A Tragedy at Midnight

Let's get over all this stuff about Powell-Loy. Howard-Lindsay hold their own in this Republic gem. I am all for 'the Republic for which it stands'.

The plot, not too original but, who cares? It was carried out beautifully by a cast of some of the era's most popular character actors.

The dialog, penned by a femme, was great fun and so well handled by John Howard and Margaret Lindsay. Why she never achieved greater fame, I will never know. She has a Lamarr-like beauty, gorgeous from any angle, and when it comes to line delivery excuse me - but - she equals Loy.

The chemistry between the stars - and they are that - is beautiful, the dialog is clever and witty.

The judo moves were very convincing as delivered by Keye Luke who also was A-plus in line delivery.

"A Tragedy at Midnight" is thoroughly enjoyable at any hour.

John Howard is a radio broadcaster whose programs solves crimes the police can't. This annoys the boys in blue, so the local Police Commissioner orders the force to find something on Howard. They can't, but he does: a dead woman in his bed. He and feuding wife, mystery-writer Margaret Lindsay go on the run to find the real killer before the cops shoot them down, aided by their houseboy, Keye Luke, whose character rejoices in the name of Ah Foo.

It's one of those movies that are supposed to be filled with snappy patter, but the jokes are like Rice Crispies that have been soaked in cottage cheese for a week. Miss Lindsay does her best, delivering her lines in a nitwitted, high-speed manner, but even director Joseph Santley can't make anything interesting out of this mess of a script.

All in all, the programmer's a pretty obscure entry in the amateur sleuth sweepstakes so popular at the time. Here it's radio crime broadcaster John Howard and his spunky wife Margaret Lindsey trying to figure out who put a dead woman in his bed, much to wife Lindsey's chagrin. The trail gets complicated, such that the whodunit part is secondary to colorful byplay. Happily though, Lindsey really shines; in fact, her smile alone lit up my gloomy living room. It's really her spark that carries the proceedings.Then too, the little byplay with the prissy hat designer remains a comedy highlight. Too bad Keye Luke's factotum has to call Howard "master". Still, he shows his jiujitsu skills in spades, and without use of a double that I could detect. Note, the naughty innuendo around finding a strange woman in the marital bed, even if it is a double one. Apparently, censorship relaxed a bit on this one. Note also presence of Roscoe Karns as the humorous cop Cassidy, a role similar to his TV Rocky King, Detective (1951-54). Nothing special about the 57-minutes, even though the cast does its best with what amounts to a murky script that's better in parts than as a whole.

The host of a whodunit radio show finds himself involved in his own mystery when he awakens to find a woman with a knife in her back in his bedroom.

Ok, it is like the Thin man, so what? In Hollywood, when something is successful, it's naturally replicated by another studio, but Tragedy at Midnight starring Margaret Lindsey and John Howard is entertaining in its own right, both stars gel well together, Margaret, especially, is animated and energetic. It's standard mystery, but a fun one which moves at a good rate. Keye Luke ( number one son from Charlie Chan) also stars.

John Howard and Margaret Lindsay star in "A Tragedy at Midnight," a 1942 film from poverty row Republic Studios.

Greg Sherman (John Howard) is a radio personality who solves cases that the police have failed to do. So the police hate him. His wife Beth (Lindsay) is a mystery writer. One evening, Beth goes out to visit her sister while Greg goes to a party. The next morning, he wakes up and nudges his wife, who doesn't move. When he looks more closely, it's not his wife, but a dead woman he doesn't recognize. She has a knife in her back.

When Beth returns, she thinks he spent the night with another woman and calls the police. Greg escapes and, once Beth realizes the truth, the two of them try to find out the identity of the woman and also who killed her.

This is a good mystery, actually, and it goes quickly, perhaps more quickly than intended since I understand the version on Netflix is cut. John Howard and Margaret Lindsay are fine. Howard calls her "Mommy," which William Powell calls Myrna Loy in the "Thin Man" films, so this is an unashamed ripoff. It probably was supposed to be a B version series of films as well, but it didn't happen.

Keye Luke plays the couple's servant and he's not what one would call politically correct today.

Entertaining.