The Two Mrs Carrolls *** (1947, Humphrey Bogart, Barbara Stanwyck, Alexis Smith, Nigel Bruce) – Classic Movie Review 2256

Director Peter Godfrey’s 1947 American mystery film The Two Mrs Carrolls is based on the 1935 play by Martin Vale and stars Humphrey Bogart, Barbara Stanwyck, Alexis Smith and Nigel Bruce. Bogart honeymooned with Lauren Bacall during production.

Martin Vale’s once fairly popular 1935 theatrical murder mystery melodrama The Two Mrs Carrolls is rather lifelessly transferred to the screen by director Peter Godfrey in 1947, with an unfair over-dependence on the skills and allure of its great stars, Humphrey Bogart and Barbara Stanwyck. Luckily, though they are not seen at their best, Bogart and Stanwyck are not afraid of showing their skills and allure.

Vale’s play is significantly altered for the film with an emphasis on suspense, but, still inhibited by its stage origins, it is an ineffective and compromised misfire, proving a disappointing match of Bogart and Stanwyck. But the two stars do their best as Bogart’s psychopathic struggling artist Geoffrey Carroll struggles against Thomas Job’s verbose screenplay to entangle Sally Morton (Stanwyck), a woman he meets while on vacation in the country, in his fickle web.

She soon falls for him and romance develops, and he proposes marriage, but what he doesn’t tell her is that there is already another Mrs Carroll.

[Spoiler alert] Geoffrey suffers from mental illness and returns home to paint a portrait of the first Mrs Carroll as the angel of death and then poisons her. He marries Sally but then feels compelled to paint her as the angel of death too and so it seems that history could repeat itself…

After a fumbled start, it does gain considerable momentum towards the end, so it’s worth staying with, particularly with this excellent cast to watch going through their paces when the chips are down. None too surprisingly, the film did badly at the box office and got poor reviews, though not that badly: it cost $1,428,000 and earned $3,569,000 globally.

The Two Mrs Carrolls also stars Alexis Smith and Nigel Bruce, and also in the cast are Isobel Elsom, Pat O’Moore, Ann Carter, Anita Sharp-Bolster, Barry Bernard, Colin Campbell, Creighton Hale, Leyland Hodgson and the director, Peter Godfrey, as Racetrack Tout.

The screenplay by Thomas Job is based on the play by Martin Vale, the pseudonym of Marguerite Vale Veiller, the wife of writer Bayard Veiller. It opened in London in 1935 and transferred in a rewritten version in 1943 to Broadway, where it was a minor hit with Elisabeth Bergner, who was much praised as Sally Morton. Bergner befriended a shy girl who showed up at the stage door one night and sponsored her career in the theatre, but the girl eventually undermined Bergner’s career in an incident dramatised in All About Eve (1950). William Faulkner worked on an early treatment of the play.

Stanwyck filmed while awaiting the return of her husband Robert Taylor from the war. She was close friends with director Godfrey, who directed her in the holiday comedy Christmas in Connecticut in 1945 and Cry Wolf in 1947. Arguably, her friendship with Godfrey blinded her to his significant shortcomings as a director. Stanwyck became close friends with Godfrey and his wife and, when they died, Stanwyck helped raise their three young daughters.

Filming began in April 1945 and ended in June 1945, almost entirely on sets at the Warner Bros studio. It was not released until 4 March 1947 in the US.

Bogart married Lauren Bacall on May 21 1945 during production, which halted to accommodate their honeymoon. Despite the troubles of filming, happily Bogart and Stanwyck got on well together.

Producer Mark Hellinger announced that Bogart would not be seen in any painter’s outfit, as that would appear unmasculine. So Bogart was furious when a painter’s smock and beret with a tassel showed up in his dressing room one day. The two stars shared a good laugh when it was revealed that they were a joke arranged by Stanwyck.

Godfrey also directed the Errol Flynn vehicles Cry Wolf (also starring Stanwyck) and Escape Me Never (1947), as well as The Woman in White (1948).

The cast are Humphrey Bogart as Geoffrey Carroll, Barbara Stanwyck as Sally Morton Carroll, Alexis Smith as Cecily Latham, Nigel Bruce as Dr Tuttle, Isobel Elsom as Mrs Latham, Patrick O’Moore [Pat O’Moore] as Charles Pennington (Penny), Ann Carter as Beatrice Carroll, Anita Sharp-Bolster as Christine, Barry Bernard as Horace Blagdon, Colin Campbell as MacGregor, Peter Godfrey as Racetrack Tout, Creighton Hale, and Leyland Hodgson.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2256

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com/