My Man Godfrey
Carole Lombard, William Powell
Directed by Gregory La Cava
Black and white
1936
Since Hollywood is out of ideas and because of the current financial crisis, another remake of 1936’s classic comedy My Man Godfrey might be interesting. You would have a hard time rewriting this comedy as smartly but it would be interesting to see its recreation.
My Man Godfrey stars Carole Lombard as a New York socialite who finds a “forgotten man”, William Powell, and brings him to a swanky hotel. This is part of a high society scavenger hunt, the most over the top moment in this classic comedy.
The rest is a bit of mild social criticism mixed with some quite witty dialogue and interesting characters. The socialite’s family is a nut house of quirky folks including a wannabe opera singer, a conniving sister, a clueless mother, and a put-upon father.
There is not doubt this family’s idiosyncrasies provided the original audience with a lot of the laughs in this movie but the social commentary’s bite and humor have lost their power. This takes little away from the entertainment value of My Man Godfrey.
Of course, this classic comedy has the Hollywood positive ending that does take away from the film but this is an entertaining movie that is still funny and interesting more than seventy years later.