ANGELS OVER BROADWAY

New Zealand Listener, Volume 4, Issue 84, 31 January 1941, Page 16

ANGELS OVER BROADWAY

| (Columbia)

EN HECHT must have been waiting a long time to make a picture like "Angels Over Broadway," for when the opportunity came, he didn’t let

many outsiders in on the executive side of production. He wrote it, produced it, and directed it. "Angels Over Broadway" is the story of a timorous little business man (John Qualen) who has embezzled 3,000 dollars from his firm, and has decided to commit suicide. Morosely taking his farewell of life in a Broadway night club, he is picked up by a slick young confidence man (Douglas Fairbanks Jnr.) who mistakes him for a wealthy "sucker"; an out-of-work night club dancer (Rita Hayworth) who mistakes him for a cheap evening’s entertainment; and a drunken playwright (Thomas Mitchell) who mistakes him for a plot for a new play. These three "angels" set out to rescue the would-be suicide-the confidence man for the sake of his own direct gain; the

little dancer because, in spite of her brittle front she has a tender heart; and the playwright because it amuses him to play God. They introduce him to a "bigtime" poker party as an out-of-town millionaire, where, preparatory to being "taken for a ride" he is allowed to win heavily. Then, with his winnings, he escapes from the game and back to life. As daybreak dispels the Hechtic night, the confidence man finds that he is none the richer from a monetary point of view, but he has accumulated a thorough beating up, a lesson on human values and the litthe dancer. The playwright, who passed out half way through, has forgotten all about it. "Angels Over Broadway" is_ strong, adult stuff, and in dialogue and situation, unmistakably Ben Hecht. In some ways it is the direct lineal descendant of that fine satire "Nothing Sacred." A character which Hecht must have taken a great deal of pleasure in creating is Eugene Gibbons, the tipsy playwright who sums himself up in a few cynical words: "I have been deserted by

my wife, whom I loved in my own nasty way, disembowelled by another woman, and I’ve written three flops." His alcoholic speeches are crammed with deadly observations on life. Offended by a half-naked, wriggling tango dancer, he remarks with a_ shudder: "Venus was never an epileptic." "If I were a philosopher," he observes on another occasion, "I would say that this age is an idiot, with a gun in one hand and a clarinet in the other. In fact I did say so, and the play closed last Saturday." High marks to the four principals, especially to Fairbanks and Mitchell. It is pleasant to see that Rita Hayworth is developing talent as well as good looks.