Misbehaving Husbands is a 1940 American comedy of errors film directed by William Beaudine for Producers Releasing Corporation. The film had the working titles of At Your Age and Dummy Husbands. Harry Langdon, Betty Blythe, Esther Muir and others in the cast were stars in silent films. It was Gig Young’s film debut.
Plot:
Absent-minded department store owner Henry Butler (Harry Langdon), forgetting his wedding anniversary ends up working late and missing the surprise anniversary party thrown by his wife, Effie, Betty Blythe. Trying to get away from work, he ends up being seen with a mannequin, which he is trying to get repaired. A friend of his wife who sees it, think it’s a blonde girl Henry is having an affair with. Others call the police, reporting a murdered woman.
Henry gets picked up by the police and kept for interrogation until the wee hours of the morning; but his troubles are just starting. Effie has overheard the gossip spread amongst her party guests; and seeing Henry come home with one of the mannequin’s shoes and blonde hair on his clothes fears the worst. She is urged on by her friend, Grace Norman (Esther Muir) and an unscrupulous lawyer, Gilbert Wayne (Gayne Whitman) to file for a divorce. Henry and Effie both have their own lawyers who advise that since neither one will leave the family home they need witnesses that the couple are living apart to facilitate the divorce proceedings, and due to Henry’s alleged violent temper Effie’s lawyer also demands she have a bodyguard, a thug named Gooch who stays at the home.
When Effie decides to stop the divorce, a little scene staged by the lawyer, with his girlfriend, Nan, posing as the blonde Henry was supposedly seeing, convinces her otherwise. It is only then that the live in witnesses, her niece Jane Luana Walters and Henry’s friend Bob Grant, Bob Byrd notice that the shoe Henry brought back that night is about a size four; too small for Nan. Jane also picks up that Gooch and Nan seem to recognise each other and trick Gooch into calling Nan where they overhear her location on an extension phone and get the truth out of her.
A drunken Henry drags the mannequin, Carole (for Carole Lombard), all over town; only to meet the police, Effie and her lawyer waiting for him at home.
Producers Releasing Corporation [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
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