This comedy from Paramount Pictures/United Artists and director Edward H. Griffith has six aspiring stage performers, Norman (William Holden), George (Eddie Bracken), Tony (James Brown), Kate (Susan Hayward), Dottie (Martha O'Driscoll), and Marge (Barbara Britton), all sharing an apartment to save on expenses. They have to keep their co-habitation a secret though, so as to not upset the morals of the day and risk immediate eviction. Their situation is upended by the arrival of cousin Muriel (Florence MacMichael) who wants to spill the beans on their arrangement, and playwright Arthur Kenny (Robert Benchley), a major Broadway figure who resided in the same apartment building in his younger years, and who has returned to recharge his creative batteries.
I found this more irritating than amusing. MacMichael uses an incredibly annoying cutesy baby voice that grates on the nerves. Neither the screenwriters nor the director succeeded in opening up the action much from its stage origins, and as such the majority of the film transpires in a single room. Future big-time movie stars Holden and Hayward are fine in their roles, but neither really displays much in the way of screen magnetism. Bracken gets to do most of the silliest shtick, naturally. This reminded me of a prototype version of Friends.
I found this more irritating than amusing. MacMichael uses an incredibly annoying cutesy baby voice that grates on the nerves. Neither the screenwriters nor the director succeeded in opening up the action much from its stage origins, and as such the majority of the film transpires in a single room. Future big-time movie stars Holden and Hayward are fine in their roles, but neither really displays much in the way of screen magnetism. Bracken gets to do most of the silliest shtick, naturally. This reminded me of a prototype version of Friends.