Film review: Libeled Lady (1936)

What a lineup!  

Here's the main idea: Spencer Tracy is newspaper man Warren Haggerty, who is about to wed his fiancee, Gladys, 

is called away (and relieved to be) to deal with a disaster, viz,  the paper has put a false rumor on the front page about Connie Allenbury (Myrna Loy), socialite daughter of millionaire James B. Allenbury (a very familiar-looking Walter Connolly), and before they can recall all the editions, the Allenburys get wind and Connie sues them for $5 million (in 1936!).  Warren's solution is to hunt down the paper's "libel man" - that is, the guy who gets people suing the paper to stop, through fair means or foul.  This is William Powell's Bill Chandler, and there's no love lost between him and Haggerty, who fired him.  (Turns out he's very fireable - since he left this paper he moved through papers all over the world, only to be traced to a hotel in New York.)  The plan is to be on the same boat as the Allenburys coming back from Europe and to charm Connie into his cabin for a cocktail, there to be photographed and countersued by Chandler's "wife" for estrangement (which would also undermine the libel suit because that's essentially what they'd accused her of in the false headline).  So, to set this up, Bill needs to be married, and Haggerty, heel that he is, nominates his fiancee.  She is none-too-pleased at this plan, especially as she's been married and divorced already, and wants to have a marriage that lasts.  But she goes along, and the two are married.  (The justice of the peace is outraged when the "bride" liplocks with the "best man" (Haggerty) and Chandler has to explain that he's an old friend of the family.) The couple has to make an appearance of connubial bliss by sharing a hotel suite, but Gladys insists on a locked door between them.  However, the next day Bill is off to Europe to set the plan in motion.  Thus begins the real meat of the film, which is the developing romance between Bill and Connie.  It gets off to a very rocky start (to Bill's surprise - he has a reputation as a ladykiller), although Bill does completely win over Pere Allenbury by checking out every book in the ship's library on angling.  However, Connie resists his charms 

and even tricks him into having cocktails with a very tedious mother-daughter pair instead of her.  It is, in fact, only when Bill gets fed up with her and gives her a piece of his mind that she starts to see him as potentially more than a grifter.  By this time they are back in New York: Haggerty is annoyed, but Bill insists he's making progress, and in fact has been invited on a fishing trip with the Allenburys, the only problem being that he has no idea how to fish. Haggerty arranges for a master angler to come and give him tips, which requires another night in the hotel suite with Gladys.  Perhaps predictably, Gladys has begun to warm to Bill, and find the process of him learning how to fish hilarious - at least until he successfully sinks a hook into her backside, demonstrating his natural skill at the fiendishly difficult "underhand" style of casting.  Indeed, Connie is still certain that Bill is a fake until she, too, witnesses the glory of his cast.  

Actually catching a fish proves difficult, however, so he moves upstream from the Allenburys so that he can take notes from the book he brought along, but after a sequence of several pratfalls (something one might not have thought the suave Powell capable of) he ends up hooking Ol' Walleye, a trout the Allenburys have been trying to land for years.  The plan is for Haggerty and Gladys to drive up and for Gladys to burst in on Bill and Connie, but Bill has such a nice time with Connie (she shows him their mid-lake cabin, complete with gramophone) that he sneaks out and meets them on the road and claims that Connie isn't even there.  Thus begins Bill's double life: he courts Connie by day, while stalling Haggerty, and coming home to the ever-more-doting Gladys.  Things are coming to the boil!  He's trying to gently push Connie to drop the lawsuit, but there are limits to the leverage he has without blowing his cover.  Finally, Haggerty decides he'll just go and throw himself on Connie's mercy and see if that works.  He meets her chez Allenbury 

and spins her a tale of how her lawsuit will put so many good men and women out of work, and that's all that he really cares about.  Connie responds that his speech has softened her heart, and that she has decided to donate her $5M to a trust fund to those poor ex-newspaper workers.  Haggerty is cornered, but at that moment Bill strolls in, and Haggerty finds out what's really been going on.  He leaves and runs to a phone and tells Gladys (whom he knows has been getting soft on Bill) the whole story, counting on her now-genuine rage causing her to storm up there on her own initiative.  However, Bill manages to intercept her and talk her round.  BUT, then Haggerty has a fake edition of the paper printed that announces the impending marriage of Bill and Connie and hands it to Connie (who is having her hair bleached and has a face covered in cream - perhaps a comment on the fact that Harlow was always referred to as a bleached blonde), 

and we're on again for the storming in.  MEANWHILE, the gossipy mother-daughter pair from the ship have overheard reference to Chandler's wife (they're staying in the same hotel) and tell Pere Allenbury, at the same party that Gladys is rushing to, closely followed by a car full of photographers hired by Haggerty.  The father breaks it to Connie, and she decides she'll confront Bill about this marriage... by asking if he'll marry her right now.  What will he do?  He can't accept, can he?  That's bigamy! (It's big o' you too - let's be big for a change!)  But he does!  

But how?  Well, because of a loophole he's discovered.  Or has he?  Many twists and turns at the ending, and a knock-down drag-out fight between Powell and Tracy.  

 

Very satisfying.  Definitely a classic screwball comedy - I'm only surprised we hadn't come across it before.