Hold 'Em Jail

When the warden needs a couple bigger, better players for his football team, he recruits Harris and Robbins (Wheeler and Woolsey). They are tricked into committing a crime, and hauled into jail ! It starts pretty slow and awkward... Peach O Reno was so much better! Wheeler and Woolsey had started in vaudeville, and made two dozen films together. This one was about halfway through the list. Edna Oliver is in here as the straight laced aunty. And a very YOUNG Betty Grable, in one of her earlier roles. A couple of the bits they do are like three-stooges bits. Lots of slapstick, physical comedy. All leading up to the big football game. This one is pretty good. Some funny bits along the way. Directed by Norman Taurog, who had just won the oscar for Skippy. The beautiful Betty G will die young at 56, but she was amazing in How to Marry a Millionaire.. catch that one for sure.

This film really displays the differences in style between Wheeler and Woolsey and Laurel and Hardy. In "Pardon Us", Stan and Oliver are sent to prison, and in every situation where they try to be helpful, they end up with the short end of the stick. When Bert and Bob are sent to prison, they end up running the place after a short time. Wheeler and Woolsey certainly did not possess Stan Laurel's comic genius, but they are optimistic and make us feel that the underdog can triumph. We do not sympathize with Bert and Bob the way we do with Stan and Oliver. Bert and Bob are too arrogant and too aggressive for our sympathy, but we do get a special delight in seeing them triumph.

Edgar Kennedy is very funny as the warden and teen-age Betty Grable is as cute as can be as the warden's daughter. The football sequence is not as funny as the Marx Brothers' "Horse Feathers", but it is amusing. Edna May Oliver and Roscoe Ates add their brands of insanity to the mixture. I only wish there were some musical numbers to spotlight the abilities of Bert, Bob, and Betty Grable. For low comedy fans, this film is certainly worth viewing.

In the 1930s, football comedies were pretty common. The Marx Brothers made their brilliant "Horsefeathers" and the Three Stooges and Joe E. Brown also took a stab at the genre--not to mention all the cartoons about the subject. So it's not at all surprising that Wheeler & Woolsey would make a football film...though the locale for this game is pretty unique!! This film is about a football game...in prison! So is it any good? Well, for Wheeler & Woolsey it is.

So how do Wheeler & Woolsey end up in jail anyway? Well, they have some fake guns that look very realistic...and a crook switches them with the real thing. The boys are naturally arrested and end up in prison-- where the warden (Edgar Kennedy) and his family (Edna May Oliver and Betty Grable) are on hand for laughs. The film is VERY unusual because there are no song and dance numbers and the big football game at the end is about as stupid and nonsensical as most football games in 1930s comedies! None of it is brilliant or will make you prefer it to "Horsefeathers" but it is harmless and entertaining.

Hold 'Em Jail finds Wheeler&Woolsey neatly framed and sent to prison for something they didn't do. Never mind though, they make jail seem like fun, except for all around them.

Though Bert and Bob have the spotlight and do their usual monkeyshines, what I like best about Hold 'Em Jail is the incredibly good cast that RKO and director Norman Taurog assembled in support of them. When you've got such scene stealers as warden Edgar Kennedy and his wife Edna May Oliver and convicts like Paul Hurst and Warren Hymer doing their usual thing, Wheeler&Woolsey would have been hard pressed to keep up. Pay close attention to Edgar Kennedy in his scenes with the boys, he really makes them work.

I also liked the fact that the script got Bert and Bob to star on the prison football team giving the film a great opportunity to satirize two genres, prison films and college rah-rah football games. Edgar Kennedy has a $1000.00 bet with the warden of another prison team and he's depending on these two to win it for him. The football game at the climax is even funnier than what the Marx Brothers did in Horsefeathers.

Betty Grable is also in Hold 'Em Jail as Kennedy and Oliver's daughter if you can believe she sprung from that gene pool. She would have an decade long climb to top box office in the Forties as America's girl next door with the million dollar legs. Robert Armstrong also has a nice bit as the radio announcer of the inter prison football game.

This is one of Wheeler&Woolsey's best films and holds up very well for today's audience.

Hold 'Em Jail (1932)

*** (out of 4)

Curley (Bert Wheeler) and Spider (Robert Woolsey) are framed for a crime and thrown into prison where they are constantly annoying the warden (Edgar Kennedy). The warden eventually needs to two on their football team as the prison goes up against a rival.

HOLD 'EM JAIL isn't going to make you fall in love with Wheeler & Woolsey if you're not already a fan but if you do enjoy their films then you'll probably enjoy this because there are some nice laughs along the way. At just 66 minutes the film is quite fast-paced and it's rather fun seeing them spoof not only the prison sub-genre but also the football one. Football and prison played a big part in films from this era so obviously RKO was wanting to take their duo and smash both of them.

There are several funny scenes scattered throughout the film but one of the highlights has to be the football game where chloroform is used to give the team an advantage. Another funny moment happens early on when Wheeler and Woolsey are framed and not realizing that they are using real guns on their robbery prank. Both Wheeler and Woolsey are at the top of their game and really help sell the laughs. The supporting cast includes a good turn by Kennedy as the warden as well as Edna May Oliver, Roscoe Ates and Robert Armstrong.