It’s in the Bag (1944, Elsie Waters, Doris Waters, Ernest Butcher) – Classic Movie Review 12,642

The popular 1944 British slapstick comedy film It’s in the Bag stars Elsie and Doris Waters as Cockney sisters Gert and Daisy, who try to recover a valuable lost dress. It is a believed lost but now part found film.

Director Herbert Mason’s popular 1944 British slapstick comedy film It’s in the Bag stars Elsie and Doris Waters as Cockney sisters Gert and Daisy, who try to recover a valuable lost dress after finding that the old dress left to them by Granny has £20,000 sewn in the bustle and they have just sold it.

The third part of the Waters sisters’ trilogy, it was produced and distributed by Butcher’s Film Service. It is a believed lost but now part found film.

It was listed on the 2010 BFI 75 Most Wanted list of believed lost films, but it was released on DVD by Renown Pictures with the featurette Miss MacTaggart Wont Lie Down (with Barbara Mullen) in May 2014, although the Renown version is only 63 minutes instead of the original 80 minutes.

The two Waters Sisters appeared in three films together. Gert and Daisy’s Weekend (1941), Gert and Daisy Clean Up (1942), and It’s in the Bag (1944). They were all produced by Butcher’s Film Service.

London East End comic actresses and singers Florence Elsie Waters (19 August 1893–14 June 1990) and her sister Doris Ethel Waters (20 December 1899–18 August 1978) performed as a highly successful double act in British music hall and variety. They were the sisters of Jack Warner, who was born Horace John Waters.

Elsie and Doris were big stars during the war, favourites of Winston Churchill, and awarded OBEs in the King’s Birthday Honours List in 1946.

It’s in the Bag is directed by Herbert Mason, runs 63 minutes or 80 minutes, is made by Butcher’s Film Service, is distributed by Butcher’s Film Service, is written by F W Baker, is shot by Geoffrey Faithfull and Gerald Gibbs, is produced by F W Baker, and is scored by Percival Mackey.

Release date: 7 February 1944.

The cast are Elsie Waters as Gert, Doris Waters as Daisy, Ernest Butcher as Sam Braithwaite, Lesley Osmond as April Vaughan, Gordon Edwards as Alan West, Reginald Purdell as Joe, Irene Handl as Mrs Beam, Vera Bogetti as Rose Trelawney, Megs Jenkins as Peach St Clair, Tony Quinn as Prendergast, and Anthony Holles as Costumier.

© Derek Winnert 2023 – Classic Movie Review 12,642

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