Screwball March: Hands Across the Table (1935)

We are feeling squirrely from being cooped up all winter. It's time for some screwball comedies to release that tension.

RODNEY BOWCOCK: After last week, it’s nice to see that we have an actual screwball comedy on our hands. Hands Across the Table is the story of a hotel manicurist, Regi Allen (Carole Lombard) who is using her job in an attempt to land a rich husband. While she enjoys the company of a wheelchair bound ex-pilot (Ralph Bellamy), its really Theodore Drew III (Fred MacMurray) who catches her eye. Unfortunately, the Drews have lost their fortune in the depression and Ted’s solution is to marry a pineapple heiress (Astrid Allwyn). After lying to his fiancée about his whereabouts, Ted takes up residence in Regi’s apartment, where they slowly fall in love.

SAMANTHA GLASSER: Photoplay's reviewer said, "If your funnybone is in need of a tickling, don't miss this sparkling and sometimes uproarious comedy of a manicurist who's determined to marry money and winds up behind the eight ball of poor but honest love."

This film was originally intended for Claudette Colbert, but Lombard had signed a contract with Universal to begin in November and owed Paramount a few more films, so they whisked her into Hands Across the Table and started shooting in August. MacMurray and Lombard have incredible chemistry. Not only do they make a beautiful couple, they seem to be having a blast working together. IMDB suggests that their crackup in the prank call from Bermuda scene was completely genuine. It feels that way.

Director Mitchell Leisen said, "In Hands Across the Table, Fred was one of the most difficult actors to direct that I had ever handled. For one thing, he used to have a tendency to talk his lines too fast. It was because he was scared of them, of course, and wanted them over as quickly as possible." He credited Lombard with easing his anxieties, first by playing a competitive game of Monopoly with him, and later by cornering him with her best friend Madalynne Fields, sitting on him and plucking his unruly eyebrows.

Lombard was well-known for using colorful language and having a lot of fun, and I like her for that. She was unapologetic in an era when women were taught to be delicate, submissive flowers, and her contemporaries (mostly) respected her for it. MacMurray said, "More than anything else, Carole proved to me that there is nothing so serious you can't have fun out of it. It isn't that she isn't sincere about her work, but she's discovered how valuable it is to know when to let down."

RB: I’m not sure how much of that was unscripted, but their joy in the scene is infectious and it’s one of the highlights in the film. They had such good chemistry that Paramount teamed them together three more times over the next two years.

SG: I remember discovering the 30s version of MacMurray in college. I knew him from his Disney Dad work, and it was shocking to see him as a vibrant, attractive man instead of a disgruntled parent. This movie goes the extra mile by showing that he could be sexy in a scene where he's in boxers and an undershirt getting tucked into bed by his conflicted roommate in an intensely charged scene.

RB: I think my earliest exposure to MacMurray was in The Absent-Minded Professor or possibly through reruns of My Three Sons, where he always seemed warm but not particularly funny. What we watched was his first comedy role, which was apparently a risk as nobody was quite sure if he could handle it. Lombard is quoted with saying that she had to work very hard to get him to loosen up to handle the role.

SG: Watching their relationship develop on screen is a delight, and it is made all the more romantic by the way it was shot. I believe the cinematographer used gauze to create a glowing soft-edged look that makes this film a pleasure all around.

RB: While the film is available on blu-ray from Kino, I watched a twenty year old DVD release from a box set of Lombard films, and I was struck by how good it looked. The appropriate amount of film grain is present and you can really see the beautiful lighting that you refer to.

TED: You know, you'd be very beautiful with blonde hair. REGI: I have blonde hair. TED: I know it.

SG: Alternately, Ralph Bellamy is the rich former flyer who becomes Regi's confidante, but doesn't quite spark her interest beyond friendship. He became notorious for playing the guy who never got the girl, and maybe it is his role in The Wolf Man that makes me feel this way, but there is something kind of creepy about him, like he is only playing nice until she's trapped.

RB: Bellamy had already appeared in dozens of films by the time he got to this and in short order after this, he’d be nominated for an Academy Award. His career eventually stalled out and he began playing in B’s like Meet the Wildcat and some of the Ellery Queen movies at Columbia. Not that we frown on that sort of thing around here.

SG: There are lots of laughs to be had. The scene of Regi and Ted in a nightclub attempting to drink upside down to alleviate hiccups is completely screwball. I also loved seeing William Demorest as Regi's date doing physical comedy. There is a joke about domestic violence that didn't age well.

Ruth Donnelly pops up again as the receptionist at the nail salon and silent actress Marie Prevost plays Regi's coworker friend.

RB: Of course, I am aware of Marie Prevost and her unfortunate outcome, but I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen her in anything until this. It’s such a shame because she’s cute and likable on screen. Her pairing in this film with Ed Gargan made me smile.

SG: Picture Play magazine's reviewer wrote, "With remarkable success it captures the rhythm of metropolitan life, the viewpoint, conversation and code of the girl who works as a manicurist and depends on the watchful use of her sex to get her out of the basement into a penthouse. Carole Lombard, in this role, is uncommonly good and her acting deserves the stellar billing she enjoys."

This was the first film released after Paramount was reorganized with Henry Herzbrun and Ernst Lubitsch in leadership roles. Their tenure didn't last long. Herzbrun was the company's attorney previously and served two years as production manager. Lubitsch only lasted one year because of his inability to delegate.

I remembered this movie fondly from seeing it many years ago when Paramount put out a boxed set of Lombard's films, and it was a joy to revisit it, so much so I plan to watch the other films in the set again in hopes of rediscovering another gem. Four stars.

RB: I remember seeing it when that set was first released, but all I really remember about it was the montage during the opening titles of all of the people getting pedicures. I found this to be a thoroughly delightful experience. Just a fun, fun movie. Four stars.