Playwright Steven Gaye (Herbert Marshall) puts great emphasis on youth. You see, there is something "grand" about being young, so grand that all youth deserve to experience young love. Thus, he spends the whole of the film debating with himself about the propriety, apparent unseemliness, and selfishness of a fifty-year-old man falling in love with a woman in her twenties. But Linda (Sylvia Sidney) enlightens him. What if woman chases man rather than man chasing woman? In that case, a May-December affair is okay, at least for a play. You'll see that in his personal life, Steven feels differently and thus tries to spare Linda the mistake of latching onto him when she is "so darn young." Thus, we get the obligatory improbable romance between Linda and a young man who really isn't much to her (or probably any woman's) liking. Although it's 1935, Linda isn't forced to remain with this overbearing man to prove she is good. Happily, the writers knew irreconcilable differences when they saw them and thought, perhaps an unorthodox pairing really is best for some!
The film is aided by consistent touches which show that it does not take itself too seriously: Ernest Cossart as the butler is every bit as much Marshall's friend as his servant. Strictly speaking, he remains very proper ("very good sir"), but his familiarity with his master and his decidedly knowing character make his conduct seem almost as if he is mocking propriety itself. Another help is Marshall's ability to effortlessly play the sophisticate, a man who never says anything wrong and who you are likely to find wearing a bow tie, even under his robe. This is a slice of the upper crust, but here, etiquette is matched by personality.
The film is aided by consistent touches which show that it does not take itself too seriously: Ernest Cossart as the butler is every bit as much Marshall's friend as his servant. Strictly speaking, he remains very proper ("very good sir"), but his familiarity with his master and his decidedly knowing character make his conduct seem almost as if he is mocking propriety itself. Another help is Marshall's ability to effortlessly play the sophisticate, a man who never says anything wrong and who you are likely to find wearing a bow tie, even under his robe. This is a slice of the upper crust, but here, etiquette is matched by personality.