Carole Lombard and Robert Montgomery are "Mr and Mrs. Smith"

In 1940, Alfred Hitchcock’s third American film, Mr. and Mrs. Smith (released in 1941), was a screwball comedy. Yes, that’s right a screwball comedy. And it starred Carole Lombard, who had recently been proclaimed the “Screwball Girl” in a Life magazine profile. Few classic movie fans are familiar with this Hitchcock comedy, even though it was a critical and commercial hit, making its debut at New York’s Radio City Music Hall.

The plot is typical for a screwball comedy. Ann (Lombard) and David (Robert Montgomery) Smith, discover that through a technicality their marriage isn’t legal. After David admits to his wife that if he had it to do all over again, he wouldn’t get married, Ann decides that she doesn’t want to be married either. What follows is a series of events in which each spouse tries to make the other jealous. Ann starts dating David’s law partner Jeff Custer (Gene Raymond) and David takes a room at his club and starts to hang out with a philandering Chuck Bensen (Jack Carson), which leads to some of the film’s funniest moments.

Carole Lombard and Robert Montgomery

Alfred Hitchcock loved Carole Lombard. She was his type of actress: beautiful, smart, earthy, and blonde. The Hitchcock family rented Lombard’s house after she and Clark Gable were married in 1939. The Hitchcock’s and the Gable’s became fast friends and it was inevitable that the director and actress would work together. Unfortunately, Lombard would make one movie after Mr. and Mrs. Smith, dying tragically in a plane crash the next year, after a successful war bond drive during World War II.

The script written by Oscar winner, Norman Krasna (Hands Across the Table, Bachelor Mother, It Started with Eve, Princess O’Rourke) is quite good and Lombard and Montgomery have great on-screen chemistry and deliver good performances. Raymond is perfect as Montgomery’s strait-laced college chum and partner. The film is peppered with some great character actors like Carson, Lucile Watson, Charles Halton, Esther Dale, and Betty Compson.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith proved that Hitchcock, the master of suspense, could be successful in any genre he put his mind to.

Carole Lombard directs Hitchcock's cameo.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith trivia

• Carole Lombard directed Hitchcock's cameo and had him do multiply takes.
• This was the first movie to feature a pizzeria.
• Cary Grant was the first choice for the role of David which went to Montgomery.
• Of Hitchcock's first four American films, this was the first one to take place in America.
• Montgomery was on loan from M-G-M and Hitchcock was on loan from David O. Selznick.
• The film was held over for several weeks at Radio City Music Hall.

To watch the film on YouTube, click onthe link below.

To join the discussion on May 8, 2023, at 6:30 p.m., click here. Once you RSVP, you will receive an invitation and a link to join the discussion on Zoom.

Discussion questions

1. Did this feel like a Hitchcock movie? Did you see any Hitchcock touches?
2. Was this a good screwball comedy in your estimation? How does it compare to others you’ve seen.
3. Did you think that Lombard and Montgomery had good screen chemistry?
4. Was there a supporting character that you liked?
5. Were you surprised by anything?

Hitchcock’s Mr. and Mrs. Smith to screen July 8, 2014 at Daystar Center

When: Tuesday, July 8, 2014 6:30 p.m.
Where: The Venue 1550 at the Daystar Center, 1550 S. State Street

Yes, a Hitchcock Screwball Comedy
In 1940, Alfred Hitchcock’s third American film, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, was a screwball comedy. Yes, that’s right a screwball comedy. And it starred Carole Lombard, who had recently been proclaimed the “Screwball Girl” in a Life magazine profile. Few classic movie fans are familiar with this Hitchcock comedy, even though it was a critical and commercial hit, making its debut at New York’s Radio City Music Hall.

Typically screwball
The plot is typical for a screwball comedy. Ann (Lombard) and David (Robert Montgomery) Smith, discover that through a technicality their marriage isn’t legal. After David admits to his wife that if he had it to do all over again, he wouldn’t get married, Ann decides that she doesn’t want to be married either. What follows is a series of events in which each spouse tries to make the other jealous. Ann starts dating David’s law partner Jeff Custer (Gene Raymond) and David takes a room at his club and starts to hang out with a philandering Chuck Bensen (Jack Carson), which leads to some of the film’s funniest moments.

Carole Lombard and Alfred Hitchcock look at the script

His kind of actress
Alfred Hitchcock loved Carole Lombard. She was his type of actress: beautiful, smart, earthy, and blonde. The Hitchcock family rented Lombard’s house after she and Clark Gable were married in 1939. The Hitchcock’s and the Gable’s became fast friends and it was inevitable that the director and actress would work together. Unfortunately, Lombard would make one movie after Mr. and Mrs. Smith, dying tragically in a plane crash the next year, after a successful war bond drive during World War II.


Award-winning script writer
The script written by Oscar winner, Norman Krasna (Hands Across the Table, Bachelor Mother, It Started with Eve, Princess O’Rourke) is quite good and Lombard and Montgomery have great on-screen chemistry and deliver good performances. Raymond is perfect as Montgomery’s strait-laced college chum and partner. The film is peppered with some great character actors like Carson, Lucile Watson, Charles Halton, Esther Dale, and Betty Compson.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith proved that Hitchcock, the master of suspense, could be successful in any genre he put his mind to.

Have some Joe and Enjoy the Show!
Before the movie, grab a cup of coffee from Overflow Coffee Bar, located within the Daystar Center. You can bring food and beverages into the auditorium; we even have small tables set up next to some of the seats.

Join the Chicago Film club, join the discussion
The Chicago Film Club is for classic movie fans. Once a month we screen a classic film and have a brief discussion afterward. For more information, including how to join (it’s free), click here. To purchase your ticket in advance, click here. The Venue 1550 is easily accessible by the CTA. Please visit Transit Chicago for more information on transportation options.

Lombard and Anne Shirley in Vigil in the Night

Backstory: Mr. and Mrs. Smith opened on February 20, 1941 at New York’s Radio City Music Hall. Hitchcock and Lombard had hoped to get Cary Grant to costar, but he was not available. Some Hitchcock critics say that Mr. and Mrs. Smith was a critical and financial flop. This is not true. Audiences were delighted to see Lombard in a comedy after starring in two heavy dramas (Vigil in Night and They Knew What They Wanted). Hitchcock’s first three American films were all solid commercial successes.

7 x 7 – My Favorite Posts

Paula’s Cinema Club tagged me with a 7 x 7 Link award. I have a hard time getting myself organized for these posts, but I was able to find some time to get this done. Similar to the Liebster Award, it’s aim is to help folks “get to know” your blog.

The 7 x 7 Award highlights a blogger’s favorite pieces of work and is passed on to others so that they too can do the same as a way to promote posts and/or blogs.

Unlike the Liebster, the questions do not vary, but like the Liebster, some are more difficult than others. So here we go.

1.Tell everyone something that no one else knows about you.
I was a painfully shy kid. I avoided having contact or conversations at all costs. I would go so far as to walk a block out of my way so I wouldn’t have to say hello or speak to someone. That’s obviously changed. Now it’s hard to shut me up!

2. Link to one of the posts that I think best fits the following categories:
a. Most beautiful piece: Beautiful is a lofty word for a blog post, but one of my best posts was for the Ida Lupino blogathon, “Ida Lupino: A Lasting Legacy in Hollywood.” A big fan of Lupino’s, it gave me a reason to write the post. I was very happy with the results and the response from readers.

b. Most helpful piece: I think my most helpful piece is from a series of post I started called “Classic Films in Context.” I examine a classic film in the context of when it was released, how it was received, and what makes it significant today. The first film I featured was the 1931 version of Cimarron starring Richard Dix and Irene Dunne. Dunne was nominated for Best Actress (first of a total of five nominations) and it’s the film that made her a superstar. Within a year, she totally eclipsed the top-billed Dix, going on to successes in musicals, dramas, and comedies.

c. Most popular piece: By far, my most popular piece is “Becoming Grace Kelly,” a post I wrote in April 2010. It’s had over 6,300 reads, which is mind-boggling to me. The irony is I’m not the biggest Kelly fan—although I am one—in the world. I just thought a lot of people would be interested in a post on the movie star who became a princess, but I never imagined it would be this successful. I timed it to release with the exhibit of her clothes and accessories at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London that year. Almost every month, it’s in the top-five of my most read posts.

d. Most controversial piece: I don’t think I have many controversial posts, but my post on The Hunger Games for the Future Classic Movies blogathon got some interesting conversations going when it was picked up by Movie Fanfare, the blog hosted by Movies Unlimited. Folks were talking big theological issues, which was an area I never touched on, nor did I really consider when writing the post.

e. Surprisingly successful piece: Besides the Kelly post already mentioned, my post on the science fiction classic This Island Earth is another one that ends up in the top-five posts for the week, every once in a while since first posted June 2011.

f. Most underrated piece: “The Truth About “Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” a screwball comedy starring Carole Lombard and Robert Montgomery hasn’t gotten a lot of love, so to speak. I’m a big fan of Lombard and this comedy, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, of all people. It can stand next to the screwball comedies directed by Howard Hawks, Preston Sturges, and Gregory LaCava any day, in my opinion.

g. Most pride-worthy piece: “Val Lewton: The genius nobody knows” is a post I’m very proud of. Lewton is someone who deserves more recognition. His movies influenced just about every filmmaker working today, including Martin Scorsese who produced a documentary on Lewton several years ago. Honorable mention: “Mitchell Leisen: The Best Director Nobody Knows.” This was my first post to be picked up by Movie Fanfare.

3. Pass this award on to seven other blogs/bloggers:


Another Old Movie Blog
They Don’t Make ’Em Like They Used To
Speakeasy
Once Upon a Screen
The Shades of Black and White
What Happened to Hollywood
Laura’s Miscellaneous Musings

More blogs/bloggers worthy of the award:

Bobby Rivers TV
Carl Rollyson

bettiwettiwoo 

Cinema_Fanatic
Immortal Ephemera

If you’ve already gotten a 7 x 7, please feel free to pass it along to the deserving blogger of your choice.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith (1941) trailer

Check out this classic trailer for Mr. and Mrs. Smith. You've got to love the stylized approach.  Supposedly, Alfred Hitchcock was surprised that Carole Lombard and Robert Montgomery had never worked together before. The trailer touts this fact.

Enjoy

The Truth about "Mr. and Mrs. Smith"

There is a belief today that Mr. and Mrs. Smith  (1941) starring Carole Lombard and Robert Montgomery and directed by Alfred Hitchcock was a flop. Nothing could be further from the truth, but for some unknown reason, this "untruth" seems to crop up whenever the film is discussed or written about.

For the love of Carole
It is true that Hichtcock directed this film as a favor to Lombard, whom he loved and admired, but he didn't dread the task, nor did he just go through the motions, not caring about the result. The production and texture of the film is very polished. It has the look of a very expensive production, and the cast, including the supporting players, are first-rate, accomplished performers. As Lombard films go, it's not in the same league, perhaps, as Nothing Sacred or My Man Godfrey, but in its day, audiences voted it one of the best films of the year, along with Hitchcock's classics Rebecca and Foreign Correspondent!

Udder hilarity

When Hitchcock moved to America, he rented a house owned by Lombard and the two became fast friends. Ever the prankster, Lombard had fun with Hitchcock and his supposed comments saying "actors are like cattle" by having a corral with three calves in it installed on the set for the first day of shooting. Each calf wore a nametag of one of the three leads: Carole, Robert, and Gene (Raymond). It was important for Lombard to set a congenial and fun atmosphere on her film sets, and this stunt must have been planned to do just that. To keep the jokes going, Lombard insisted on directing Hitchcock during his brief cameo. Not able to resist temptation, Lombard insisted Hitchcock do take after take until his "performance" was to her liking.

Held over at Radio City

When Mr.and Mrs. Smith opened at Radio City Music Hall on January 20, 1941, it played to sold-old audiences. In fact the first nine days were booked solid and the film was held over (it was something of a big deal to be held over at the Music Hall, back in the day). The reviews were almost unanamously good with Look magazine saying that "Hitchcock has employed the same strategy that marks his blood-chilling melodramas," utilizing the "same casual approach, the same pell-mell finish, the same corner-of-the eye viewpoint.... The net effect is the same, too: another Alfred Hitchcock hit." The New York World-Telegram said that "Portly Alfred Hitchcock abandons melodrama, but not entertainment, in the frisky, scampish, gleeful comedy called Mr. and Mrs. Smith." Other reviews positively noted that for an Englishman, Hitchcock seems to know exactly how American couples think (New York Herald Tribune). The New York Post compared Hitchcock's first comedy to those of Ernst Lubitsch!

Check it out for yourself

Modern audiences can decide for themselves whether or not Mr. and Mrs. Smith is a classic or even a worthwhile entertainment, but one thing is for certain: Lombard's timeless appeal shines through and Montgomery proves to be one of Hollywood's most adept film comedians.

Rent it from Netflix and see for yourself, then let me know what you think.