They Got Me Covered (1943)

User Rating:

6.8/10   

Director:

David Butler

Writers:

Leo Rosten (story) &
Leonard Spigelgass (story) ...

Release Date:

4 March 1943 (USA)

Genre:

Musical | Comedy

Tagline:

Samuel Goldwyn laughingly presents

Plot:

Bumbling reporter Robert Kittredge has been fired after bungling his latest assignment. His career isn't...

Plot Keywords:

Nazi | Reporter | Spy | Washington DC | Roommate

Cast

Bob Hope	...	Robert Kittredge
Dorothy Lamour	...	Christina Hill
Lenore Aubert	...	Mrs. Olga Vanescu
Otto Preminger	...	Otto Fauscheim
Eduardo Ciannelli	...	Baldanacco (as Edward Ciannelli)
Marion Martin	...	Gloria, the 'Glow Girl'
Donald Meek	...	Little old man
Phyllis Ruth	...	Sally
Philip Ahn	...	Nichimuro
Donald MacBride	...	Norman Mason
Mary Treen	...	Helen
Bettye Avery	...	Mildred Smith
Margaret Hayes	...	Lucille
Mary Byrne	...	Laura
William Yetter Sr.	...	Holtz (as William Yetter)

Runtime:

95 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Mirrophonic Recording)

Certification:

Australia:PG | Finland:S

Company:

Samuel Goldwyn Company, The

Trivia:

In the scene where Hope opens the music box we hear Bing Crosby singing his hit "When The Blue Of The Night". Hope says the line "That guy is haunting me”. Crosby and Hope were co-stars in the famous "Road Pictures" and often made cameos in each others films.

Movie Connections:

Featured in 100 Years of Comedy (1997) (V)

Soundtrack:

Where the Blue of the Night (Meets the Gold of the Day)

Hope/Lamour WWII comedy

Bob Hope is a Pulitzer-prize winning Robert Kittridge reporter who, after assuring his editor that Germany will not invade Russia loses his job in "They Got Me Covered." He thinks that this minor infraction can be forgiven if the man who won him the first Pulitzer, his contact Vanescu, will just come through with the story he says he has. But he's too nervous and tells Kittridge to have a stenographer (Lamour) meet him and she should carry a red bag and a green umbrella. His girlfriend/secretary calls home and arranges to have her roommate meet them - but Kittridge has the meeting place mixed up and by the time they get to the right place, the roommate has been taken away in a car. She gets the story in shorthand but the Nazis can't decipher it. They bring in decoder after decoder who look at the notes in dismay and say things like, "This isn't Gregg shorthand...this isn't Pittman....this isn't speedwriting..." - a very funny scene that probably had the secretaries in the audience laughing. The poor roommate then becomes a target.

The script is loaded with war jokes about rationing, the swing shift, etc., and Hope pops them off in his usual wry manner. When he hears Crosby on the radio, he turns it off and says, "That guy is haunting me." Lamour sports a big, high hairdo that almost looks like she's got it intertwined with a fur piece. She gives Hope great support. The Axis powers are a scream - Otto Preminger, Eduardo Cianelli, and Philip Ahn. In one very funny scene, Hope, disguised as a dummy, is eavesdropping on them at a health club when Preminger decides to show his skill with a knife - at the dummy.

Wartime audiences must have loved this, and much of "They Got Me Covered" still holds up even if that particular war is over. Great comedy delivered by masters.