'MAMA LOVES PAPA’

Evening Star, Issue 21622, 18 January 1934, Page 5

'MAMA LOVES PAPA’

EXCELLENT COMEDY FOR EMPIRE An excellent comedy is the feature which opens its season at the Empire Theatre to-morrow. The’ title of the film is ‘ Mama Loves Papa,’ and the story concerns the lives of a happilymarried couple, the husband being a confirmed humorist. The wife, however, has no sense of humour at all. Two such temperaments under the same roof may be ordinary enough with some people. Bub when the husband is Charles Buggies, and the wife is Mary Boland, the case is different. Mary is determined that her husband should bo a gentleman, and the simple fact of his arriving at work one morning in frock coat and striped trousers starts a series of awkward situations that keeps the audience involuntarily roaring with laughter. First of all Euggles’s chief thinks that his employee’s attire indicates a bereavement in the family, so Buggies is told to take the day off. He wanders into a park, and, getting mixed up with a dedication ceremony, finds himself appointed park commissioner in record time. Even there the fun does not stop, and it is not long before the couple combine to show the really laughable side of life. At a sedate party Buggies exceeds the limits of conventional insobriety. Other scenes of concentrated humour occur when Buggies tells Mary a joke which she fails utterly to see. Buggies is undoubtedly one of the best natural comedians on the screen. Mary Boland’s part is made more amusing by her attempts to persuade her husband to live up to standards of “ culture dictated by popular lectures. She plays the part of a middle-class wife excellently. A further attraction is the presence of the popular Lilyan _ Tashman as the wife of a park equipment supplier. Her husband is played by Morgan Wallace, who tries to bludgeon Buggies into questionable business deals. Others in the cast are George Barber, Buth Warren, Walter Catlett, Andre Beranger, Tom Bicketts, and Frank Sheridan. A really good set of shorts will round off the programme.