Merrily We Live (1938)

Produced by Hal Roach, directed by Norman Z. McLeod, and written by Jack Jevne & Eddie Moran, all of whom were responsible for Topper (1937) the year before, this essential screwball comedy also features Constance Bennett, Billie Burke, and Alan Mowbray. Even though its core story (and more) is similar to My Man Godfrey (1936), it delivers laughs by the bundle with its quirky characters and clever dialogue. Eric Hatch, who wrote "Godfrey", worked with McLeod, Jevne & Moran on "Topper". Brian Aherne plays a writer mistaken for a "forgotten man" (a tramp) and "hired" by a ditzy wealthy woman philanthropist (Burke) after her seventh "project" made off with the family silver. Her beautiful blonde daughter (Bennett), and practically every other female within range (like the family maid, played by Patsy Kelly), falls for the handsome stranger while the family butler (Mowbray) and her husband (Clarence Kolb) try to get rid of him. Bonita Granville plays Burke's youngest daughter, a prankster that delights in extorting money for her inside information while she corrals the family's many pets. Additionally, Tom Brown plays Burke's son and Marjorie Kane plays another live-in servant; neither is given very much to do. Sidney Bracey exhibits his characteristic (Buster) Keaton-like stone face, playing an additional butler hired for a party; Willie Best appears late in the film, playing the scared, mumbling character he always did, as does Pat Flaherty (uncredited as a police officer).

Aherne, whose next (and serious) role in the biographical drama Juarez (1939) would earn him his only Academy Award nomination, does a terrific job with comedy. Though we don't learn that his character Wade Rawlins is a novelist until late in the story, it is entirely credible that a writer could quickly assess the situation and adopt the mistaken the identity of a bum in order to play along for the experience therein, especially after he'd seen Bennett! For herself, Bennett inhabits her character Jerry Kilbourne much better in this film than she did her role in Topper (1937), which came off as a poor (wo)man's version of Carole Lombard. Jerry's romantically pursued by Philip Reed's character while she's made jealous by Ann Dvorak's bold flirtations towards Rawlins. Mowbray is better in this film as well; then again, he's given more to do. He comically plays the Kilbourne family's longtime butler who's fed up with the constant flow of indigents that are instantly accepted into the home, such that he frequently contemplates quitting. Granville's character lights up every scene she is in as the teenager daughter who relishes (and indeed causes some of) the crazy goings on in the household. Kolb is funny as the cranky head of the household who's family only partially respects his authority; funnier still is his change of heart from the one who insists they get rid of Rawlins to the one who orders "Mowbray" to serve him breakfast in bed, once he realizes the value Rawlins is to his pending bond issue with Senator Harlan (Paul Everton, whose wife is played by Marjorie Rambeau).

But the star of the film is far and away Burke, who earned her only Academy Award recognition when she received a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her hilarious character in this film, which also received Oscar nominations for Art Direction, Cinematography, Sound, and the title Song. Burke's character is blissfully unaware of the big picture, while at the same time suffering from a lack of short term memory. Other than that, she has a kind heart which leads her to take in tramps off the street to be their family's live-in chauffeur, despite the fact that these transients often don't work out well - the last one, before Rawlins, was a thief! Her lilting voice fits her perfectly (and better than it does Glinda the Good Witch in The Wizard of Oz (1939)) and, unlike her husband, she interprets her children's mocking (e.g. of her voice, the fact that she greets the family's pets each morning, etc.) as if they were "terms of endearment". Virtually all of the film's "laughing out loud" moments involve Burke's character, like the scene where she's "training" Rawlins how to serve, before her dinner party. During this subsequent dinner party, Aherne's character, thanks to the Senator Harlan's daughter's (Dvorak) interest in him, makes the transition from the Kilbourne's chauffeur to their guest.

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