Man About Town (1939 film)

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Man About Town
Man about town poster 1939.jpg
Film poster
Directed by Mark Sandrich
Written byZion Myers (story)
Allan Scott (story)
Morrie Ryskind (story and screenplay)
Produced by Arthur Hornblow Jr.
Starring Jack Benny
Dorothy Lamour
Edward Arnold
Cinematography Ted Tetzlaff
Edited by LeRoy Stone
Production
company
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release date
  • July 7, 1939 (1939-07-07)
Running time
85 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Man About Town is a 1939 musical comedy film starring Jack Benny, Dorothy Lamour, and Edward Arnold.

Contents

Plot

A producer tries to get his leading lady to take him seriously romantically by pursuing other women.

Cast

Premiere

Paramount Pictures, Benny's radio show sponsor Jell-O, Young & Rubicam (Jell-O's advertising agency) and NBC staged a lavish premiere in Benny's hometown, Waukegan, Illinois. [1] [2]

Reception

Time described it thusly: "As lavish, tuneful, talent-packed as a good radio variety hour, Man About Town is just about as entertaining, just about as memorable." [1] In her 2017 book Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio Comedy , media studies professor Kathryn H. Fuller-Seeley wrote that "Man About Town, a lightweight film, was far funnier and fresher than anybody had anticipated." [2] Then-Senator Harry S. Truman saw the movie in Washington, and wrote in a letter home to his wife that he enjoyed it. [3]

Silver Screen magazine called it:

... the best of the Jack Benny pictures. It has swell gags, sprightly dialogue, and some pleasing acting by Jack—but lordy, lordy, it's Rochester who fairly wraps up the picture and takes it home. [4]

Others also praised Anderson, who played Benny's valet Rochester in the radio program. Cue magazine stated that the "brightest star in the picture is, oddly enough, not Benny but ... Eddie Anderson." [2] Screenland magazine wrote that "Jack Benny's best picture is not his picture at all, but Rochester's." [5] Howard Barnes wrote in the New York Herald Tribune that "you are likely to come away from the picture remembering the colored player's laugh-provoking and versatile performance as vividly or more vividly than the star's." [2]

However, playwright and author Thomas Hischak disagrees, writing in 1939: Hollywood's Greatest Year, "Considering the talent involved—director Mark Sandrich, screenwriter Morrie Ryskind, songwriters Frank Loesser, Friedrich Hollaender, Matty Malneck, and players Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson, Betty Grable, Monty Woolley, and Phil Harris—the movie should have been much better than it ended up." [6]

Paramount, seeing how successful Man About Town was, immediately produced another film starring the radio cast, Buck Benny Rides Again , released the following year. [2] [7]

References

  1. 1 2 "Cinema: The New Pictures: Jul. 10, 1939". Time. Retrieved November 16, 2025.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Fuller-Seeley, Kathryn H. (2017). Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio Comedy. University of California Press. pp. 142–146. ISBN   9780520967946 . Retrieved November 16, 2025.
  3. ↑ Frank, Jeffrey, The Trials of Harry S. Truman (Simon & Schuster 2022), p. xx
  4. ↑ "Silver Screen 1939-09 Vol. 9, No. 11". Silver Screen. p. 50. Retrieved November 16, 2025.
  5. ↑ "Screenland 1939-09 Vol. 39, No. 5". Screenland. p. 53. Retrieved November 16, 2025.
  6. ↑ Hischak, Thomas S. (2017). 1939: Hollywood's Greatest Year. Roman & Littlefield. p. 158. ISBN   9781442278042 . Retrieved November 16, 2025.
  7. ↑ Erickson, Hal (2014). From Radio to the Big Screen. McFarland & Company. pp. 65–66. ISBN   978-0-7864-7757-9 . Retrieved November 18, 2025.
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