Too Many Husbands

Released the same year as My Favourite Wife, this straightforward adaptation of Maugham’s play (Home and Beauty) covers similar ground except this time it’s Jean Arthur who finds herself with a surplus spouse when MacMurray turns out not to have been drowned a year previously. Much to his annoyance, she has already fallen into the consoling arms of erstwhile best pal and business partner, Douglas (drippy as ever). Unable to choose between them and reluctant to try, Arthur has terrific fun with two suitors squabbling and dancing attendance over her; but despite exemplary playing, the film runs in circles before the literal juris ex machina rules in MacMurray’s favour, leaving Douglas to hang around for a second chance, while the delightful Arthur continues to have her cake and eat it.

d/p Wesley Ruggles sc Claude Binyon ph Joseph Walker ed William A. Lyon, Otto Meyer ad Lionel Banks m Frederick Hollander cast Jean Arthur, Fred MacMurray, Melvyn Douglas, Harry Davenport, Dorothy Peterson, Melville Cooper, Edgar Buchanan, Tom Dugan
(1940, USA, 84m, b/w)