People Who Are Crazy But Human

Radio Record, 15 July 1938, Page 27

People Who Are Crazy But Human

["Romance For Three." M-G-M. Directed by Edward Buzzell. With Frank Morgan, Robert Young, Mary aa Florence Rice. Just releas-

ERE’S another of those exceptionally competent second-line comedies which Metro have been turning out in fair quantity lately. Remember "Married Before Breakfast" and "Beg, Borrow or Steal?’ This is better than either. In fact, it’s so good it moves up easily into the front line of entertainment. . What .a clean-up it would be at the if. it had one or two really big stars-but it wouldn’t be a better Come to think of it, Metro-although as much infected by the current epidemic of craziness ag any studiodoesn’t seem to have made so many flops. "Double Wedding" is the only one I can think of at the moment, though, with a little concentration, one could probably add’ to ‘the’ number. ee Romance In The Snow "THE main reason for the success of "Romance for Three" is that, while the characters behave in quite as eccentric a fashion as those in, say. "Bluebeard’s Highth Wife," they remain pleasantly human throughout. Thanks to expert direction and acting, it’s a happy rather than happy-g0-lucky affair, this delicious little fantasy about a poor slogan contest winner who swaps places with a millionaire at a Swiss winter resort and lives in the lap of luxury and feeds on caviare, while the rich man lives in the attic and feeds on boiled beef and carrots. ~ Both. thoroughly enjoy the change, both have-incredible but hilarious ad-ventures-the poor boy falls in love with the rich man’s daughter; the rich man tastes the joy of intrigue with a lovely adventuress who hag penetrated his disguise and vamps him with gusto. -And there is another very amusing complication in the person of lidna May Oliver, as the millionaire’s housekeeper, whose devotion to duty drags her to the alpine hotel, and, even on toa ski- -run, to save her mast¢tr . from ‘the vamp. | In the end, rewards and punishments are handed out in proper story-book style. he hotel manager and the porter, who have tried to make the rich man’s life a misery while they thought he ‘was poor, are demoted, while the overworked scullery hand; who has been kind to him, is raised to managership. The poor hero marries the rich man’s daughter; the vamp is pnt in her place; and so on. All Artists HAT a cast of first-rate artists there is in "Romance for Three’Frank Morgan, Robert Young, FWdna May Oliver, Florence Rice, Reginald Owen, Iferman Bing, Henry IIull, Sig Rumann! They’re all so good, so

. thoroughly in tune with the irresponsible gaiety of the picture, that distinctions are rather invidious. ' Yet Morgan stands out, as he always does, With q mixture of eccentric comedy and human philosophy that makes the milionaire a very lovable, if unlikely, person. One of the other characters puts him in a nutshell when he says: "I’m glad you’re a rich _ man, because as a poor man you could not make a living." Herman Bing, the screen’s champion roller of pig supplies the best line ‘of dialogue, when, as the pompous porter, he is ordered by the manager to secure three Siamese kittens immediately. Even a cat, he protests, is allowed 60 days to get kittens!