Personal Property 1937

     This film is based on a play that opened in London on January 22, 1930 and on Broadway on November 1, 1930.  Raymond Dabney was in trouble with the police and he has returned to his family.  He served some time and he was away for a while.  His mother tells him that his brother Claude is engaged.  Raymond later meets Claude’s fiancé widow Crystal Wetherby and she is in debt.  The Bailiff comes to her house and Raymond convinces him to give him a job watching the house.  The Bailiff wants to make sure that Crystal doesn’t leave or sell anything from the house to pay the debt.  Raymond doesn’t know at this point that Crystal is engaged to his brother?  Crystal is giving a dinner party the next evening and Raymond asks to be the butler.  He’s not allowed to leave the house until Crystal pays the Bailiff.  This is a reason to explain why he is there.  When Raymond learns that the Dabney family will be guests at the dinner party, it does present another problem.  Claude, Cosgrove and Mrs. Cosgrove Dabney surely will notice that Raymond is the butler?

     There is a LOT of back and forth in this film.  The only reason Crystal wants to marry Claude is to pay off her debts.  Claude wants to marry Crystal because Claude and his father want her money to boost their women’s lingerie business.  The only person that knows both sides of the Crystal/Claude relationship is Raymond.  He doesn’t think she should marry for money?  3* (This movie is OK)   

84 min, Comedy directed by W.S. Van Dyke with Jean Harlow, Robert Taylor, Reginald Owen, Una O’Connor, Henrietta Crosman, E.E. Clive, Cora Witherspoon, Marla Shelton, Forrester Harvey, Lionel Braham, Barnett Parker.

Note:  Imdb 6.6 out of 10, Rotten Tomatoes 52% audience, Three Movie Buffs average 3* out of 4*, Letterboxd average 3.3* out of 5*, Amazon 4.4* out of 5* with 18 reviews.

Special Note:  Jean Harlow wears a massive 152-carat star sapphire ring surrounded with diamonds throughout the film.  Her then boyfriend William Powell gave the ring to her.  It was for their engagement and sapphire rings were very popular in Hollywood during this era.  Her ring was said to be the biggest sapphire owned by any film star!!  Unfortunately, the sapphire was not gem quality because Powell was tightfisted with money.  No one knows what happened to the ring and it wasn’t expensive?  Reginald Owen played Claude Dabney both is this film and in the 1931 version titled The Man in Possession with Irene Purcell and Robert Montgomery.  This film was a huge success for MGM with a profit of $872,000 ($143.6M in 2016 dollars).  This is the final completed film with Jean Harlow.  She collapsed on the set of her next project, Saratoga of 1937.  She was born March 3, 1911 in Kansas City, Missouri and she died June 7, 1937 at the age of 26 in Los Angeles, California.  She died from uremic poisoning and kidney failure possibly due to the aftereffects of scarlet fever at the age of 15 in 1926. Powell and Harlow did not marry before she died.