Ex-Lady

Ex-Lady

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Robert Florey
Produced by Darryl F. Zanuck
Written by David Boehm
Starring Bette Davis
Gene Raymond
Frank McHugh
Monroe Owsley
Music by Leo F. Forbstein
Cinematography Tony Gaudio
Edited by Harold McLernon
Production
company
Distributed by Warner Bros.
Release dates
  • May 15, 1933 (1933-05-15)
Running time
 67 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $93,000

Ex-Lady is a 1933 American Pre-Code comedy film directed by Robert Florey. The screenplay by David Boehm is based on an unproduced play by Edith Fitzgerald and Robert Riskin. It is a lightweight and modern version of a drawing room comedy. The film was made before the Motion Picture Production Code was in force, and it is risqué: in subject matter (people having affairs without shame), in staging (double beds) and in the fairly revealing negligees that Bette Davis's character wears.

Plot

Helen Bauer (Bette Davis) is a glamorous, successful, headstrong, and very liberated New York graphic artist with modern ideas about romance. She is involved with Don Peterson (Gene Raymond) but is not prepared to sacrifice her independence by entering into matrimony. The two agree to wed only to pacify Helen's conventional immigrant father Adolphe (Alphonse Ethier), whose Old World views spur him to condemn their affair. They form a business partnership, but financial problems at their advertising agency put a strain on the marriage and Don begins seeing Peggy Smith (Kay Strozzi), one of his married clients. Convinced it was marriage that disrupted their relationship, Helen suggests they live apart but remain lovers. When Don discovers Helen is dating his business rival, playboy Nick Malvyn (Monroe Owsley), he returns to Peggy, but in reality his heart belongs to his wife. Agreeing their love will help their marriage survive its problems, the two reconcile and settle into domestic bliss.

The plot is unusual for its time in that Helen is not denigrated for her beliefs about marriage and Don is not depicted as being a cad.[1] In addition, although they are sleeping together and unmarried, neither is concerned about the possibility of children, and certain dialog could suggest that they are using birth control.[1]

Cast

Production

The Warner Bros. film was a remake of the Barbara Stanwyck vehicle Illicit, released two years earlier.[2]

Following the film's release, producer Darryl F. Zanuck resigned from Warners to form his own production company, 20th Century Pictures, which eventually merged with Fox to become 20th Century Fox.

The prologue to the 1962 film What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? includes a scene from Ex-Lady as an example of former child star Jane Hudson's failure to achieve screen success as an adult due to her lack of talent.

Davis and Raymond in a scene from the trailer for Ex-Lady.

Critical reception

The New York Times in a contemporary review from 1933, described the film as "an honestly written and truthfully enacted picture of the domestic problems which harass two persons in love with one another".[3]

In contrast, a more recent review in TV Guide called it a "lame little melodrama notable chiefly for being the first film to have Bette Davis' name above the title".[4]

References

  1. 1 2 Basinger, Jeanine (1995). A Woman's View: How Hollywood Spoke to Women, 1930–1960. Middleton, Connecticut: Wesleyan University Press. p. 385. ISBN 0-8195-6291-2.
  2. ↑ Ex-Lady at Turner Classic Movies
  3. ↑ New York Times review
  4. ↑ TV Guide review
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Ex-Lady.
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 11/2/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.