Four Mothers ** (1941, Priscilla Lane, Rosemary Lane, Lola Lane, Gale Page, Claude Rains, May Robson, Eddie Albert) – Classic Movie Review 11,903

Director William Keighley’s 1941 American drama film sequel Four Mothers is the mawkish and wobbly final part of the trilogy begun with Four Daughters (1938) and Four Wives (1939), in which the married sisters lose their life savings when brother-in-law Ben Crowley (Frank McHugh) goes bankrupt as a hurricane destroys his development site. Money is desperately needed, so patriarch Adam (Claude Rains) is forced to sell the house where he raised his daughters, while his son-in-law Felix (Jeffery Lynn) goes to Chicago to work conducting an orchestra.

Four Mothers stars the returning Priscilla Lane, Rosemary Lane, Lola Lane and Gale Page as the Four Mothers, Ann, Kay, Thea and Emma. It is the last but least in the series unfortunately, and thumpingly over-directed by Keighley, but the returning cast (the three Lane sisters, Gale Page, Claude Rains as the Lemp family patriarch Adam, May Robson as his sister Aunt Etta, Eddie Albert as Kay’s husband Clint, Jeffrey Lynn as son-in-law Felix Deitz) bring their charm and conviction. And the screenplay by Stephen Morehouse Avery fills the 86 minutes with busy plotting, ending as Kay (Rosemary Lane), the only childless Lemp daughter, finally realising she is pregnant.

Jack Scholl and Heinz Roemheld’s song ‘Moonlight and Tears’ gives the idea.

Based on the story Sister Act by Fannie Hurst, it was released by Warner Bros on 4 January 1941.

The cast are Priscilla Lane as Ann Lemp Deitz, Rosemary Lane as Kay Lemp Forrest, Lola Lane as Thea Lemp Crowley, Gale Page as Emma Lemp Talbot, Claude Rains as Adam Lemp, Jeffrey Lynn as Felix Deitz, Eddie Albert as Clint Forrest, May Robson as Aunt Etta, Frank McHugh as Ben Crowley, Dick Foran as Ernest Talbot, and Vera Lewis as Mrs Ridgefield.

The Lane sisters appear in all three films and also appear together in the 1939 Daughters Courageous.

Priscilla Lane (born Priscilla Mullican, June 12, 1915 – April 4, 1995), is remembered for The Roaring Twenties (1939), Saboteur (1942) and Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)

Rosemary Lane (April 4, 1913 – November 25, 1974).

Lola Lane (born Dorothy Mullican, May 21, 1906 – June 22, 1981).

Gale Page co-stars with the Lane Sisters and is the only film daughter not played by one of the Lanes. She appears with them in all four films in the series.

There was a fourth Lane sister, Leota Lane (October 25, 1903 – July 25, 1963), but she left Hollywood for New York City before the sisters’ breakthrough.

© Derek Winnert 2022 Classic Movie Review 11,903

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