Thank You, Jeeves! *** (1936, Arthur Treacher, David Niven, Virginia Field, Lester Matthews, Colin Tapley) – Classic Movie Review 11,989

Director Arthur Greville Collins’s 1936 20th Century Fox black and white comedy Thank You, Jeeves! stars Arthur Treacher and David Niven as Jeeves and Bertie Wooster. The film takes P G Wodehouse’s characters and the title of one of his novels but the screenplay by Stephen Gross and Joseph Hoffman has no similarity to any of Wodehouse’s books. Wodehouse recalled: ‘They didn’t use a word of my story, substituting another written by some studio hack.’

Here, Jeeves (Arthur Treacher), the perfect English butler, continually makes amends for his master Bertie Wooster (David Niven)’s incompetence as he is pursued by foreign agents after Marjorie Lowman (Virginia Field)’s cousin’s revolutionary aeronautical invention.

This early adaptation of P G Wodehouse’s popular characters and situations to the screen was the first of a series of only two, ending abruptly after Step Lively, Jeeves! (1937). Despite Wodehouse’s contempt, the humour is generous and charming, with just a smattering of social satire involved.

Arthur Treacher lent his name to the Arthur Treacher’s Fish and Chips chain of restaurants.

David Niven charms in his first major role at 20th Century Fox as frivolous fop Bertie Wooster, but he is dwarfed by Arthur Treacher, in his most notable screen role, with a beautifully understated performance as the eternally wise batman manservant Jeeves. However, Wodehouse was unimpressed by Treacher, who ‘pulled faces all the time. Awful.’ He said: That supercilious manner of his is all wrong for Jeeves.’

Drawbacks are some silly slapstick comedy, the clumsy spy plot and the thoughtless 1930s-era patronising of an African-American actor, but overall it is generally worthwhile and entertaining.

Willie Best, who plays Drowsy the hitch-hiking saxophonist, had a busy career from 1930 to 1955 but was one of the victims of the racist attitudes of the era.

It runs only 57 minutes and is a humble B-movie, played only as a second feature in selected American cities and not screened in UK cinemas because the quota on imported films restricted the showing of B-movies.

It was released on October 4, 1936.

It was was re-edited for TV in 1955 and shown as Thank You, Mr Jeeves.

Treacher again plays Jeeves in the 1937 sequel Step Lively, Jeeves! but there is no Bertie Wooster as Niven was then under contract to Samuel Goldwyn.

The cast are Arthur Treacher as Jeeves, Virginia Field as Marjorie Lowman, David Niven as Bertie Wooster, Lester Matthews as Elliott Manville, Colin Tapley as Tom Brock, John Graham Spacey as Jack Stone, Ernie Stanton as Mr. Snelling, Gene Reynolds as Bobby Smith, Douglas Walton as Edward McDermott, Willie Best as Drowsy, Jimmy Aubrey, Edgar Dearing, Colin Kenny, Paul McVey, Joseph North and Dorothy Phillips.

The 1934 novel Thank You, Jeeves is the first full-length book in the series of stories with Bertie Wooster and Jeeves. None of the film’s major plot elements come from the novel. Bertie does play a musical instrument, annoying Jeeves, as in the book, though Bertie plays drums instead of a banjolele.

According to Bertie Wooster, Jeeves ‘can buttle with the best of them’. In the novels, Jeeves had a six-decade run from Extricating Young Gussie in 1915 to Aunts Aren’t Gentlemen in 1974, the last novel fully completed by Wodehouse before his death.

Treacher and Merv Griffin on Griffin’s CBS talk show, 1969.

Arthur Treacher lent his name to the Arthur Treacher’s Fish and Chips chain of restaurants. He is remembered for his many butler roles, as the 1960s sidekick to talk show host Merv Griffin, and as Constable Jones in Mary Poppins.

© Derek Winnert 2022 Classic Movie Review 11,989

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