Three Loves Has Nancy (1938)

This tale about a small town girl who goes to the big city is supposed to be a screwball comedy, but it offers the thinnest of plots, a disjointed storyline, and few real laughs.Janet Gaynor stars as Nancy, the girl around whom the story revolves, but she lacks the magnetism--homespun or otherwise--to explain why Robert Montgomery and Franchot Tone would be drawn to her so vehemently. Regardless, they are all working with a script that substitutes non sequiturs for real humor, and a one-note fish-out-of-water story for emotional depth. The result is mere amusement.I don't think another actress could have saved this film, but Gracie Allen, Irene Dunne or Jean Arthur might have given it a stronger comedic base. The writers of this film were pitching screwball, but they missed the plate entirely.

"Three Loves Has Nancy" is a frustrating film to watch. This is because it has many wonderful moments...but also some bad ones where the characters struggle very hard to make it work...and it doesn't. It's because the film sometimes tries just too hard to be goofy. I really think the film would have been better had they just allowed the film to have some quiet moments and trust the film to work. But, it's all loud and forced.The film finds Robert Montgomery playing a novelist. In a funny scene, he meets the rather oblivious lady played by Janet Gaynor. And, from her on, Montgomery and Gaynor's paths keep crossing--and in each case, Montgomery comes off on the losing end! It's quite cute--and reminiscent of another 1938 comedy, "Bringing Up Baby". However, once Montgomery brings Gaynor home, the film really loses direction. Having the love triangle of Montgomery, Franchot Tone and the unseen George just doesn't work--I would have just concentrated on Montgomery and Gaynor. In fact, Tone really wasn't necessary at all--and from here on the film is a bit of a disappointment. Worth seeing? Probably....but understand the film is highly uneven.

Janet Gaynor is a country bumpkin who finds herself in New York with Robert Montgomery and Franchot Tone while her fiancée is missing in "Three Loves Has Nancy," a wonderfully funny comedy. Montgomery, Gaynor, and Tone are all hilarious as parts of this strange menage. Gaynor, as Nancy, stood up on her wedding day by "George," is sent by her family to New York to find him. After a series of events, she winds up being used by writer Montgomery to get a rapacious female and her mother off his case. When Franchot Tone, his publisher, friend, and neighbor, gets a sniff of Gaynor's southern cooking, the two men battle it out for her attention. Montgomery considers her a jinx and wants to be rid of Nancy - or so he thinks - until Tone decides he's in love with her.There are quite a few laugh out loud scenes in this film. It's highly recommended. The "goof" described by IMDb indicates that perhaps two men were cast on different days as Tone's father, an uncredited role, but only one actor is listed. Anyway, it's great fun.

Three Loves Has Nancy with Janet Gaynor may not be on the same level as Lady Eve with Barbara Stanwyck but it comes close. I was laughing so hard that my son in the next room yelled out to me, "What's going on in there?" Franchot Tone simply stole the picture and Bob Montgomery was a close second. I couldn't believe the scene in which they were in bed together, stealing the one cover back and forth from each other. It had me in stitches. How could the Hollywood production code state that a married couple on screen couldn't sleep in the same bed yet these two men were allowed to do so? Did the censors simply miss out on the innuendo in 1938? Just too funny for words, perhaps even funnier than a similar scene made today, because this film was made in the age of innocence in Hollywood.Janet delivers her lines flawlessly, and she is very sweet, but Tone and Montgomery made more with their material here. I rate this delightful film 9 out of 10. Don't miss it when next it airs on TCM.