Whether or not money can buy happiness (or just rents it) is a question still being pondered millenniums after the appearance of the first gold diggers. Today, having tons of money may get your name in the paper or most likely just pay for a good therapist, but in the depression, if you were lucky enough not to have lost your shirt or skirt in the stock market, you had to wonder if the broke heir or heiress or the dashing young man or sexy chorus girl was after you or your bank roll. Real life heiresses Barbara Hutton and Doris Duke had their prestigious but sometimes lonely lives documented in T.V. movies, even appearing together as pals in the 2001 Doris Duke bio, "Too Rich".
Their fictional depression era movie counterpart is introduced as the orphaned daughter of wealthy parents who went down on the Titanic, and to avoid unwanted publicity, she has lived in seclusion all her life. The audience learns early on in this light screwball comedy with dramatic moments that the real heiress (Miriam Hopkins) has switched places with her secretary (Fay Wray) in the hopes of finding a husband who loves her, not her status or bank account. She's actually a very lovely young lady, fun and caring, yet definitely insecure over her ability to attract a man. Along comes handsome Joel McCrea who makes a bee-line for Wray but also enjoys spending time with Hopkins whom he considers a "buddy". Wray goes along for the prank, yet unlike in the badly remade "Bride By Mistake", is always prepared to relinquish her status should the plan backfire.
A well-written and complex comedy, this is a film without a real complete conclusion, but that gives the audience the opportunity to determine how they would like the revelation of the truth to come out. Hopkins and McCrea share a nice chemistry and prove that true love does usually start off with the two being more pals than lovers. Wray's character is never really developed beyond just being an agreeable part of the scheme, but Henry Stephenson is excellent as Hopkins' adviser. Droll Reginald Denny and loyal Beryl Mercer round out the supporting cast for a comedy that doesn't answer all the questions about what it takes to be a happy rich person, but then that answer needs to come from the person whose life desire it is to be wealthy.
Their fictional depression era movie counterpart is introduced as the orphaned daughter of wealthy parents who went down on the Titanic, and to avoid unwanted publicity, she has lived in seclusion all her life. The audience learns early on in this light screwball comedy with dramatic moments that the real heiress (Miriam Hopkins) has switched places with her secretary (Fay Wray) in the hopes of finding a husband who loves her, not her status or bank account. She's actually a very lovely young lady, fun and caring, yet definitely insecure over her ability to attract a man. Along comes handsome Joel McCrea who makes a bee-line for Wray but also enjoys spending time with Hopkins whom he considers a "buddy". Wray goes along for the prank, yet unlike in the badly remade "Bride By Mistake", is always prepared to relinquish her status should the plan backfire.
A well-written and complex comedy, this is a film without a real complete conclusion, but that gives the audience the opportunity to determine how they would like the revelation of the truth to come out. Hopkins and McCrea share a nice chemistry and prove that true love does usually start off with the two being more pals than lovers. Wray's character is never really developed beyond just being an agreeable part of the scheme, but Henry Stephenson is excellent as Hopkins' adviser. Droll Reginald Denny and loyal Beryl Mercer round out the supporting cast for a comedy that doesn't answer all the questions about what it takes to be a happy rich person, but then that answer needs to come from the person whose life desire it is to be wealthy.