler and Woolsey comedies, the boys are broke and trying to set up a con to better their situation. Here they are already thriving, so much, in fact, that the law firm across the street is trying to put them out of business - Jackson, Jackson, Jackson, and Jackson. Let's just call them the Jackson Four.

Complications include the Jackson Four up to no good, the ex-husband of a former client who wants to shoot Wattles and Swift for handling his wife's divorce, and the two grown daughters of the Brunos coming to Reno to try and stop their parents from divorcing. Like so many Wheeler and Woolsey comedies, this builds from controlled chaos in the beginning to full blown mayhem in the courtroom scene finale.

Wheeler and Woolsey have always been a hot or cold taste for most film buffs. They were basically a less acerbic version of the Marx Brothers sort of humor, made more palatable for the small town senses. They are basically at their best when telling a few racy jokes and doing a song and dance, but they are not trying to be comedy greats, just pleasant entertainers. If you don't buy into their relaxed sort of charm, they aren't going to win you over. But their pre-code films, including this one, do work quite well, and of their post-code films, the only truly awful one is MUMMYS BOYS, and that's because it has no musical numbers.

I'd consider this one to be one of their best.

Lots of clever jokes, chuckles, men in drag. Sight gags and the usual fare for Wheeler and Woolsey, even some filthy one liners in here if you pay attention. A couple of those jokes would have been snipped right out when the film code started being enforced just a couple years later. This one is all about going to Reno for a quick divorce, with the two men cast as Wattles and Swift, divorce lawyers, with some surprises thrown in. At one point, the two "attorneys" represent opposing sides in one divorce case, but it's really all about getting their jokes out as fast as they can. Watch for Cora Witherspoon, who was in Bank Dick with W.C. Fields. I thought this was a riot, even if it's extra short at just 63 minutes. The jokes and timing in this one hold up better than some of their other oldies. Directed by William Seiter, who had made tons of comedies with ALL the Hollywood greats. I recommend it - its a fun one!

Perhaps DIPLOMANIACS is their unsung classic, while COCKEYED CAVALIERS might be considered their most lushly produced. There is much to be found in HALF SHOT AT SUNRISE; KENTUCKY KERNELS; THE NITWITS; and HIPS! HIPS! HOORAY!, but for my money, PEACH O'RENO is my favorite Wheeler & Woolsey picture. I never knew about these two, but after my Dad mentioned that they had been his boyhood favorites, I took a close look at their stuff. The first thing that hooked me was the music, for in most of their work, there is at least one terrific song, usually performed by the unsung, underrated genius Bert Wheeler, and his very pretty, very unpretentious partner, Dorothy Lee. Wheeler was not just a good comic and good dancer, he was a clever, gifted dancer, and an inspired, original comedian. A notable 1920s "star of tomorrow," Bert Wheeler's singing was just a fabulous extra. When we are lucky, the songs in his pictures are extended by way of a comic verse for Bob Woolsey, a rather wacky character man who will confuse many until they realize that despite the glasses and the ever present cigar, he is not George Burns. The two were teamed by the legendary Flo Ziegfeld for RIO RITA, and they came along as part of the package when RKO filmed it, with Dorothy Lee selected by Wheeler himself (she appeared as part of the team 13 times). PEACH is that type of film you always hope you'll find along the way – a picture you can recommend to anyone and you can depend on a positive reaction. PEACH can be compared, foot for foot, to any of the best Marx Brothers, I think it is that funny, that unexpected, and that entertaining. Just simply accept Wheeler & Woolsey as Divorce Attorneys, and you too can buy into this inspired satire on the divorce game in Reno, circa early Depression. Divorce? Well, you bet this is pre-code, and when these lawyers need to hire a correspondent, they just dress up Bert Wheeler, who will amaze you with this brilliant turn. Not content to merely parade or mimic, Bert's naughty, slightly debauched femme fatal should place him among America's comedic giants. There have been good drag acts on film, but very few have offered the detailed, inspired, finely-tuned portrayal served up here! In addition, Wheeler taps, the music is fun, the supporting cast is uniformly game and marvelous, the W & W schtick (trick settings, trick costumes, trick photography) is often a delight, the script is crackling, and although her best lines were cut by the censors way back when, we get a rare appearance by Broadway great Zelma O'Neal (GOOD NEWS; FOLLOW THRU!) as Woolsey's opposite.