Ladies Should Listen

As the Great Depression deepened during the mid-1930's, audiences sought escape from the grim realities of unemployment, bread lines, and Hoover Towns in dark movie palaces watching films. "Ladies Should Listen" is an ideal piece of escapist fluff for the period, and, surprisingly, the film retains some charm and appeal for contemporary audiences. The telephone operator at a posh apartment building has romantic designs on a handsome womanizer who lives there. The silly nonsense that ensues moves fast, which prevents any lapses in logic or credibility to register. Based on a play, the antics are still somewhat stage-bound, but some of the lines are quite funny, and the cast delivers them with skill.

Although the film was poorly received on release and star Cary Grant was thought miscast, the film remains a light entertainment, and Grant plays an early version of his romantic "Cary Grant" character. The supporting cast is fine, with Nydia Westman a standout as a young bespectacled heiress, who is starry-eyed for Grant. Fussy Edward Everett Horton plays his standard comedic character, and lovely Francis Drake is the designing switchboard operator, although she fails to register strongly.

Gadgets to create the sounds of thunder and rain or to spray the air with perfume aid Grant in his romantic pursuits and, mixed with nitrate options in Chile, a conspiratorial pair of South Americans, a love-lorn doorman, and an cleverly inventive butler, create a light farce with few pretensions beyond diversion. Short and breezily directed by Frank Tuttle, whose career began in the silent era, "Ladies Should Listen" is cute, silly fun, especially for fans of Cary Grant.

Cary Grant simply isn't good at silly. Maybe I have too many images of him being the lead man in dramas, so to see him playing in bad comedies like "Kiss and Make-Up" and "Ladies Should Listen" is off putting. With a title like "Ladies Should Listen" you have to expect it to not be good.

The is the second movie in which Cary Grant's character steals the significant other of Edward Everett Horton. Horton can't get a break. Whatever movie he plays in he's the square, the nerd, the geek there to play off of the leading man.

Cary Grant plays Julian De Lussac, a French inventor and ladies' man. He was interested in Marguerite Cintos (Rosita Moreno) while Susie Flamberg (Nydia Westman) and another woman was interested in him. All Julian wanted was Marguerite and he had to have her.

Marguerite had called Julian to end their relationship. In a ploy to keep her, Julian pretended to commit suicide while on the phone with her. Within the next minute a distraught woman ran into his room openly mourning his death like she was mourning a lost lover. When Julian got up from playing dead he found that the woman was not Marguerite but Anna Mirelle (Frances Drake), the switchboard operator for the building.

Here's one for you. Through overhearing just about all of Julian's telephone conversations (probably prompted by seeing him and being hopelessly attracted), Anna had come to know and love Julian. She was eavesdropping at the time he pretended to kill himself and was so overcome with grief that she ran up to his apartment to have a moment with him instead of calling emergency services.

She was an obsessed stalker, but she was pretty so it was OK. Right? Plus, this was a comedy so normal rules don't apply. Even still, she was like many women in films who fall for the philanderer. They know he's just looking to conquer one woman after the other, yet they believe that they'll be that woman that he'll settle down with. They do everything they can to gain his attention and prove that they are a better option than all the other hussies he sleeps with while he overlooks her until she does something so outstanding he finally sees her with a romantic eye.

Groan.

The title "Ladies Should Listen" didn't mean what I thought it meant; that ladies should heed their man. In this case it meant that they should listen in or even eavesdrop in order to uncover nefarious plots or be well-informed.

Anna listened and listened. She bent over backwards to protect her crush. Her job and her dignity were both worth sacrificing to give her unsolicited assistance to Julian. It was embarrassing and worse, it wasn't funny.

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LADIES SHOULD LISTEN (Paramount, 1934), directed by Frank Tuttle, ranks one of the many "drawing room" comedies produced during the 1930s, and although not based on any current stage successes, it looks more like a filmed stage play. Not quite on a lavish scale as the more productive MGM comedy with Robert Montgomery or Norma Shearer, LADIES SHOULD LISTEN features the up-and-coming Cary Grant, several years before rising to super-star status, then showing his capability as a light comedian in spite of acting in a part that might have been best suited for popular Frenchman Maurice Chevalier, who, by then, has moved on and no longer part of the Paramount banner.

The story revolves around Julian De Lussac (Cary Grant), a Parisian man-about-town who, through no fault of his own, gets himself involved with three women at the same time, including one in particular, Anna Mirelle (Frances Drake), a switchboard operator who listens in on Julian's telephone conversations, who becomes his protector. Aside from Susie Flamberg (Nydia Westman), an comely bespectacled young lady who does her best to garner Julian's attention in spite of being engaged to Paul Vernet (Edward Everett Horton), matters become complicated when Marguerite Cintos (Rosita Moreno), who, along with her husband, Ramon (Rafael Corio), make attempts in having Julian as their next blackmailing victim.

The supporting cast consists of George Barbier as Susie's father, Joseph; Charles E. Arnt as Albert, the manservant; Charles Ray, a once popular leading man of the silent screen now appearing in minor roles, playing Henri, the building porter who loves operator gal Anna; with Henrietta Burnside and Joe North in smaller roles. Sad-eyed and dark-haired beauty Frances Drake, an up-and-coming Paramount starlet, works well as the nosy switchboard girl who gets herself involved in a playboy's escapades, while Nydia Westman, in her Una Merkel-type manner, provokes some solid laughs with her man-chasing performance. One scene finds her telephoning Julian (Grant), telling him some interesting news, "I'm in bed!"

LADIES SHOULD LISTEN became the second and final comedy to pair Grant and Horton of equal star status. (Horton appeared in future Grant comedies, including Columbia's HOLIDAY in 1938, and the madcap Warner Brothers comedy, ARSENIC AND OLD LACE in 1944). They had previously worked well together in the funnier KISS AND MAKE UP (1934), which consists faster pace, silly comedy climaxed by an amusing car chase. As for LADIES SHOULD LISTEN, it lacks the quicker pace KISS AND MAKE UP has, and gives the impression of being an early 1930s talkie since much of it takes takes place in Julian's boudoir. No song numbers are inserted as the earlier film, however, it does include familiar underscoring, "Falling in Love Again," a song introduced and immortalized by Marlene Dietrich in the German produced musical-drama, THE BLUE ANGEL (1930).

With the screenplay by Claude Binyon and Frank Butler, LADIES SHOULD LISTEN should have been more amusing, and with Ernst Lubitsch in the director's chair, who had worked wonders with material such as this, it would have been, especially with Cary Grant in the lead. What's equally surprising is that this comedy is relatively short, 62 minutes. Out of circulation in the television markets for quite some time now (having been presented on New York City's WPIX, Channel 11, prior to 1972) LADIES SHOULD LISTEN, might be something to consider if it should ever be resurrected on television again. "Operator, please connect me to Turner Classic Movies programming department." One final note, star searchers, look closely for future leading actress, Ann Sheridan, appearing briefly as a fellow switchboard operator named Blanche. (**)

An overly familiar romantic comedy, the paper-thin LADIES SHOULD LISTEN is a harmless, if trivial, addition to the genre. Neither the writing or direction is sharp enough to make the material really spark or crackle, but Cary Grant displays his increasing prowess in romantic farce, and the plot line of his character being romanced by the telephone operator who repeatedly saves him through eavesdropping is serviceable if hardly superior. The basic structure (as well as the Paris backdrop) is more than casually reminiscent of Grant's previous film KISS AND MAKE UP, only not as inspired or as energetically performed by the supporting players. Still, the film provides a solid hour of agreeable, lightweight entertainment.

Julian de Lussac, an investor with an expiring option in Chilean mineral rights, is frolicking about with any and every beautiful woman in Paris. Unknown to Julian his current amore, Marguerite, is the scheming wife of a dangerous, scheming investor. Both are contriving to part Julian and his mineral option.

The woman who brings him to his senses is the switchboard operator of his apartment building, Anna. Anna knows every detail of Julian's many affairs and has fallen in love with him via listening in on his phone conversations. She knows why each love affair occurred and why each ended. She also knows from her connections with other operators, just what Marguerite and her husband are up to.

Julian is flattered by Anna's adoration, but in no way returns it. From the time that Anna's secret love is out in the open, Anna wages war against the evil couple who are trying to dupe Julian. Her weapon: the switchboard.

A man with the morals of an alley cat just needs the right woman to show him the path to true love.