“Four’s a Crowd,” Comedy-Romance

Manawatu Times, Volume 64, Issue 144, 21 June 1939, Page 11

“Four’s a Crowd,” ComedyRomance

FLYNN, DE HA VILLA ND, RUSSELL AND KNOWLES STARRED

(Regent: Screening 10.30 p.m. Friday.)

“Four’s A Crowd,’ 7 swiftly-paced comedy romance, has a cast topped by Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Rosalind Russell and Patric Knowles. Walter Connolly, Hugh Herbert, Melville Cooper and Franklin Pangbom are also featured.

The quartette to whom the title refers is made up of Errol Flynn, as a former newspaper editor who has become a high-powered public relations counsellor; Olivia de Havilland, as a spoiled heiress to many millions; Rosalind Russell, as a clever and witty, as well as good-looking, newspaper reporter; and Patric Knowles, rich playboy engaged to wed Olivia, who inherits the paper on which Rosalind works. The crowding to which the members of the quartette subject each other be gins when Pat decides to end his newspaper’s existence because it is losing money, but is roundly denounced by the outspoken Rosalind, who ends her tirade with tho advice that all the owner need do to turn his paper into a moneymaker is to hire a live-wire newspaperman like Errol as managing editor.

Tat takes the advice, Errol returns to tho newspaper business, and, looking for a sensational issue to arouso interest, launches a series of attacks on Olivia’s grandfather, played by Walter Connolly, who is an irascible and unscrupulous millionaire business brigand with two hobbies—miniature railroad trains and a pack of eighteen Great Danes which he is wont to set on unwelcome visitors to his estate.

Errol meets Olivia and gives her tho romantic rush, although he is also courting Rosalind. He is so successful with Olivia that she breaks her engagement to Pat, and the latter turns to Rosalind for solace. He gets it—and an elopement. This merry mix-up proves the truth of the title, but the final scene in the office of a bewildered justice of the peace clears up the matter.