On stage, "Strange Interlude" was a nine-act "triple play", with time to leave for supper (and a nap). It was a success, and won the 1928 "Pulitzer Prize" for drama. Writer Eugene O'Neill used a Greek gimmick to nice effect - the characters would speak their "true thoughts" in asides, while the rest of the cast froze...
For this movie version, Robert Z. Leonard has the performers reveal their "inner thoughts" in voice-overs. You will recognize the technique, which is not unusual (in smaller doses). In this film, the voice-overs are a distraction - for the most part, they reveal nothing the cast can't reveal through cinematic acting. Mr. Leonard should have considered aborting the spoken asides. Obviously, Norma Shearer (as Nina Leeds) and her stellar co-stars are capable of revealing their "inner thoughts" in close-up - so, the voice-overs are superfluous.
The film is about Shearer's love for four different men: the idealized "Gordon Shaw" (an unseen World War casualty), darkly passionate Clark Gable (as Ned Darrell), popular and successful Alexander Kirkland (as Sam Evans), and ever unrequited Ralph Morgan (as Charlie Marsden). The men have exquisitely trimmed moustaches. Shearer marries one of them - but, fearing heredity insanity will befall her child, she gets herself pregnant by another. The film does not explicitly reveal that "Nina" aborted her first pregnancy.
Photographer Lee Garmes, art director Cedric Gibbons, and the MGM crew make the production look first class all the way. Henry B. Walthall (as father Leeds), May Robson (as mother Evans), Tad Alexander (as young Gordon), Robert Young (as older Gordon), and Maureen O'Sullivan (as Madeline) offer outstanding support. Just try to edit out the "strange interludes" in your mind...
******* Strange Interlude (12/30/32) Robert Z. Leonard ~ Norma Shearer, Clark Gable, Alexander Kirkland
