Although Rogers had starred in four hit films sans Fred Astaire during the mid-1930s, it was really with BACHELOR MOTHER, her first solo effort after the team's separation and RKO's biggest hit of 1939, that she really confirmed that she didn't need to sing or dance to appeal to mass
audiences. Notable as an example of the slight relaxation during the late 1930s of Hollywood's self-enforced Production Code, the slightly risque story features Rogers as a single saleswoman for a large Macy's-like department store who finds a baby on her doorstep, whereupon everyone assumes that
she's its mother.
Many of the witty lines apparently went right over the heads of the censors. Niven, delightful in his first major romantic comedy lead, portrays the playboy son of store owner Coburn, falling for Rogers even though he too assumes that she is the child's mother. Director Kanin, here enjoying one of
his earliest successes, shapes the material as though he had had decades of experience. The supporting cast is uniformly excellent, especially Albertson and the hilariously befuddled, scene-stealing Coburn ("I don't care who's the father... I'm the grandfather!"). Originally made in Hungary in
1935, the film easily outpaces its wet-blanket remake with Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher, BUNDLE OF JOY (1956). leave a comment