Jonathan confides in his good friend Eve (Jane Wyman) that his lover, stage actress Charlotte Inwood (Marlene Dietrich), accidentally killed her husband. And when he tried to help her out, he became a suspect. Eve is sweet on Jonathan so she tries to help him, hiding him away and doing some amateur sleuthing.
Let’s start off here. Alastair Sim steals the show. As Eve’s eccentric father, he dominates every scene he is in. There is no mystery why he is my favorite Ebenezer. Side note, Hitchcock named his daughter’s character “Chubby Bannister”. Seriously, dude?
This is my fourth film with Marlene Dietrich and she is still an enigma. In her late 40’s here, she is still playing the sexy sexy. I kinda get her sex appeal but at the same moment, I kinda don’t. And her big song is truly lost on me, but it didn’t help that I watched Blazing Saddles (1974) the prior weekend. If you don’t know why that is relevant, then you have some watching to do. Madeline Kahn was an absolute treasure.
Jane Wyman is our 33 year old, cute as a button ingenue college girl with a crush, fresh from her divorce from Ronny. She was made up to be dowdy when going undercover but looked pretty much the same. What did Marlene think of her? Well, here’s a quote of hers from IMDb in its entirety:
"I did one film for Alfred Hitchcock. Jane Wyman was in it. I heard she'd only wanted to do it if she were billed above me, and she got her wish. Hitchcock didn't think much of her. She looks too much like a victim to play a heroine, and God knows she couldn't play a woman of mystery, that was my part. Miss Wyman looks like a mystery nobody has bothered to solve."
Mee-OW!
Stage Fright is another worthwhile lesser Hitchcock. There is a little mystery here and a fun story to watch. And, for what it's worth, Hitch didn't work again with either actress. AMRU 3.5.
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