Big Hearted Herbert (1934)

Director:

William Keighley

Writers:

Lillie Hayward (screen play), Ben Markson (screen play),

Stars:

Aline MacMahon, Guy Kibbee, Patricia Ellis

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Aline MacMahon	...	Elizabeth
Guy Kibbee	...	Herbert
Patricia Ellis	...	Alice
Helen Lowell	...	Martha
Phillip Reed	...	Andrew
Robert Barrat	...	Jim
Henry O'Neill	...	Goodrich Sr.
Marjorie Gateson	...	Amy Goodrich
Nella Walker	...	Mrs. Goodrich
Junior Durkin	...	Junior Kalness (as Trent Durkin)
Jay Ward	...	Robert Kalness
Hale Hamilton	...	Mr. Havens
Claudia Coleman	...	Mrs. Havens

Storyline

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Plot Keywords:

bathtub | family relationships | dinner party | maid | cuspidor | 

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Genres:

Comedy

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

6 October 1934 (USA)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Warner Bros, Vitaphone Corporation, The

Technical Specs

Runtime:

59 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The play opened on Broadway in New York City, New York, USA on 1 January 1934 and closed in May 1934 after 154 performances. The opening night cast included J.C. Nugent as Herbert and Elisabeth Risdon as Elizabeth.

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Quotes

Herbert Kalness: [Resisting the suggestion that his son go to college instead of going to work at Kalness' factory] I never saw a college man yet who was worth his salt - freshman year or any other year!
Goodrich Sr.: Aren't you being a bit severe on colleges, Mr. Kalness?
Herbert Kalness: "Colleges"? We don't have 'em any more. Big athletic institutions. Football teams. Baseball teams. Crews, swimmers, hockey players. Tiddlywinks teams for all I know. Careening around the country to get their pictures in the paper!

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Connections

Version of Father Is a Prince (1940)

User Reviews

A rare gem!

This movie is a perfect capsule of 1930s family life in middle America. You have the grumpy put-upon (todays type-A) up-by-the-bootstraps businessman perfectly embodied by the actor who had these parts cornered: Guy Kibbee (a rare breed unto himself, they don't make them like him any more). Harried, pompous, blustery & scared to death his world is going to collapse around him & his perfect little family because of an IRS audit.

Then there is his perfect family: Aline McMahon as his wise, witty & imperturbable wife, Junior who's just about ready for college but wants to get into his uncle's engineering business not dad's plumbing fixture manufacturing plant. There's curly blonde-headed sis who wants to marry the Harvard grad & there's the cute kid brother who never saw a banana that he didn't want to eat. Finally there's the highly opinionated but lovable housekeeper.

This could have as easily been a successful radio show or a long-running comic strip. The situations are hilarious, the lines are sharp & the performances are absolutely on target. Plus you get a glimpse of a life (granted it's through the prism of Hollywood, but no less distorted than today's sitcoms of dysfunctional therapy-addicted families) that has long been extinct. Just imagine! - a locally owned family run plumbing fixture manufacturing company. Manufacturing plants used to pepper this country once upon a time, especially in the Northeast & parts of the Midwest; self-sustaining communities abounded. Half of today's population would give anything to return to those days.

If that doesn't shed light on the great divide that is cleaving this country, nothing can.