Merrily We Live

Merrily We Live fell below expectations. So many great comic actors and scenarios, but director Norman Z. McLeod fails to create a good comic environment for it and it all becomes factitious. Billie Burke was more a bubbly airhead then usual and she's good at that. Brian Aherne manages to make a good impression as the bum. Probable the best thing I got out of this was as a introduction to the talents of old vaudevillian Clarence Kolb as the father of the family. The man knew physical comedy!

While this may not have A list actors and production staff it is so well done that, despite a lot of inanities and shortfalls, it can stand proudly and be a worthy part of a genre in a never to be repeated time that is full of classics. More silly than most and yet... IMO far more than "a mildly interesting curiosity", call it "an interesting surprise".

It has its moments, but the inconsistencies in the screenplay keep it from classic status. The premise would work with a bit better timing by some of the actors. But it's worth it just to watch Clarence Kolb steal every scene he's in.

A comedy that makes you appreciate how good the classic '30's and 40's Hollywood comedies really are. The quality of the writing is somewhere around the level of a forgotten '50's TV sitcom, and the only ones that can manage to somehow rise above the muck are Constance Bennett and Clarence Kolb--totally unaided by the director. A mildly interesting curiosity if you absolutely nothing else to do.