mark.waltz Apart from George Burns, the delightfully dizzy Gracie Allen seemed like half a team, like Desi without Lucy. George and Gracie had made a mixed bag of comedies and musicals throughout the 1930's, but what worked was how they played off of each other, evident in their very long running T.V. series. George would throw Gracie one simple of dialog, and Gracie would simply pull a Jackie Gleason by silently putting into motion, "And away we go...." That aspect made her delightful malapropisms and metaphors hysterical, especially while describing her equally befuddled family. Even with the weakest of plots, Gracie was hard to resist.Unfortunately, that's not the case in this last ditched effort to continue a decade long series of Philo Vance mysteries, with Philo (or Fido as she mispronounces his name as) a secondary character, not appearing until almost half way through the movie. It's mostly a Gracie vaudeville routine, although she has one very funny moment while sneaking around a room filled with covered furniture, she becomes literally afraid of every movement, including seeing herself in a mirror, and like "The Man Who Knew Too Much", an altercation with a stuffed cat. She even gets to sing briefly, but unlike "A Damsel in Distress", that moment takes away from the plot which there really isn't much of, only the investigation to the death of a gangster found in a nightclub office. There's tons of popular performer characters of the day including William Demarest and "Pa Jones" (Jed Prouty) who visits Gracie in jail, something she promises to do for him some day. Judith Barrett makes an appealing femme fatal, but romantic heroine Ellen Drew has nothing to do. After one last try on her own ("Mr. and Mrs. North"), Gracie would never separate from her husband again, except this time on some little medium called television.

lugonian THE GRACIE ALLEN MURDER CASE (Paramount, 1939), directed by Alfred E. Green, the tenth installment to the then popular "Philo Vance" murder mysteries that initially began with William Powell's portrayal in THE CANARY MURDER CASE (1929), returns Warren William to the role for the second and final time, with this being something completely different, placing S.S. Van Dine's fictional character solving his latest caper opposite none-other than Gracie Allen. After many years as part of the Burns and Allen comedy team opposite husband, George Burns, from vaudeville, radio, motion pictures and later television, Gracie Allen finally gets her chance to work opposite another straight man. By 1939, the motion picture field saw the temporary or permanent splitting of popular screen partnerships, ranging from Oliver Hardy of Laurel and Hardy fame, partnered opposite Harry Langdon in ZENOBIA, to the popular song and dance team of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers ending their 10 film union-ship with THE STORY OF VERNON AND IRENE CASTLE. While George Burns didn't go solo until a decade after Gracie's death by the 1970s, this is Gracie minus George, acting as sidekick to Philo Vance, whom she addresses as "Fido." For a change of pace in the series where Philo Vance is actually a secondary character, appearing 28 minutes into the story and not around for the fadeout, leaving much of the 77 minutes over to Gracie Allen. The story begins in the city limits of Riverwood where employees of the Vogue Perfume Company are gathered together for their annual picnic. Bill Brown (Kent Taylor), the company's perfume mixer, loses the companionship of his girlfriend, Ann Wilson (Ellen Drew) to fellow employee, Fred (Richard Denning), leaving him to spend much of his time alone. Enter Gracie Allen, having just returned from her trip in Europe, arriving at the picnic, where her Uncle Ambrose (Jed Prouty) introduces her to his staff and to Bill. Bill accepts Gracie's company and later that night escorts her to the Diamond Slipper Cafe. As the plot develops, Benny the Buzzard (Lee Moore), who has escaped prison, arranges a meeting with Diamond Slipper manager Danny Mirche (Jerome Cowan). It is revealed through Dixie Del Mar (Judith Barrett), Benny's girlfriend and night club singer working for Mirche, that she knows that Benny took the rap for Danny, and believes there's trouble ahead. Later, Benny is found dead in Mirche's office, with the body discovered by Gracie, who also finds Bill's cigarette case on the floor in the office, believing that he done it. Sergeant Heath (William Demarest) and Attorney Markham (Donald MacBride) arrive at the scene after receiving a mysterious phone call, and through Gracie's testament, they place Bill under arrest with Gracie as material witness. With Dixie found dead through poisoning, Detective Philo Vance (Warren William) is called to investigate, accompanied by Gracie Allen. Philo Vance will never be the same again.Unlike film series featuring such notable detectives as Sherlock Holmes, Charlie Chan or Bulldog Drummond, Philo Vance has faded to obscurity regardless of its long range of films lasting through the 1940s. Although Gracie Allen, in her final film for Paramount, never assisted the likes of Holmes, Chan or any other fictional film sleuths for that matter, this edition, ranks one of the more notable and acceptable entries. While the actors play it straight, the comedy rests upon Gracie in her typical manner and funny, and not so funny verbal exchanges (Demarest: "The chief wants to see you. Gracie: "I just love Indians"). Aside from acting daffy, Gracie also takes time to sing the Frank Loesser song, "Snug as a Bug in a Rug" during the picnic ceremony.With H.B. Warner as Richard Lawrence, and Horace MacMahon as Gus the Waiter, in support, the cast also includes the comedy team of Al Shaw and Sammy Lee as "Two Thugs" taking part in the confusion of shaking hands with Gracie, getting all tangled up in the process. Other highlights include a well staged race against time through the Broadway district of Manhattan as Gracie rides behind the motorcycle cop going through traffic bound for the night club to prevent Philo Vance from smoking a poisoned cigarette accidentally placed in the case by his servant (Willie Fung).Unavailable on the television markets since the 1970s, THE GRACIE ALLEN MURDER CASE finally made it to home video in 2006 through Video Attic and DVD in 2008 through Nostalgia Family. THE GRACIE ALLEN MURDER CASE is definitely of nostalgic interest to those who enjoy the antics of Gracie Allen and a curio for anyone who has never seen the likes of her or Philo Vance. (**1/2)

Dan-13 This film's been getting trashed pretty hard, which is a shame because it's actually a lot of fun and Gracie Allen shines in it. OK, so it's not the most complicated mystery, but it does have some suspenseful moments, especially the climax which gives new meaning to cigarettes being hazardous to your health. The film's real charms come from Gracie Allen, whose scatterbrained antics generate a lot of laughs. Warren William is also perfect reprising his role of Philo Vance (Fido, to Gracie) and hilariously playing straight man to Mrs. George Burns.I'd advise anyone who panned this film to give it another chance. You may be surprised.

John Esche Willard Huntington Wright, the goateed, urbane former editor of "The Smart Set" had carved himself a successful cottage industry with his nom-de-plume, S.S. VanDine and THEIR urbane creation, detective Philo Vance in the 1920's and 30's both on the page and the screen. Wright/VanDine shopped Vance through a variety of studios and actors, with two actors becoming particularly identified with the creation - William Powell, before deserting Vance for Dashiel Hammett's even better crafted light comic detective, Nick Charles (did Hammett take the hint from VanDine's wildly popular KENNEL MURDER CASE to give Nick and Nora Charles their clue sniffing wire haired terrier, Asta?), and the screen's original Perry Mason, William Warren who tried to hold his own opposite Gracie Allen in this effort.Wright was nearer the end of a fairly illustrious career than he probably realized when, just after Christmas of 1937 according to John Loughery's 1992 biography ("Alias S.S. Van Dine - The man Who Created Philo Vance"), he agreed for $25,000 (in 1937 dollars) to supply Paramount Pictures a 3,000 word outline of a Philo Vance mystery to star Gracie Allen and, it was assumed, her husband and straight man, George Burns. Burns would bow out after seeing the first draft of the screenplay. Paramount (Nat Perrin would be credited with the disastrous screenplay) could do anything they liked with Van Dine's outline (and indeed they did) while he went his own way and published his novel based on the original outline. To Van Dine's chagrin, Paramount felt HIS version had too much Philo and not enough Gracie, though there's little to prove that in this film with Gracie Allen (being hilariously "Gracie" for her many fans) blindly incriminating every innocent person she cares about, and nearly destroying Philo's determined investigation (she insists on calling him Fido, no matter how often corrected). Perhaps the FUNNIEST thing in the film is William Warren's ever higher arched eyebrows as Gracie butts in over and over - very nearly getting both of them killed in the process.In any case, the film was made and Van Dine made his "novelization" (retaining his George Burns character from the original outline). Both movie - opening in New York June 8, 1939 - and book flopped, but Van Dine went on that year to do one MORE Philo Vance mystery (this time prompted by an offer from Fox Films for him to build a Philo Vance novel around their latest star, Olympic champion skater Sonja Henie, to be filmed later). The mystery was called "The Winter Murder Case" and was in its final stages of pre-publication when Van Dine succumbed to a heart attack on April 11, 1940. There would be one more posthumous Philo Vance movie from Warner Brothers (CALLING PHILO VANCE - a lesser remake of THE KENNEL MURDER CASE), and three from a poverty row studio in 1947, but THE GRACIE ALLEN MURDER CASE would be the last during Van Dine's lifetime and with his direct participation. Fox reworked Van Dine's last story - omitting Vance entirely(!) - to make the "Sonja Henie Murder Case" (the name they had originally wanted for "The Winter Murder Case") as SUN VALLEY SERENADE!How much you enjoy THE GRACIE ALLEN MURDER CASE will entirely depend on how much you like the wacky charms of Gracie Allen. Set yourself up with a couple Burns and Allen shorts before hand and it is certainly wacky fun for fans - but for solid 30's mystery fans, it borders on the painful. Paramount's Perrin threw motivations and clues - anything that couldn't be mangled by Gracie's unique sensibility - out the window.The peripheral pleasures are VERY peripheral but undeniable. Gracie gets to sing most pleasantly a Frank Loesser song ("Snug As A Bug In A Rug" - it was published with all "Gracie's" confused lyrics intact) which you WILL have trouble getting out of your mind, and there's a good deal of wonderful Loesser ("Two Sleepy People" especially) in the background. Some lines - like Gracie's flat insistence that "cigarettes never hurt anyone" - meant with specific plot related comic irony in the film - play with decidedly macabre overtones today!The film which taught Gracie NEVER to appear on screen without George (and she never did after this semi-fiasco) is still fun for fans, but if you want to see comic stars in unexpected settings, better you should track down a copy of the similarly flawed, but on the whole more satisfying LOVE THY NEIGHBOR - also from Paramount, a year later - in which their promising starlet Mary Martin joins established stars Jack Benny and Fred Allen in a film extension of their famous radio "feud." Martin's entirely delightful Paramount films are now entirely overshadowed by her later Broadway triumphs . . . the stunning success Burns & Allen had on radio and (from 1950 to 1958) on television situation comedy has largely overshadowed their brief film career (George and Gracie with Fred Astaire and Gershwin music were delightful in the DAMSEL IN DISTRESS two years earlier) and especially THE GRACIE ALLEN MURDER CASE, but an occasional exhumation of the corpse may be worth it for true fans and the curious.