A gossip columnist helps a Broadway ingenue beholden to a penthouse gangster.A gossip columnist helps a Broadway ingenue beholden to a penthouse gangster.A gossip columnist helps a Broadway ingenue beholden to a penthouse gangster.
André Luguet
- Max Boncour
- (as Andre Luguet)
William Burress
- Ollie
- (scenes deleted)
George Raft
- Sneaky
- (scenes deleted)
George Beranger
- Manager of Elizabeth Morgan's
- (uncredited)
Gino Corrado
- Sardi's Waiter
- (uncredited)
George Ernest
- Newsboy
- (uncredited)
Harrison Greene
- City Editor
- (uncredited)
Eddie Kane
- Sardi's Captain of Waiters
- (uncredited)
John Larkin
- Tod - Jimmy's Elevator Operator
- (uncredited)
John Marston
- George Curley
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaDuring his tenure with Warner Bros., William A. Wellman churned out a number of energetic, fast-paced entertainments which are often overlooked by admirers of his work but stand out from the assembly-line programmers they were intended to be. Among the highlights from this early period are Night Nurse (1931) with Barbara Stanwyck, the grim Pre-Code drama Safe in Hell (1931) and Love Is a Racket (1932) (1932) starring Douglas Fairbanks Jr. as a newspaper columnist working the Broadway beat. The latter film is not only a fascinating time capsule of its era, with glimpses of then-popular New York City nightspots such as Sardi's, but also presents an unapologetic, cynical view of reporters who often resort to any means necessary to score a front-page story.
Wellman would go on to make several more distinctive B-pictures for Warner Bros. including the post-World War I social drama Heroes for Sale (1933) and the picaresque railroad adventure, Wild Boys of the Road (1933), but Love Is a Racket (1932) is a fun, unpretentious introduction to his Pre-Code films for the studio.
- Quotes
James 'Jimmy' Russell: [Giving her a gift of 'nylon' stockings] Here you are, ya' peroxide pirate.
Switchboard Operator: Oh, Mr. Russell... they're lovely! And extra length, too!
James 'Jimmy' Russell: Yeah... winter'll soon be here.
- ConnectionsAlternate-language version of L'athlète incomplet (1932)
Featured review
pretty good D Fairbanks jr flick
A "pretty good" starring role for the dashing Douglas Fairbanks jr, who had good movies and bad movies. Here, he is a newspaper reporter Jimmy Russell, trying to catch a gal who cannot seem to settle down. Co stars are Ann Dvorak (Merrily we Live and Three on a Match) and Frances Dee (Little Women, Human Bondage), and Lee Tracy (Dinner at Eight), who has a most interesting biography on his page on IMDb. Oddly, we don't really know much about his character in this movie... he's just kind of there. Dedicated black- and- white- movie watchers will see Eddie Kane and Gino Corrado, who play waiters at Sardi's restaurant they were assistants or sidekicks in just about every movie made since dirt was invented. Of course Russell (Fairbanks) has an adversarial relationship with his newspaper boss (although this film probably pre-dated most of the others that used that ploy).... and there are a couple of other hard to believe things going on here, but I won't spoil any plot monkey-business. Watch for the cool telephone gadget at the very beginning....and a long, lecture on love and life at the very end.
helpful•62
- ksf-2
- Dec 14, 2007
Details
- Runtime1 hour 11 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content