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.

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

Joan Blondell as Sally Reardon
Melvyn Douglas as William Reardon
Mary Astor as Lola Fraser
Frances Drake as Anne Calhoun
Jerome Cowan as Nick Shane
Robert Paige as Jerry Marlowe
Thurston Hall as District Attorney
Pierre Watkin as Mr. Ketterling
Walter Kingsford as Grigson
Lester Matthews as Walter Fraser
Rita Hayworth as Mary, Ketterling's secretary (uncredited)

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

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.

External links

There's Always a Woman at the TCM Movie Database
There's Always a Woman on IMDb
There's Always a Woman at AllMovie
There's Always a Woman at the American Film Institute Catalog

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[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.