There's Always a Woman

There's Always a Woman
Directed by Alexander Hall
Produced by William Perlberg
Written by Gladys Lehman
Based on There's Always a Woman
1937 story in American Magazine
by Wilson Collison
Starring Joan Blondell
Melvyn Douglas
Mary Astor
Music by George Parrish
Cinematography Henry Freulich
Edited by Viola Lawrence
Distributed by Columbia Pictures Corporation
Release date
 April 20, 1938
Running time
 80-82 minutes
Country United States
Language English

There's Always a Woman is a 1938 comedy mystery film starring Melvyn Douglas as a detective investigating a murder and Joan Blondell as his interfering wife Sally. The film was based on the short story of the same name by Wilson Collison and the supporting cast includes Mary Astor. Seeing the potential for a series, Columbia Pictures quickly made a sequel, There's That Woman Again, released the same year, with Douglas reprising his role, but with Virginia Bruce as Sally. No further sequels were made.

A 19-year-old Rita Hayworth makes a small uncredited appearance in this film as Mr. Ketterling's secretary.

Plot

Bill Reardon's (Melvyn Douglas) private detective agency is not making any money, so he decides to swallow his pride and return to work for the district attorney as a special investigator. His wife Sally (Joan Blondell), who persuaded him to start his own business, decides to keep the agency going herself.

Sally is quickly hired by Lola Fraser (Mary Astor) to investigate Anne Calhoun (Frances Drake), a former girlfriend of Lola's husband Walter (Lester Matthews) who has been in contact with him. At a nightclub owned by Nick Shane (Jerome Cowan), pretending to be out with Bill for pleasure rather than business, Sally witnesses Anne's angry fiancé Jerry Marlowe (Robert Paige) threatening Walter, and before long Walter ends up dead.

Jerry is the prime suspect. Mr. Ketterling (Pierre Watkin), Jerry's employer, talks him into hiring Sally to prove him innocent. Shane could be behind it, she figures, but his body is found in the Reardons' apartment, where Sally catches a whiff of a familiar perfume, Lola's. Escaping police custody as a murder suspect, Sally gets Lola to sign a confession that she killed Shane in self defense by pretending to have found her handkerchief at the scene of the crime. However, Bill arrests Lola for hiring Shane to kill Walter to inherit all of his estate instead of getting a divorce settlement. When Shane started blackmailing her, she killed him.

Cast

Reception

The New York Times called the film "one of the lightest and most engaging affairs of recent months" and "a 'Thin Man' of the lower-income brackets."[1]

References

  1. ↑ B. C. (April 29, 1938). "The Screen; ' There's Always a Woman': Murder and Mirth at the Music Hall--'Hawaii Calls' at the Palace At the Palace At the Squire Theatre At the New Yorker Theatre". The New York Times.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.