Servants' Entrance (1934)

User Rating:

7.7/10   

Directors:

Frank Lloyd
Walt Disney

Writers:

Sigrid Boo (novel)
Samson Raphaelson (writer)

Release Date:

26 September 1934 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy

Plot Keywords:

Based On Novel

Cast

Janet Gaynor	...	Hedda Nilsson aka Helga Brand
Lew Ayres	...	Erik Landstrom
Ned Sparks	...	Hjalmar Gnu
Walter Connolly	...	Viktor Nilsson
Louise Dresser	...	Mrs. Hansen
G.P. Huntley	...	Karl Berghoff
Astrid Allwyn	...	Sigrid Hansen
Sig Ruman	...	Hans Hansen (as Siegfried Rumann)
John Qualen	...	Detective
Catherine Doucet	...	Anastasia Gnu
Greta Meyer	...	Anna, the Cook
Dorothy Christy	...	Mrs. Knut Johnson
Josephine Whittell	...	Christina
Jerry Stewart	...	Olaf, the Butler
Ruth Marion	...	Olga, the Cook

Runtime:

88 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Company:

Fox Film Corporation

Movie Connections:

Version of Vi som går køkkenvejen (1953)

Lubitsch Without Lubtitsch

Samson Raphaelson, one of Lubitsch's favorite screenwriters, tackles the script of this comedy of manners, Frank Lloyd directs and Janet Gaynor stars, ably supported by an excellent cast -- and they pull it off.

First, this is probably Miss Gaynor's most successful venture outside her usual acting vein in the talkies. She's very good at playing hard-working, honest, vulnerable girls. But she starts out with a scene with G.P. Huntley as the two most useless featherbrains in the world that left the tough Museum of Modern Arts audience gasping for breath from laughter, and continues with the plot in place, with the occasional belly laugh that keeps you interested. There are some lovely cameos, including a turn by Ned Sparks that will make you fall out of your chair. Even Lew Ayres, not noted for his comic abilities does a few lovely double takes.

Director Frank Lloyd is thought, nowadays, to have been another competent studio hack, useful enough for big productions like MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY but not for anything that required nuance. Here is one of the films that makes that claim a lie. This is still a comedy of manners, but we can see the Screwball Comedy evolving here, with its dual class warfare/war of the sexes themes.

If you have a chance to see this, do not pass it up.