Topper ***** (1937, Cary Grant, Constance Bennett, Roland Young, Billie Burke, Alan Mowbray, Eugene Pallette) – Classic Movie Review 3671

Norman Z McLeod directs the sparkling 1937 vintage supernatural fantasy comedy classic Topper brightly, expertly and quite delicately and delightfully, with the help of a delicious screenplay by Jack Jevne, Eric Hatch and Eddie Moran, adapting Thorne Smith’s 1926 novel The Jovial Ghosts.

Cary Grant and Constance Bennett star as the delightful, fun-loving duo George and Marion Kerby who are in limbo after being killed in a car smash through driving recklessly.

They reappear as ghosts to their old banker buddy, downtrodden, henpecked, stuffy Mr Cosmo P Topper (Roland Young) and teach him a thing or two about the art of living.

There are half a dozen superb comedy performances in this super-sophisticated slice of screwball humour from producer Hal Roach, better known then for his slapstick comedies with Laurel and Hardy. It produced by Hal Roach Studios, and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Hooray for the top-notch star playing and the perfect support that includes fluttery Billie Burke as Mrs Clara Topper, Alan Mowbray as the butler Wilkins and Eugene Pallette as Casey. Lana Turner appears as an extra. Hoagy Carmichael makes an uncredited cameo appearance as the piano player, in his screen debut. He introduces the song ‘Old Man Moon’,  sung by Grant and Bennett.

Also in the cast are Arthur Lake as the elevator boy / bell boy, Hedda Hopper as as Mrs Grace Stuyvesant, Virginia Sale as Miss Johnson, Theodore von Eltz, J Farrell MacDonald, Elaine Shepard as the secretary, Doodles Weaver, Si Jenks, Three Hits and a Miss, Irving Bacon, Betty Blythe, Ward Bond as a cab driver, Hoagy Carmichael, Donna Dax, Shep Houghtgon, Jack Mulhall, Martha Tilton and Claire Windsor.

Topper was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Roland Young – his sole Oscar nomination ever – and for Best Sound, Recording for Elmer A Raguse.

Topper was immensely popular and is followed by two sequels: Topper Takes a Trip (1938) and Topper Returns (1941). It was remade as the TV series Topper (1953–1955), with Anne Jeffreys, Robert Sterling and Leo G Carroll, and again for TV in 1979 with Kate Jackson, Jack Warden and Andrew Stevens. A TV pilot for a proposed new series, Topper Returns, starring Roddy McDowall, Stefanie Powers and John Fink, appeared in 1973.

Producer Hal Roach talked a reluctant Grant into starring, after saying the screwball elements would be played up and the supernatural aspects Grant didn’t much like would be played down, and offering a pay cheque of $50,000 a percentage deal on the profits. It was good move for Grant, boosting his career and leading to screwball classics The Awful Truth (1937), Bringing Up Baby (1938) and Holiday (1938). But he didn’t do the Topper sequels.

Constance Bennett got top billing but agreed to a pay cut from her usual $40,000 fee. She scored a personal success too, and Roach reunited her with director McLeod, screenwriters Jevne and Moran, and actors Billie Burke and Alan Mowbray for 1938’s Merrily We Live. And she did the first sequel, Topper Takes a Trip (1938).

It was shot at the Hal Roach Studios in Culver City, LA.

Topper has the dubious distinction of being the first black-and-white film to be colorized digitally. Hal Roach Studios re-released it in 1985 with colour by Colorization Inc.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3671

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