She Married Her Boss

Claudette Colbert and Melvyn Douglas star in "She Married Her Boss," a 1935 comedy also starring Edith Fellows and Jean Dixon.

This is a very dated comedy including a wife having to leave her career when she gets married, drunk driving, and child abuse - all things that are pretty much out now. Sometimes it's hard, but the only way to get anything out of these movies is to take them for what they were - done at a specific time when society mores were different. Some of it, however, has to do with the censors, particularly the career woman part, and there really wasn't any need for it. Interesting to me that the censors were very careful to push the nonworking mom but okayed spanking a kid with a hairbrush and drunk driving.

Claudette Colbert is Julia Scott, an efficient assistant at a department store, taking care of a huge office for her boss Richard Barclay (Melvyn Douglas). Julia isn't happy - her idea of a real career would be to marry her boss, with whom she's been in love for six years. She gets her wish, and his darling daughter (Fellows) along with it.

Julia finds that Barclay's home is a mess, and sets about putting it in order. Bonding with his daughter is going to take more, however, than mere efficiency. The kid's a brat. And Barclay's sister, who's used to having things her own way, is no party either.

Colbert is fabulous, and Douglas, one of the great actors, doesn't infuse a terrible part with much warmth. His character isn't very likable, and one never feels that this is a truly married and in love couple. I don't really blame Douglas - the role is badly written, to go along with some of the script. The supporting actors are all excellent, including the aforementioned, Katherine Alexander as Barclay's sister and Raymond Walburn as the butler.

There are some very good scenes, and the film is definitely worth it for Colbert - and a look at how far we've come in some arenas.

First, I must respectfully disagree with one reviewer here who kept describing the film as a screwball comedy. Even in the 1930s, every comedy was not a screwball comedy, and this isn't one (despite one kinda goofy car episode). It's not a drawing room comedy either. It's simply a domestic comedy...in fact, is it really a comedy. Let's see, you have an obsessive boss that has no real personal life, a sister that's a terrible prude and suppresses any family joy in life, a young daughter who is so unhappy that she's become a terrible brat, a young lady (Colbert)who has her eyes on her boss but then finds herself in an unsatisfying marriage, and a little girl who then pines because the stepmother who has brought some joy into her life then leaves home. In many ways, this is a pretty serious story -- with some comedic moments.

Several reviewers have wondered why the Colbert character is interested in the Melvyn Douglas boss character to begin with. A fair criticism. The screenwriters and director sure haven't given us much of a clue about that. But how many of us have found ourselves in an unfulfilling relationship or marriage, ultimately realizing we made a mistake. And I tried to remember that this film was made in 1935. Films were not always very sophisticated back then...they were slowly growing up...and the story here is certainly more sophisticated than many other films from the same time.

Claudette Colbert is quite good here, though obviously not quite as well developed as an actress as she was in the 1940s. Melvyn Douglas was good in the role he played, although it's rather hard to like that role. Two standout performances were 12-year-old Edith Fellows as Douglas' bratty daughter (who develops into a rather nice child once the home situation improves), and Raymond Walburn as Douglas' butler (the scenes of Douglas and Walburn in a drunken state were among the better drunk scenes I've seen).

If you see this movie for what it is -- a drama story with comedy overtones -- you'll really enjoy it. It's far better than many other mid-30s productions...and 1939 was just around the corner.

Terribly uneven mix of comedy and romantic drama, the script of SHE MARRIED HER BOSS is unworthy of the talents assembled to interpret it. The always reliable Claudette Colbert has to contend with lines like: "Marriage is a woman's real career," as a woman secretly in love with her boss for six years. MELVYN DOUGLAS is the boss, but his part his so poorly written that you have to wonder what Colbert ever sees in him. Nevertheless, he plays it with a flair for this sort of inane comedy.

JEAN DIXON as Colbert's friend and KATHERINE Alexander as Douglas' snooty sister are just cardboard cutouts. And poor EDITH FELLOWS has to play the most insufferable brat since Bonita Granville's turn in THE CHILDREN'S HOUR.

There are various lapses of taste throughout (from today's viewpoint), and the costumes are really the most unflattering female designs ever worn by Colbert in any of her early films. You have to yearn for the Colbert of the '40s (so smartly sophisticated) because she looks downright dowdy in most of her odd wardrobe choices. As I say above, dated in more ways than one.

Not recommended.

"She Married Her Boss" is a forgotten but alluring Columbia classic, directed by Gregory La Cava, a modest auteur with a flair for upbeat improvisation and delicate touch. La Cava's unassuming touch is less fully evident in this small heartwarming romantic comedy than the director's superior pictures like "Stage Door", "My Man Godfrey", and "Primrose Path".

But "She Married Her Boss" features highly resourceful Claudette Colbert as the competent department store secretary Julia that falls for her boss Richard Barclay (Melvyn Douglas); it also has an unintentionally funny, almost surreal moment involving a department store window and mannequins. As it turns out the film is all Colbert's -- and another reminder what a lovely, divine comedienne Ms. Colbert was. The supporting cast, all wonderful, includes

"She Married Her Boss" is the sort of cuddly classic that works best if you watch it with someone you love or care about.

I've read the other comments that talked about aspects of this film that are dated, offensive, or just plain bizarre. I was rather surprised that no one brought up the movie's cringe-inducing gender stereotypes. Anyone who has seen Claudette Colbert or Melvyn Douglas in the films they made before the introduction of the Production Code(in mid-1934) would immediately recognize the heavy hand of the censors, who did their best to impose on Hollywood their narrow-minded idea of "family values." (On the basis of this film, it would appear that allowing married women to pursue a career would bring about the end of American society, but child abuse and drunk driving are just good clean fun!) Though the cast and plot look good on paper, the result is strained and uneven, as if the script had been written to Pre-Code standards and then hastily cleaned up so as not to offend the censors.

Claudette Colbert plays Julia Scott, a bright, capable, and confident executive assistant at a large department store. She runs the busy office like a well-oiled machine and clearly enjoys the work. It's hard to fathom why she's spent six years mooning over her boss, Richard Barclay. The way the role of Barclay is written, the usually charming Melvyn Douglas comes off as a humorless, sexless cipher. All the more jarring, then, to hear Julia talk about her desire to give up her terrific job and marry Barclay. Without a trace of irony, she describes marriage as "a woman's REAL career."

Okay, she wants to get married. But why on earth would the lovely and vivacious Julia want Barclay as a husband? Not only is he dull as ditch-water, he treats her as if she were a piece of super-efficient office equipment. Once they're married, he ridicules her for assuming the stereotypical role of housewife, despite the fact that she's set his chaotic home in order and tamed his obnoxious brat of a daughter. There's nothing in the movie to explain Barclay's eventual change of heart; apparently it's brought on by a quart of whiskey. So much for good old "family values." The film is so devoid of any hint of sexual attraction that we don't see a single cuddle or smooch--not even at the very end when it's clear that the newlyweds will finally get around to doing what newlyweds are famous for doing. Julia has more physical contact (and chemistry) with Leonard Rogers, her sweet-tempered playboy suitor, who's a lot more appealing as husband material than that cold fish Barclay.

Solid performances are turned in by familiar actors in some of the secondary roles: Raymond Walburn as the perfect butler; Katherine Alexander as Barclay's drama-queen sister; Edith Fellows as the evil daughter; and especially Jean Dixon as Julia's wise-cracking, matchmaking best friend.

Would love to have seen this film made just a year earlier, before the Hays Office started taking their moralizing hatchet to so many of the things that made movies of the 30s worth watching.