The same, but different

Abstract

THE AWFUL TRUTH ABOUT MARRIAGE, REMARRIAGE AND SCREWBALL COMEDY There is a moment early in The Awful Truth (1937) when Lucy Warriner/Irene Dunne, having decided to divorce her husband, Jerry/Cary Grant, telephones their lawyer. Rather than cutting to the interior of a suitable office, the scene cuts to a large but gloomy drawing-room, filled with old-fashioned lumps of furniture. The telephone is answered by a man with silvery-gray hair and a moustache; his role as lawyer clearly mirrors a patriarchal role--the Law of the Father. Discovering the reason for Lucy's call, the lawyer's jovial tone turns to benevolent concern, and he attempts to lecture Lucy on how is a thing. As he speaks, his own wife enters the room; she hovers in the background of the frame, repeatedly interrupting Lawyer: As I was saying, Lucy, [smiling and sincere], marriage is a thing, and when you've been married as long as I have, you'll appreciate it too. Wife: [stepping forward and speaking quite crossly] Your food is getting ice cold. You're always complaining about your food. How do you expect me - Lawyer: [interrupting angrily] Will you shut your big mouth! I'll eat when I get good and ready and if you don't like it you know what you can do! So--shut up! [Turns away again] Lucy, darling [soft and gentle], marriage is a thing! The couple's age and stiff appearance and their outdated decor evoke a past era. The Victorian myth of domestic bliss is casually ripped to shreds, even as the voice of its authority--the lawyer/patriarch--attempts to reassert its value. Patriarchal authority is undermined further by the fact that Lucy clearly does not take his advice: the next shot is of the chancery court, and while the lawyer is present at the divorce hearing, he does not say a word. Bearing this moment in mind, there is an evident tension between the diegetic representation of marriage and the screwball narrative's drive to unite the couple. Marriage is a beautiful thing in screwball comedy; it is always a problem. No one simply falls in love, gets married and lives happily ever Instead, the central couple pretend to be married (If You Could Only Cook [1935], Midnight [1939]); pretend they are not married (The Palm Beach Story [1942]); think they are married (Mr. and Mrs. Smith [1941]); or get divorced (His Girl Friday [1940]). Engagements are made to be broken (My Man Godfrey [1936], Bringing up Baby [1938], Holiday [1938]), implied adultery abounds (She Married Her Boss [1935], The Awful Truth, Topper [1937]) and bigamy seems almost inevitable (Libeled Lady [1936], My Favorite Wife [1940], Too Many Husbands [1940]). Every variation on the theme of marital duplicity and infidelity is made use of in screwball comedy. Indeed, there are hardly any happily married characters : it is a world peopled with widowed fathers, maiden aunts, bachelor butlers and maids. Thus, although the central couple are inevitably united at the end of the film, the exact status and conditions of this relationship should not be too hastily or unequivocally identified with the traditional institution of let alone with the convention of living happily ever after. It is this tension between the union of the couple and the representation of marriage that I want to review in this article. If marriage is not a thing, the question remains, what is it? A closer look at It Happened One Night (1934) elucidates the cycle's attitude. Ellie Andrews/Claudette Colbert is already married to King Westley/Jameson Thomas, but according to her father/Walter Connolly she will never [...] live under the same with him. Living under the same roof clearly functions euphemistically for the sexual consummation of the marriage, but it proves to mean much more, since Ellie does live under the same with Peter Warne/Clark Gable, while pretending to be his wife (cf. …