“Merrily We Live” At Plaza Theatre

Northern Advocate, 20 February 1939, Page 2

“Merrily We Live” At Plaza Theatre

Amusements

A continuous stream of giggles, punctuated* with frequent bursts of mirth, accompanied the initial screening of the current Plaza Theatre attraction. "Merrily We Live.” on Saturday night. A superb modern comedy topping "Topper” ftself. "Merrily We Live” represents the brightest in smart, swift-moving entertainment.

Blonde, piquant Constance Bennett has the leading role as Jerry Kilbourne, spoiled daughter of a successful business-man (Clarence Kolb) and an absent-minded mother (Billie Bourke) with a penchant for reforming tramps with drastic results to the family plate. Tom Brown is the son of the household and Bonita Granville scores a hit as the erratic, practical joking daughter. To this homely household comes Wade Rawlins (Brian Aherne) whose car has run away from him while returning from a fishing trip and smashed to pfeces over a bank. Unshaven and disreputable, Wade is taken for another deserving derelict of humanity by the scatter-brained Mrs. Kilbourne, and ordered to leave by the exasperated Jerry. He only wanted to use the telephone, but is so intrigued as to allow himself to be made the Kilbourne’s new chaffeur. The fun reaches a furious tempo when the Kilbournes give a party in honour of Senator Harlan, whose support the head of the house desires in a business deal. The new chaffeur finds himself forced to play the part of a guest, and to receive the attentions of the senator’s luscious daughter, to the exasperation of Jerry. And so in this setting the story swings to a hilarious climax. "Sparkling” is the only adequate description of this film, brilliant dialogue and uproarious comedy leaving never a dull moment. An unusually good list of supports includes a technicolour Traveltalk, "Glimpses of New Brunswick, a Metfo news reel featuring bombing horror of the Chinese war, London’s observance of Armistice and the opening of Parliament, and the latest of the powerful "Crime Doesn’t Pay series, showing the unhappy, way of bank robbers up against the law.