I saw this movie when I was a teen and for some reason it provoked from me a (now) unaccountable aversion to Margaret Sullavan. Seeing it last night with "new eyes" I don't know how I could have been anything but delighted. My sides are still aching over the scenes between Frank Morgan and Reginald Owen---they are as funny as anything I've ever seen.
Margaret Sullavan plays Luisa Finglebusher (an unforgettable name---which everyone wants her to forget), a sheltered, imaginative waif from the local orphan asylum who is hired as an usherette at the fancy movie palace (her uniform is not a dress, but trousers---the matron of the asylum, concerned at the racy idea of one of her orphans wearing pants, asks the proprietor (Alan Hale) if they aren't too "tight fitting"? Hale: "That depends on the girl---the trousers are all the same size." Luisa is fetching enough in her "pants" to catch the (harmless) eye of a kindly middle-aged man (Owen) who, seeing her as a lamb let loose in a jungle, basically takes her under his protection and introduces her to the world---and fills her head with the idea that she deserves "furs, diamonds, cars and all the best things life offers". Until now, Luisa's main M.O. is, like the good fairy in the stories she tells the younger orphans, to do someone a good deed each day.
Enter Frank Morgan, another middle-aged man who takes a much less paternalistic interest in Luisa---he wants to be her "daddy" alright, but not like Owen's father-figure. He is determined to spend his money on a woman to make himself a playboy (where are these guys now?) and he's picked Luisa. Frightened by his attentions she blurts out that she's married, but instead of putting him off, he tells her he will make her husband rich and see that she gets all the things she deserves (furs, diamonds, cars) through him. Suddenly, it occurs to Luisa that this is her way to do a good deed! She has to make up a husband to back up her lie, so why not choose some poor chap down on his luck and let this man make him rich! So out of a phonebook she picks the name "Dr Max Sporum" (Herbert Marshall) and tells Morgan that's her husband.
After all this it's a madcap matter of Luisa trying to get to Sporum to explain what's happening and keep Morgan from finding out she's really not married---and all the while Reginald Owen thinks she's turning into a "fallen woman" he has to save! Wyler manages to make it possible for the audience to follow this nonsensical storyline and to mine it for exquisite, delicate laughter along the way. Some scenes fall quite short of the magic the Master (Lubitsch) could have made from them---particularly the getting-acquainted scenes between Sullavan and Marshall---but Wyler's adoration of Sullavan enslaves his talents to showing her off at her most mecurical and otherworldly.
If it is a bit of a stretch to imagine Margaret Sullavan as being quite that naive and innocent, she at least is, as always, authentically unique---not bound to be defined by the rules of the ordinary woman.
Wyler fans should see the nice print Kino presents as part of a series of Wyler movies (I may have to get them all, eventually) and this particular disc contains some still photos of Wyler at work and play.
Lubitsch fans should see it too, if only to appreciate him even more---for many great directors in his day paid him the inestimable compliment of imitation (Wyler, Mamoulian, Borzage---and Wilder all through his career). Oh, and if that's not inducement enough, the screenplay was written by Preston Sturges.
