Shopworn

This is a pretty ordinary little film about a young waitress (Barbara Stanwyck) who falls in love with a wealthy college student (Regis Toomey) who will go on to become a doctor, and how his mother strives to break up their relationship. I rounded it up a bit because of Stanwyck's performance; she is such a natural and has a couple of great scenes. I also liked how she was such a strong woman - her character was toughened by her father's death, and she stands up to unwanted advances while waitressing, endures being sent away to a woman's reformatory on morality charges, and tells Toomey off when he returns to her after she's made it as a dancer. Being committed for trumped up morality reasons is outrageous today, but it was reality then, and the mother had also considered getting her committed to an asylum, a real practice stemming from the 19th century. If you don't like 'em or they're threatening in some way, lock 'em up. The ending is unfortunately a little dippy, but you could do worse than watch this one, and it's almost entirely due to Stanywck.

One of the great scenes has her throwing money in a guy's face after he tries to bribe her into leaving town to get her out of Toomey's life: "What are you trying to make of me - what you wish I was? Something cheap and common, something that money can buy? Well, you can't. Nobody can! You and the nice, decent people who sent you here are the real cheap ones, trying to put a price on something there isn't any price for! If that's being decent, I'm glad I'm common! If that's being rich, I'm glad I'm cheap, and I'm gonna stay cheap! Because no matter how cheap I am, I'm not for sale!"

This fast-moving film features Barbara Stanwyck in her early period when she usually played a tough, lower-class dame with a hot temper who stands fast to her principles. This character is virtually identical to the ones she played in NIGHT NURSE, LADIES THEY TALK ABOUT and BABY FACE. Here she is a waitress who falls in love with a rather bland medical student (Regis Toomey) whose nasty and snobbish mother (an excellent and truly scary Clara Blandick) schemes with a corrupt judge (Oscar Apfel) to separate the young lovers by sending Stanwyck to one of those reformatories that pop up so frequently in films of this era. The ever-fluttery Zasu Pitts is on hand as Stanwyck's aunt - what a comedown from GREED.

In one scene Stanwyck, trying to memorize the dictionary as a means of self improvement, shows her suitor a list of words beginning with the letter "e" which she has written down. He reads them aloud, stops after "ejaculate," looks at her with some curiosity and says that even he would never use such a word. That moment immediately pigeonholes this film as pre-Code. The scene continues artfully with one-word exchanges all starting with the letter "e." Later, while Lucien Littlefeld is conversing about the Stanwyck-Toomey relationship with Oscar Apfel, a couple of lines are very clumsily overdubbed by other actors. Makes one wonder what was actually said. Late in the film there is an imaginative banquet scene in which the camera carefully pans the length of a dining table highlighting the place cards (each a little paper doll inscribed with a guest's name) while the corresponding but off-screen voices converse on the soundtrack; then the camera moves back to reveal the whole table and all of the people we have been listening to. The yard between the diner where Stanwyck works and the house where the owners live is well depicted: tattered laundry hanging on a line, overflowing garbage cans and kittens playing.

The screenwriter Robert Riskin contributes some snappy and witty dialogue. He worked quite frequently with Frank Capra, penning the scripts for IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT, MEET JOHN DOE, LADY FOR A DAY and MR. DEEDS GOES TO TOWN, among others. All of these films address the issue of "decency" – what truly constitutes decency? Saying you are decent or actually being decent?

Working class heroine Barbara Stanwyck is tough as nails as she spits in "decent society's" face rather than buckle to bribe or threat as a waitress in an other side of the tracks romance with a med student in Shopworn.

The son of an overly possessive mother, David Livingston falls hard for tip chaser Kitty Lane at a local greasy spoon. Clinging mom is not about to let this happen and she wastes no time in exercising her considerable pull in getting a big time judge relative to send her to the slammer for 90 days on morals charges. Upon release Kitty goes on stage and makes it big. Six years later she runs into David, now a doctor again along with his mother still intent on keeping a firm grip on him.

There is some very ugly abuse of power that takes place in Shopworn as the son obsessed mother badgers the judge to do her corrupt bidding in getting Kitty out of the way. There are also swipes at law enforcement, the penal system and polite society, with Kitty being an ideal lynch pin for such actions. As Kitty, Stanwyck does an excellent job of vociferously exposing hypocrisy, especially in the scene where she is bribed and threatened as she throws the money in the judge's face and berates the police. The ending is contrived however and the sickeningly sweet finale is hard to swallow. Babs is too good for the lot of 'em. Mom and son (a wincingly woosie performance by Regis Toomey) don't deserve to be in the same room as her.

I'm surprised no one has reviewed this at all. Well, Barbara Stanwyck made a whole lot of movies, and this one is OK. It's got Zasu Pitts and the usual suspects. Barabara Stanwyck plays a flirty waitress in a college town who takes up with a young lad from an upper class family. Interesting to see how mores have changed. Lots of golly gee lines in this one, lots of upper class snobbery. Truly a different world. In this movie at least Barbara S. doesn't play a total trollop, like Mexicali Rose. In this one she becomes a successful actress, although on the riske side. It's not clear from the film if she went from burlesque to legit, but something along those lines. Interesting flick.

This is an early Barbara Stanwyck film, Shopworn, from 1932.

After her father dies in a construction accident, Kitty Lane (Stanwyck) keeps her promise to her dad and goes to live with his sister (Zasu Pitts). There, she works as a waitress.

It's a college town, and the guys are ga-ga over her, though she turns them all down. She falls for a bookish man, David (Regis Toomey), a medical student who doesn't seem to pay attention to her.

David comes from a good family - his father is a Judge, and his mother is possessive. She does not approve of Kitty. She fakes an illness and David finds that he must take her to a specialist in Vienna. Before he leaves, he proposes to Kitty, intending that she join them.

Everyone pretends to go along, but while packing, the police show up and arrest her for violating the public morals act, after she refuses the $5000 offered her. She is sentenced to prison for 90 days. David is told she took the money.

Upon her release, Kitty joins the Follies and makes a great success. Six years later, David visits her dressing room. She leads him on just to reject him, but later, the two talk it out and get back together. But his mother is still a pain, referring to her as "that shopworn woman."

One major scene was cut from this film - while in prison, Kitty miscarries a pregnancy, so it seems that she and David had quite the romance going.

I wouldn't say that Regis Toomey, who became a prolific character actor, and Barbara Stanwyck are well-matched. In the beginning, his role is that of an easily-influenced young man where his parents are concerned, and back in those days, this wasn't unusual. Later on he seems better able to stand up for himself. But as a couple, even when she was just starting out, Stanwyck had star quality, so it doesn't really work.

Stanwyck was a petite ball of fire, versatile, strong and charismatic, with a beautiful figure to boot. What a pleasure to see her in these early films. Watch it for her.