TO-NIGHT AND MONDAY.

Waipa Post, Volume 44, Issue 3178, 14 May 1932, Page 5

TO-NIGHT AND MONDAY.

“ THE MAN IN POSSESSION.” We know very few young women who wouldn’t like to solve the servant problem as does Irene Purcell in “ The Man in Possession,” which opens at the Empire Theatre to-day, to-mght and on Monday. For if Robert Montgomery wouldn’t suit them as a butler we don’t know who would. That’s what happens, at any rate, in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s screen version of the popular stage farce with the exception that Montgomery forces himself into the Job where, in real life, it might take some persuasion to coax him into the service. This is Montgomery’s best picture to date and in it he seems to be having as much fun as the audiences who howl at his brilliant characterisation. It is purely a laughing matter from start to finish and is outlandishly spicy at several spots. However, you won’t take offence and surely couldn’t object to anything Montgomery says, the saintly way he says it. Sam Wood directed the brilliant feature and did so with rare judgment for story and action valuations, confronted as he was with the task of screening almost all his action within the four walls of a tiny English cottage. Charlotte Greenwood romps away with supporting honours as the maid who appoints herself Nemesis to the pseudo-butler but finds herself outpointed when he brings romance into the life of the dashing young widow lady-of-the house. It is one of Miss Greenwood’s most hilarious roles and she makes the most of it in a big way. Among the outstanding members of the cast are C. Aubrey Smith, Beryl Mercer, Reginald Owen and Alan Mowbray, all perfectly cast. The story concerns itself with the young court clerk who goes to the widow’s home to attach her possessions for a debt. To spare her humiliation during an important dinner, he acts as her butler with disastrous results. The fact that she is engaged to his blustery brother intrigues his sense of vengeance and by the time the dinner is over he is completely the “ man in possession,” as the title of the play indicated. This is one of the swiftest-moving and screamingest films we have seen yet. It’s worth seeing twice.