Don't Tell the Wife

Thurston Hall gets out of prison and back to selling gold mines in a boiler room. He's got a new wrinkle to avoid going to prison: he's got a mine. Is there gold in it, asks one of his crew? He has no idea.

They tap Lynne Overman for the start-up capital, but his wife, Una Merkel, wants to know who's backing the operation. One of the Wall Street Winthrops, he claims; so they track down clownish Guy Kibbee, whose name happens to be Winthrop, to serve as the nominal head of the firm.

There's a fine selection of comics in this movie directed by Christy Cabanne, including 'Big Boy' Williams, William Demarest, Lucille Ball, and Si Jenks. Cabanne has the reputation of being one of the worst directors ever to grind film, but given a decent budget, he proved that false, and here's the proof. It's very funny.

Don't Tell the Wife (1937)

** (out of 4)

An all-star cast of character actors are wasted in this rather flat comedy. A con man gets released from prison and decides to head back into the stock fraud racket but his ex-partner is now married and his wife (Una Merkel) refuses to let him "invest" any money unless they can show proof that this new business deal is legit. They hire a dimwitted magazine writer (Guy Kibbee) to pretend to be a wizard at stocks but he ends up causing more trouble than anything. DON'T TELL THE WIFE has a decent idea but sadly it never comes together due in large part to some poor pacing from director Christy Cabanne but also a very weak screenplay that frankly just doesn't contain anything funny. It's a real shame that the screenplay is so disappointing because we're treated to a very good cast. Kibbee really can't add too much to the film as he's playing the same type of dimwitted character that he had countless times by this point in his career. The actor is always charming to watch but his character is really letdown by the script. Merkel is also wasted in her supporting role as is Lynne Overman as her husband and Thurston Hall as the con man. Guinn 'Big Boy' Williams plays his typical dumb thug and we also get Lucille Ball in a small part as well as Hattie McDaniel in a brief bit and we also have Wilfred Lucas in a very brief bit. DON'T TELL THE WIFE remains mildly entertaining thanks to the wonderful cast but there's just no getting around the fact that for a comedy there just aren't any laughs.

Any flick with Guy Kibbee or Thurston Hall or Guinn 'Big-Boy' Williams has got to have entertainment value. The chemistry works with "Don't Tell The Wife". A con-man tries to get out of the rackets and settle down with his wife, but the pull of the old game is too strong for him to resist. He's got to make another score for security and for old time's sake. The wife doesn't buy in quickly. Kibbee helps to convince her via his bumbling character in this flick (which probably would have been better handled by a Cecil Calloway or Frank Morgan). In times prior to this, the chiselers had sold phony stock to phony mines. This time there is a real mine, but what happens comes as quite a surprise to all concerned. Completely out of touch with reality, and only suggestive of madcap without going overboard, this one is actually kinda entertaining.

For me, Una Merkel is the high point. Demarest is good as always, Kibbee is Kibbee, and the rest of the cast do their job quite adequately.

The plot is not entirely cliched, the pacing is okay, the acting is fine, and I suspect some of the jokes would have landed in 1937, but overall ... well, it passes the time without actually being funny.

This is one of Lucille Ball's early roles, and she's good, but of course tragically underutilized.

The only objectionable thing to me is the 50mph ticket contrivance, which, besides being irritatingly stupid, is totally unnecessary. It makes me think the writers simply couldn't figure out what to do at this point and gave up trying.

The busiest players in the Hollywood Studio era had to be the character actors. I don't think any of them rested at all. A whole gang of them got to work here in Don't Tell the Wife and with no star to steal scenes from they practiced their scene stealing monkeyshines on each other.

Guy Kibbee writes a financial column and a group of conmen Thurston Hall, Guinn Williams, Lynne Overman, and William Demarest have decided he's the perfect gullible dupe in which to hide their nefarious scheme involving a gold mine. They also need some seed money for their enterprise and a related con involves Lynne Overman convincing wife Una Merkel that the scheme is on the up and up. Kibbee is also used as a patsy for that.

That's as far as I'm going to go, but if you watch this picture and see all these wonderful players do their shtick, you almost might forget the plot here.

There was one star here however and one Academy Award winner. Hattie McDaniel is down in the cast list as, what else, a maid. And in a small role as the secretary to the schemers was Lucille Ball who became a bigger name than any of them. But that was in the distant future.