Rafter Romance (1933)

User Rating:

6.7/10   

Director:

William A. Seiter

Writers:

H.W. Hanemann (screenplay) and
Sam Mintz (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

1 September 1933 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Romance

Plot:

Ginger Rogers, a working girl, shares a Greenwich Village apartment with Norman Foster, an artist-night watchman...

Plot Keywords:

Alcoholic | Roommate | Landlord | Swastika | Night Watchman

Cast

Ginger Rogers	...	Mary Carroll
Norman Foster	...	Jack Bacon
George Sidney	...	Max Eckbaum
Robert Benchley	...	H. Harrington Hubbell
Laura Hope Crews	...	Elise Peabody Whittington Smythe
Guinn 'Big Boy' Williams	...	Fritzie (as Guinn Williams)
Sidney Miller	...	Julius Eckbaum

Runtime:

73 min (Turner library print)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Victor System)

Certification:

USA:Approved (PCA #1512-R: 11 September 1935 for re-release) | USA:Passed (National Board of Review) | USA:TV-G (TV rating)

Company:

RKO Radio Pictures

Trivia:

Ellen Corby, as one of the telephone solicitors, can be seen among those gathering around Robert Benchley when he announces the "banquet", and again at the picnic as one of a trio of prize winners. She's the dark haired one with her back to the camera.

Movie Connections:

Remade as Living on Love (1937)

Soundtrack:

Dinah

On TCM's "lost and found" schedule...but a minor discovery...

There's a feeling of deja vu to the plot of RAFTER ROMANCE about two people who aren't aware of each other's identity until they fall in love, but in 1933 it must have seemed quite an original idea.

At any rate, it gives GINGER ROGERS and NORMAN FOSTER a nice chance to show what they could do with light comedy and tender romance. They play two roommates who work different shifts but who eventually meet and fall in love. (Shades of YOU'VE GOT MAIL and other such stories). And oddly enough, ROBERT BENCHLEY would be making a play for Ginger as a lecherous wolf, just as he would some ten years later in THE MAJOR AND THE MINOR when he suggested she slip into something more comfortable.

After a series of pranks and misunderstandings, Foster and Rogers find each other at the company picnic and promptly fall in love.

Watch for LAURA HOPE CREWS (Aunt Pittypat of GWTW) as a woman who wants to "keep" Norman Foster--and GUINN WILLIAMS as a brawny taxicab driver.

Summing up: Good fun with an early look at Ginger.