Someone call a plane and shout Bingo!, I just watched the 1935 Warner Bros. Screwball comedy "Page Miss Glory", and it was one of the most fun and entertaining movies I've seen that have came out from the mid '30's! It was exciting, it was funny and it was very well put-together as a story about what happens when fame and notoriety can get out of hand.
-SPOILERS AHEAD-
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy and based off of the 1934.play of the same name written by Joseph Schrank and Phillip Dunning, the story is about a young and optimistic country girl named Loretta Dalrymple (played by Marion Davies) who just moved into New York and wanted to get a job working as a chambermaid in a fancy hotel. Unbeknownst to her, in said hotel resides a sleazy conman named Click Wiley (played by Pat O'Brien), his neurotic partner who specializes in photography Ed Olson (played by Frank McHugh) and Ed's disgruntled girlfriend Gladys Russell (played by Mary Astor), desperately forged a fake celebrity photo of a beautiful and stunning woman in which they named it 'Dawn Glory' and submitted the photo to a beauty contest in order to win the reward money of $2,500 as a last minute attempt to avoid being kicked out of the hotel as they are getting close to the required deadline to pay the bill (in which they must've spent all their money on and I think it was hinted at the beginning when Click were throwing cards at a hat defeatedly). Before submitting the photo to the contest, a young, handsome and highly revered plane pilot named Bingo Nelson (played by Dick Powell) entered in the conmen's suite and saw the photo of 'Dawn Glory', resulting in him quickly falling in love with her, believing her to be an actual person. The two conmen, of course, lied to the love struck Bingo about Dawn Glory being real before he left to go to Alaska to save sick children by delivering medicine through a blizzard. And as a result of the photo's contest entry, there's good news and bad news for the two over-confident scammers: the good news is that the photo actually managed to win the contest, resulting in the scammers to win the $2,500 prize and therefore not being evicted out of the hotel. However, the bad news is that the conmen would get more than what they bargained for. After the contest win reputation and due to Bingo, after successfully sending the serum to the children in Alaska, announced his love and admiration for the imaginary Dawn Glory on live radio by claiming his marriage proposal to her, resulted in the scammers garnering unwanted media attention from reporters, interviewers and photographers alike pestering Click, Ed and Gladys by demanding that they get a visit and/or look at the unreal Miss Glory, with a lot going to extreme lengths to even hire an old lady pretending to be Dawn Glory's mother so that they could see her. And to make matters worse, an eagle-eyed and suspicious reporter of the Express newspaper named Slattery (played by Lyle Talbot), is on to Click's and Ed's infamous scheme (after researching about their past crimes similar to this one) and blackmailed the two to finally show her in person for an interview. Meanwhile, the hopeful Loretta is head over heels with someone, too, and that someone is Bingo, whom she is enamored his jovial and sweet personality along with his reputation of being a brave and risk-taking hero. But after hearing his announcement of marrying Dawn Glory, she became heartbroken and wishes that one day she desires to gain the heart of Bingo Nelson by hoping that she will be like Miss Glory. And yet as a result of getting her hair styled blonde and wearing a prototype dress sent by the beauty contest that was meant for Miss Glory with her chambermaid friend, the snarky and sarcastic Betty (played by Patsy Kelly), she accidentally attracted the attention of a desperate Ed and Gladys and set her as the physical appearance of Miss Dawn Glory, therefore rendering her hopes slightly come true. After Slattery went to the hotel with Click and the others and being bombarded by a stampede of excited reporters and sightseers, Ed and Gladys used Loretta as a real-life version of Miss Glory so that they could keep the media off their backs for a while. Loretta, sees this opportunity as a chance to finally meet the man of her dreams, the kind-hearted Bingo. But sadly, the conmen refused to give her the chance of meeting him, saying that attracting the hearts of millions is more important. As a result, the saddened Loretta gazed lovingly at a photo of Bingo and imagined him singing the titular song in which he had a tremendous singing voice! Already having enough of the disturbance from the media and antsy to see Bingo, Loretta tries to escape through the window only to get caught by Click, Ed and Gladys. Seeing this opportunity to blackmail then, it looks like that Loretta would try to use this chance to "seduce" Ed into going on a date with her, which would result in being late for an appointed time to meet Click at the hotel and angering his girlfriend Gladys. As a result, Ed tries to ignore Loretta's manipulative advances towards her, only for her snap and angrily demands Ed to make her see Bingo or else she'll spill the beans about the fabrication of Miss Glory. Not wanting to take anymore chances with Loretta and refusing to let her roam free at all, a furious Ed snapped at her angrily declaring that he will lock her up in the suite, much to Loretta's horror. Now she feels truly trapped like Cinderella being locked up by the Wicked Stepmother, that is until Betty sets her free and Loretta happily reveals herself to her and excitedly requests her to send Bingo up for an arranged meeting. Along the way comes the beauty contest's sponsor, Simeon Hamburgher (played by Al Shean) who asked Bingo to promote his product of Miss Glory's approval by touting it with his plane and announce it on the streets of New York. Unfortunately, competitor J. Horace Freischutz (played by Joseph Cawthorn) desired to see Miss Glory in person so he sent his assistant Joe Bonner (played by Hobart Cavanaugh) to set up a meeting with her, in which Bonner hired two gangsters named Petey and Blackie (played by Allen Jenkins and Barton MacLane) to kidnap her and take her to Freischutz, in which they overheard that Miss Glory is actually a fraud and plans to kidnap her and extort Click for his scheme. After confronting Click about it, the cowardly conman callously suggests that they take Bingo instead of "Dawn", only for a jealous and bitter Gladys to quit the scheme and suggest that they should continue to take "Dawn" out of their hairs. However, Bingo, after being summoned by Betty to meet up with her and desperately trying to find Miss Glory throughout the picture, and Loretta finally got together and Loretta tells Bingo the truth that she had been a chambermaid and proclaims her love to him, asking if it would be any different. Bingo, understanding the situation and reciprocating her feelings, heartwarmingly states of course not. As a result, the thugs decided to take Loretta, Ed and Bingo as hostages with Loretta being forced to stay inside of a suitcase with holes as leverage with the love struck Petey, only for Bingo to escape and Loretta to stall Petey so that Bingo could entrap Petey in the suitcase and run off with Loretta. Because of the crowd of sightseers, reporters and police officers barging the room without Click's consent but is still willing to reveal Miss Glory so that she could finally be out of their hair and yet discovering that Petey is in the suitcase much to everyone's disappointment and Click's chagrin, they found out that Bingo has announced that he has flown away from the hotel in his plane with Loretta/"Miss Glory" and is still planning on marrying her and for "Miss Glory" to announce her goodbye and wants to live her life with Bingo in solitude.
Because of its well-excuted themes of greed and trickery leading to undesirable consequences, the stressful downsides of fame and attention, the media's overindulgence on beauty and celebrity fame in a shallow way and it's adorable romantic subplot, not to mention the result of what happens when the creation of something becomes bigger than the actual creator of it, the story is absolutely delightful to follow and its execution certainly does make up for it as do the performances of the actors/actresses, most especially Marion Davies' and Dick Powell's characters respectively. This movie is so damn hilarious too, as one of the funniest scenes in the picture for me is when the overexcited people stampeding to the conmen's suite by shouting "1! 2!! 3!!!" before opening the door with the cluttered and bombarded Slattery after leaving only to suddenly run back to the suite when he saw the crowd charging at his direction. Unfortunately, WB Archive has not released an official DVD release of the movie and I would hope that they will someday. The best ones I could find are from unofficial DVD websites such as dvdplanetstore or dvdlady, in which I would and wouldn't recommend anyone buying from there too much. This is quite an engaging classic that needs to be shown and preserved on home video, because the fact that it's not released is simply frustrating and unfair to not just me but for anyone who wants to see the movie. I just wish "Page Miss Glory" gets released officially on DVD, and when it does, I'm hoping it would attract more attention and praise from its audience just like those pesky folks in the movie and it would have the 1936 Looney Tunes short of the same name directly by Tex Avery. It was such a funny little short that kinda captivated the fun "mystery" on who Miss Glory is and the twist reveal and the end is absolutely hilarious! I watched this movie with very little expectations and it was a lot better than I anticipated. I honestly think the movie would sell well if WB finally had the opportunity to release such a classic, funny, and humorous film!!!
-SPOILERS AHEAD-
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy and based off of the 1934.play of the same name written by Joseph Schrank and Phillip Dunning, the story is about a young and optimistic country girl named Loretta Dalrymple (played by Marion Davies) who just moved into New York and wanted to get a job working as a chambermaid in a fancy hotel. Unbeknownst to her, in said hotel resides a sleazy conman named Click Wiley (played by Pat O'Brien), his neurotic partner who specializes in photography Ed Olson (played by Frank McHugh) and Ed's disgruntled girlfriend Gladys Russell (played by Mary Astor), desperately forged a fake celebrity photo of a beautiful and stunning woman in which they named it 'Dawn Glory' and submitted the photo to a beauty contest in order to win the reward money of $2,500 as a last minute attempt to avoid being kicked out of the hotel as they are getting close to the required deadline to pay the bill (in which they must've spent all their money on and I think it was hinted at the beginning when Click were throwing cards at a hat defeatedly). Before submitting the photo to the contest, a young, handsome and highly revered plane pilot named Bingo Nelson (played by Dick Powell) entered in the conmen's suite and saw the photo of 'Dawn Glory', resulting in him quickly falling in love with her, believing her to be an actual person. The two conmen, of course, lied to the love struck Bingo about Dawn Glory being real before he left to go to Alaska to save sick children by delivering medicine through a blizzard. And as a result of the photo's contest entry, there's good news and bad news for the two over-confident scammers: the good news is that the photo actually managed to win the contest, resulting in the scammers to win the $2,500 prize and therefore not being evicted out of the hotel. However, the bad news is that the conmen would get more than what they bargained for. After the contest win reputation and due to Bingo, after successfully sending the serum to the children in Alaska, announced his love and admiration for the imaginary Dawn Glory on live radio by claiming his marriage proposal to her, resulted in the scammers garnering unwanted media attention from reporters, interviewers and photographers alike pestering Click, Ed and Gladys by demanding that they get a visit and/or look at the unreal Miss Glory, with a lot going to extreme lengths to even hire an old lady pretending to be Dawn Glory's mother so that they could see her. And to make matters worse, an eagle-eyed and suspicious reporter of the Express newspaper named Slattery (played by Lyle Talbot), is on to Click's and Ed's infamous scheme (after researching about their past crimes similar to this one) and blackmailed the two to finally show her in person for an interview. Meanwhile, the hopeful Loretta is head over heels with someone, too, and that someone is Bingo, whom she is enamored his jovial and sweet personality along with his reputation of being a brave and risk-taking hero. But after hearing his announcement of marrying Dawn Glory, she became heartbroken and wishes that one day she desires to gain the heart of Bingo Nelson by hoping that she will be like Miss Glory. And yet as a result of getting her hair styled blonde and wearing a prototype dress sent by the beauty contest that was meant for Miss Glory with her chambermaid friend, the snarky and sarcastic Betty (played by Patsy Kelly), she accidentally attracted the attention of a desperate Ed and Gladys and set her as the physical appearance of Miss Dawn Glory, therefore rendering her hopes slightly come true. After Slattery went to the hotel with Click and the others and being bombarded by a stampede of excited reporters and sightseers, Ed and Gladys used Loretta as a real-life version of Miss Glory so that they could keep the media off their backs for a while. Loretta, sees this opportunity as a chance to finally meet the man of her dreams, the kind-hearted Bingo. But sadly, the conmen refused to give her the chance of meeting him, saying that attracting the hearts of millions is more important. As a result, the saddened Loretta gazed lovingly at a photo of Bingo and imagined him singing the titular song in which he had a tremendous singing voice! Already having enough of the disturbance from the media and antsy to see Bingo, Loretta tries to escape through the window only to get caught by Click, Ed and Gladys. Seeing this opportunity to blackmail then, it looks like that Loretta would try to use this chance to "seduce" Ed into going on a date with her, which would result in being late for an appointed time to meet Click at the hotel and angering his girlfriend Gladys. As a result, Ed tries to ignore Loretta's manipulative advances towards her, only for her snap and angrily demands Ed to make her see Bingo or else she'll spill the beans about the fabrication of Miss Glory. Not wanting to take anymore chances with Loretta and refusing to let her roam free at all, a furious Ed snapped at her angrily declaring that he will lock her up in the suite, much to Loretta's horror. Now she feels truly trapped like Cinderella being locked up by the Wicked Stepmother, that is until Betty sets her free and Loretta happily reveals herself to her and excitedly requests her to send Bingo up for an arranged meeting. Along the way comes the beauty contest's sponsor, Simeon Hamburgher (played by Al Shean) who asked Bingo to promote his product of Miss Glory's approval by touting it with his plane and announce it on the streets of New York. Unfortunately, competitor J. Horace Freischutz (played by Joseph Cawthorn) desired to see Miss Glory in person so he sent his assistant Joe Bonner (played by Hobart Cavanaugh) to set up a meeting with her, in which Bonner hired two gangsters named Petey and Blackie (played by Allen Jenkins and Barton MacLane) to kidnap her and take her to Freischutz, in which they overheard that Miss Glory is actually a fraud and plans to kidnap her and extort Click for his scheme. After confronting Click about it, the cowardly conman callously suggests that they take Bingo instead of "Dawn", only for a jealous and bitter Gladys to quit the scheme and suggest that they should continue to take "Dawn" out of their hairs. However, Bingo, after being summoned by Betty to meet up with her and desperately trying to find Miss Glory throughout the picture, and Loretta finally got together and Loretta tells Bingo the truth that she had been a chambermaid and proclaims her love to him, asking if it would be any different. Bingo, understanding the situation and reciprocating her feelings, heartwarmingly states of course not. As a result, the thugs decided to take Loretta, Ed and Bingo as hostages with Loretta being forced to stay inside of a suitcase with holes as leverage with the love struck Petey, only for Bingo to escape and Loretta to stall Petey so that Bingo could entrap Petey in the suitcase and run off with Loretta. Because of the crowd of sightseers, reporters and police officers barging the room without Click's consent but is still willing to reveal Miss Glory so that she could finally be out of their hair and yet discovering that Petey is in the suitcase much to everyone's disappointment and Click's chagrin, they found out that Bingo has announced that he has flown away from the hotel in his plane with Loretta/"Miss Glory" and is still planning on marrying her and for "Miss Glory" to announce her goodbye and wants to live her life with Bingo in solitude.
Because of its well-excuted themes of greed and trickery leading to undesirable consequences, the stressful downsides of fame and attention, the media's overindulgence on beauty and celebrity fame in a shallow way and it's adorable romantic subplot, not to mention the result of what happens when the creation of something becomes bigger than the actual creator of it, the story is absolutely delightful to follow and its execution certainly does make up for it as do the performances of the actors/actresses, most especially Marion Davies' and Dick Powell's characters respectively. This movie is so damn hilarious too, as one of the funniest scenes in the picture for me is when the overexcited people stampeding to the conmen's suite by shouting "1! 2!! 3!!!" before opening the door with the cluttered and bombarded Slattery after leaving only to suddenly run back to the suite when he saw the crowd charging at his direction. Unfortunately, WB Archive has not released an official DVD release of the movie and I would hope that they will someday. The best ones I could find are from unofficial DVD websites such as dvdplanetstore or dvdlady, in which I would and wouldn't recommend anyone buying from there too much. This is quite an engaging classic that needs to be shown and preserved on home video, because the fact that it's not released is simply frustrating and unfair to not just me but for anyone who wants to see the movie. I just wish "Page Miss Glory" gets released officially on DVD, and when it does, I'm hoping it would attract more attention and praise from its audience just like those pesky folks in the movie and it would have the 1936 Looney Tunes short of the same name directly by Tex Avery. It was such a funny little short that kinda captivated the fun "mystery" on who Miss Glory is and the twist reveal and the end is absolutely hilarious! I watched this movie with very little expectations and it was a lot better than I anticipated. I honestly think the movie would sell well if WB finally had the opportunity to release such a classic, funny, and humorous film!!!