Screwballing Around

Libeled Lady (1936)

William Powell
Myrna Loy
Jean Harlow
Spencer Tracy

William Powell and Myrna Loy are a wonderful pair, legendary for their performances in The Thin Man series. They had a tremendous amount of chemistry. Jean Harlow was famous (especially as a sex symbol) in her own right, and I bet a ton of people even today have heard the name Spencer Tracy. The one thing that surprises me about this cast is that even though Tracy did some comedies with Katherine Hepburn (the love of his life), I have never thought of him as a traditional screwball comedy actor. He was all right in this one, though.

As with all screwball comedies, the plot is silly. On the day he is to be married, an editor of a newspaper (Spencer Tracy) finds out that his paper has committed libel. He drops everything, including his long-suffering fiancee (Jean Harlow), to try and fix things. It seems that the paper accused the daughter (Myrna Loy) of a very wealthy man of stealing another woman's husband, which later turned out to be untrue. She is so angry, in a detached sort of way, that she decides to sue for 5 million dollars (in 1936!). Desperate, the editor hires a "heel" (William Powell) to try and seduce the woman, making the lie seem true. Of course, to make the scandal work, Powell has to actually be married, so Spencer comes up with the crazy idea of Harlow (his own fiancee) marrying him temporarily, just until this whole thing is over.

Of course, along the way, Powell falls in love with the rich heiress. At the same time, Powell treats Harlow, who is desperate for affection she isn't getting from her former fiance (who still calls himself her fiance), with a faux type of affection, which Harlow likes a great deal. This leads to Spencer becoming jealous, which Harlow intended all along.

You get all that?

It doesn't really matter because the plot isn't the point. The real entertainment comes from watching the characters try to deal with the various individual misunderstandings and sticky situations. The best part, though, is Myrna Loy. William Powell just seems to light up in every scene he shares with her, and her sarcastic voice is a character in its own right. Spencer Tracy and Jean Harlow did have a sort of chemistry, but it wasn't as sublime as what Powell and Loy were always able to show.

I really want to watch The Thin Man right now.

On a side note, I had wanted to watch The Agony and the Ecstasy tonight, but I got home an hour later than I expected so I am going to have to reschedule again. I was originally supposed to watch it and Mean Creek but the Heston/Harrison movie is nearly two and a half hours long. So, I switched it with Libeled Lady, which is just over 90 minutes. This way, I will at least get some decent sleep tonight. The movie I'm scheduled to watch tomorrow night isn't too long, so I will, hopefully, finally, be able to watch Rex Harrison and Charlton Heston go at each other, so to speak.