Ma chère secrétaire

Where has this movie been hiding all my life? Picked it up cheaply mainly to see what a young Kirk Douglas was like, not being a particular fan of his much acclaimed later work. This is a screwball comedy that is really funny, not just because of the situations but with jokes too. I sat wide eyed through much of this barely able to believe what was being said, was indeed being said. Douglas is great and Laraine day fine but Keenan Wynn, perhaps a little influenced by Grouch Marx, is fantastic. Some really great lines and gags and only a little slapstick, mainly surrounding his attempts at domesticity. No boring passages, this is a solid romp from start to finish.

PS Just one thing, my copy is a PAL Region '0' Dynamic Entertainment release on DVD and has a poor snowy picture and a barely tolerable 'ringing' soundtrack. There seem to be various 'public domain' releases, does anyone know of a decent copy?

The hitherto under-publicised film; My Dear Secretary (1949) illustrates that lead film stars were often there as a marketing tool such as in this example of Kirk Douglas, while the real talents were the character actors, such as in the case of the multi talented Keenan Wynn - see this versatile actor in his highly adept sinister role in Kind Lady (1951). In other words Wynn is the driving force of this film as opposed to the star attraction. In this film Wynn is the comedic talent to the drab cliché straight man role of Douglas'.

Douglas here plays the role of Owen Waterbury, the egotistical writer with a misogynistic womanising streak. In this respect it could be said that Douglas was playing himself. This egotistical persona was merely exacerbated for Douglas' later heroic roles such as in Spartacus (1960). Like his role in Sparticus, in My Dear Secretary,Douglas likes to show off his masculine torso when he puts his shirt on minus vest. This is somewhat of a tribute to Clarke Glable's famous vestless scene in; It Happened One Night (1934).

Douglas' role of the writer Waterbury uses the secretarial school as a licence to his womanising ways, making passes at them and auditioning them for the role of wife, of which is eventually awarded to Stephanie Gaylord (Laraine Day) who plays his bland, docile, door mat wife. That is until she comes into her own with her own award winning novel. This culminates in the roles being reversed as Waterbury becomes the subordinate partner in their marriage. In this respect the film's denouement was ahead of its time, illustrating women as not only a success in their own right, but as the matriarchal head of the family.

Though the acting parts of Douglas and Day were stereotypically bland, the supporting cast are outstanding in their respective roles. This is especially attributed to Wynn. He alone makes the film a must see. Of course, the great Irene Ryan (Mary, the housekeeper) is adept at scene stealing in her minor role.

In sum, this is a film of talented characters with bland stars.

The stars of this movie are supposed to be Kirk Douglas and Laraine Day, but it's worth saying right off the top that the movie is worth watching primarily for Keenan Wynn's hilarious performance as Ronnie Hastings. He really is the one who makes this movie.

Ronnie is a neighbour of and assistant to author Owen Waterbury (Douglas.) After writing a best-seller, Waterbury gives a lecture to a writing class and meets Stephanie Gaylord (Day.) Waterbury offers Gaylord a job as his secretary, and she accepts, but what she didn't know is that Waterbury's secretaries don't last very long. He's a bit of a playboy type, and he and Hastings always insist on a certain "type" of secretary (ie, extremely cute) and most of them don't take very kindly to being hit on as soon as they walk through the door.

Basically, this movie deals with the evolution of the relationship between Waterbury and Day. Both play their parts very well, but, as I said, the show is stolen by Wynn right from the beginning, and it all leads up to an ending (again with Wynn as the comedic centrepiece) that I didn't see coming, particularly given what seemed to be Ronnie's taste in women.

All in all, it's good, clean entertaining comedy, with a plot that admittedly gets a little bit tired by the end, but still there's quite a few laughs here. 7/10

An overlooked and underrated gem in the genre of American Screwball comedy, "My Dear Secretary" pits Kirk Douglas and Laraine Day together in a romantic battle of the sexes set against the literary world of the 1940's. The script, complex in its plot as one expects from these brilliant comedies from that era, is flawless, and the performances by Day and Douglas, who demonstrates an early knack for comedic acting sorely underused in most of his later films, are solid. It is Keenan Wynn however as Douglas' wisecracking best friend who does a great deal of scene stealing in one of his most memorable roles. A shame Kirk Douglas claimed a lack of affection for this picture in his autobiography as it is a real treat to watch him in this type of film. Made by low key United Artists at a time when screwball comedy was winding down, it is not hard to see why this picture was overlooked then and is all but forgotten now. In the shadow of the more famous Cary Grant and Roselind Russell et al comedies it is nevertheless an intricate and finely tuned piece of screwball which deserves better recognition. Look for it at the video store, you will pleasantly surprised. And while you're there check out "A Lady Takes a Chance" with Jean Arthur and John Wayne, another sadly under-appreciated comedy from the 40's.

"My Dear Secretary" is an odd film, as the first and last portions of the film vary so much in quality. The first is brisk and funny--the second is very slow and completely different. It's too bad because if the film could have maintained its pace, it would be an excellent and enjoyable picture. Instead, it's just frustrating to watch.

The film begins with Laraine Day being hired as a secretary to a successful writer. She's excited by this but her excitement soon wanes as she sees that her new employer (Kirk Douglas) is a very immature and undisciplined guy. Again and again, instead of working on his book, he takes the secretary and his friend (Keenan Wynn) out gambling and on spur of the moment vacations!

Despite this portion of the film being hard to believe, it was quite funny--particularly for Wynn, who provided wonderful support. However, completely out of the blue, Day (who is rather conservative) marries Douglas--a wedding that makes absolutely no sense at all. And, as if the unlikelihood of the pairing also threw the writer, the film just languished and stopped being funny. Instead, the marriage soon begins to fizzle and Douglas' attempt to write his next great novel seems to be a bust. There's more to it than this--including Day becoming a great writer herself and a divorce--but none of it made much sense or kept my interest.

Rarely have I seen such an uneven film. I wanted to like it a lot more than I did and can say it's, at best, just an amiable time-passer and nothing more.