You Gotta Stay Happy ** (1948, Joan Fontaine, James Stewart, Eddie Albert, Roland Young, Willard Parker, Percy Kilbride, Porter Hall) – Classic Movie Review 8651

‘IT HAPPENS up in the Wild Blue Yonder – it gets WILDER as they get FONDER! ‘

Joan Fontaine stars as Dee Dee Dillwood, who leaves her betrothed Henry Benson (Willard Parker) – her sixth fiancée! – at the altar and talks pilot Marvin Payne (James Stewart), who is in the next door hotel room, into taking her to California. When Jimmy’s plane crashes on Mr Racknell (Percy Kilbride)’s farm, it is all lovey-dovey between the stars, in H C Potter’s fair, light-hearted 1948 screwball romantic comedy You Gotta Stay Happy. Unfortunately, a chimpanzee and a corpse get in on the act too.

The playing is far better than the rather underdeveloped and undernourished material deserves, even if the film is mostly miscast, with Fontaine and Stewart less than ideal together as a screen romantic couple. In a strong support cast, Kilbride (aka Pa Kettle), Eddie Albert as Stewart’s pal Bullets Baker and Roland Young as Ralph Tutwiler are notable assets, and director H C Potter keeps it moving expertly and swiftly along.

The screenplay by co-producer Karl Tunberg is based on Robert Carson’s Saturday Evening Post serial.

In 1948 Fontaine enjoyed top billing over Stewart, but then she was married to producer William Dozier.

Also in the cast are Porter Hall, Marcy McGuire, Arthur Walsh, William Bakewell, Paul Cavanagh, Halliwell Hobbes, Fritz Feld, Stanley Prager, Frank Jenks, Mary Forbes, Edith Evanson, Peter Roman, Houseley Stevenson, Emory Parnell, Arthur Hohl, Don Kohler, Bert Conway, Hal K Dawson, Vera Marshe, Jimmie Dodd, Robert Rockwell, Edward Gargan, Frank Darien, Myron Healey, Al Murphy, Harland Tucker, Isabel Withers, Beatrice Roberts and Chief Yowlachie.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8651

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com