Play Girl (1941)

Kay Francis made her last movie under contract for Warners in 1939 and the last years had been one humiliation after another. By the end of 1940 she had flitted between Universal and RKO, each film a little worse than the one before. All through this she was having a ghastly affair with an alleged German aircraft manufacturer, Baron Barnekow and the gossip columnists were at pains to point out Kay's advancing age!!! To top it all Kay was forced to accept pictures like "Play Girl" about an ageing gold-digger who has a showdown at the end with a potential groom's mother, who points out - "He could be your own son Grace" and "You're two years older than me you know". Well may Kay lament (as she does in the movie) "It's tough to be a woman"!!!You often read where Kay never looked her best in these later movies but I thought she looked positively radiant as Grace Herbert, an older gold-digger fallen on hard times. A young girl, Ellen (Mildred Coles, who finished her sparse career in Westerns) has applied for a job as Grace's secretary, but Grace finds her innocent and conscientious and also finds potential. She will make a new girl of her, she can be her age, have fun and earn money at the same time.First "cab off the rank" is Bill (Nigel Bruce) an old flame of Graces. Kay shows she has a real flair for comedy as she and Ellen rehearse what Ellen will say and how Bill will respond. Kay is "spot on" in her biting imitation of his remarks - "not got lumbago - well, all the best doctors must be wrong then hahaha"!! that when Bill is actually playing the scene it falls quite flat. While Ellen gets into the swing of it, she has already lost her heart to Tom (Jim Ellison, also from Westerns), a cowboy, who helped them fix a flat tyre when they were on the road. Because he jumped from the train, Grace dismisses him as just a cowboy but when it turns out that he is a millionaire, suddenly Ellen doesn't find gold digging fun anymore.I really enjoyed it - reading that it was a comedy, I thought could Kay do it - but she did with flying colours. Bill's mother (Katherine Alexander) and Grace become friends and the film ends with Grace happily getting ready to meet an uncle of Bill's, someone who is going to put an end to her "play girl" days. Margaret Hamilton was good as Grace's cynical friend and good old Kane Richmond had rather a small part as a suitor who is not what he appears.

I've never been a huge KAY FRANCIS fan, but at least in PLAY GIRL she gets a better than average script (for a B-film), and an excellent supporting cast that is able to breathe some life into the material. And her character is sensible and mature, not to mention a bit too noble to be believable by the last reel.She's a fashionable gold digger who decides to train a protégé to lure men into the net when her own looks become too mature. This time the prize is JAMES ELLISON, a handsome young cattle rancher who happens to fall hard for her protégé, played winsomely by MILDRED COLE.KANE RICHMOND and NIGEL BRUCE lend valuable support in key roles and the whole story is done with flair and style that makes it pleasant entertainment. On the face of it, it's strictly minor stuff with many soap opera overtones.Only disappointing angle is the resolution of the love affair involving Ellison and Cole with no on screen reunion provided by the script. Instead, he rushes to join the young protégé in Florida while Francis turns her attention to another man. The plot soon becomes a twisted soap opera with Francis nobly giving up the young man in favor of telling him the truth about Cole's whereabouts.Nothing deep here, just a pleasant diversion that passes quickly and is soon forgotten. Good work by a capable cast makes it easy to watch.

This film is definite evidence that the films in the latter portion of Kay Francis' career were pretty ordinary. This film, while competent, is only passable entertainment and certainly won't keep your undivided attention.Kay plays a high-living gold digger. The problem is that she never got married and settled down and now she's broke and her prospects are few. So, on a lark, she finds a young protégé and grooms her to be a gold digger as well--but also to marry and keep a rich guy. The problem is that the young lady has scruples and she just can't bring herself to do this to such a nice guy. So, Kay decides to pull out all the stops and try to get the guy herself--even though she's older than the young man's mother! Oddly, one of the beaus that the protégé has in the film is Nigel Bruce. While his age is fine for the film (after all, she was looking for a "sugar daddy"), saying he was from Chicago made me laugh. After all, Bruce has a very, very English accent and seeing the guy who later played Dr. Watson in the Sherlock Holmes films as an American from Chicago made me laugh.Otherwise, there's not much in this film that seems new or particularly interesting. Even the noble ending seems all too familiar. Watchable, but that's about it.

Warner Brothers continued its campaign to get Kay Francis to break her contract not just by lowering the quality of her vehicles, not just by loading her dialogue with 'r's or putting her in horse operas, but now by lending her out to other studios. She was the highest-priced actress on the Warner's lot and they didn't want her any more. But she was not going to give up that contract.In this lend-out to RKO, Miss Francis, as usual, gives a wonderful performance. In fact, given the cast of minor players -- including a few long-time favorites of mine like Nigel Bruce and Kane Richmond -- and they give fine performances too, even if we are expected to believe Mr. Bruce hails from Chicago, in this minor comedy. It's about a professional adventuress who is getting a lot too old to play wealthy men for suckers. It's a little slow-starting, but by the half-way mark, it is moving along at a good clip. Definitely worth your while.