You Can’t Take It with You: Movies about Writing

This Frank Capra classic is about an eccentric family whose oldest daughter wants to marry into a banking family. Oh, and of course, the banking family is trying to buy the family home in a shady deal.

The patriarch of the household is Lionel Barrymore, an armchair philosopher who doesn’t believe in war or income taxes, and grandpa to the Neighborhood. His daughter, Mrs. Sycamore is a writer. His son-in-law likes to invent fireworks with the help of the former ice man that moved into their house nine years earlier. He has two granddaughters One is Essie, played by Anne Miller, a dancer who is married to a musician named Ed, but the pair also make and distribute candy as a means of paying the bills. The other granddaughter is Alice, played by Jean Arthur, who is in love with the bosses son Tony played by Jimmy Stewart. Also, in the house is their housekeeper, her fiancé, a former clerk who invents toys, and a pet raven. Alice loves her family, but worries about how her future in-laws will react to them. Most of the film is about class warfare, the definition of wealth, and various shenanigans.

At the beginning of the movie, the daughter is working on a play and asking everyone in the house if they have ever been in a monastery. When her father asks her how it’s going she says she’s written herself into a monastery and can’t get out. He replies, “Well you’ll figure out a way. Remember the time you got out of jail.” Each mishap she looks at as inspiration and excitement. Alice also asks that her mother not read any of her plays aloud upon the first meeting with Tony. Alice explains that her mother writes plays only because a typewriter was delivered to the house by mistake and she liked it. I feel like this is as good a reason for any to become a writer.

The Ex-Mrs. Bradford: Movies about Writing

The Ex-Mrs. Bradford is a 1936 where Jean Arthur plays a mystery writer named Paula whose trying to convince Dr. Lawrence “Brad” Bradford (William Powell) to marry her again instead of making his alimony payments to her. It’s a comedy. During their “wedded bliss” Paula would convince Brad to consult on murders so she could research them for her novels. But Brad insists that he likes his life now where he can read the paper and “enjoy a murder” without her buzzing in his ear. He didn’t object to her writing mysteries. He objected to her “living them”. He has a point there as she is paranoid that every surprise is a gangster with a gun ready to bump the both off.

Of course, because this is a movie, a case falls into their lap about a murdered jockey. What follows is intrigue and screwball antics. Paula uses their budding retry at domesticity to play detective. She tries drugging them, bashing them, and all sorts of other problems in order to solve the case. However, events lead to suspicious against Brad and now he has to play the detective while Paula distracts the police on his tail.

I enjoy how Paula’s brain is always on the case like how most writers would be distracted. Of course, since she writes mysteries, it causes her to forget her manners. I appreciate this about her character. So many old movies make authors charming and sociable. It’s more realistic in my opinion for her to be distracted and a little “dizzy” as they say in 30s lingo. She also has a big box of props for developing murder stories which is a fantastic detail!