You're Telling Me!
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| You're Telling Me! | |
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| Directed by | Erle C. Kenton |
| Written by | Walter DeLeon W.C. Fields Paul M. Jones J.P. McEvoy Julian Leonard Street |
| Produced by | Emanuel Cohen William LeBaron |
| Starring | W.C. Fields Larry "Buster" Crabbe Joan Marsh Adrienne Ames |
| Cinematography | Alfred Gilks |
| Edited by | Otho Lovering |
| Music by | W. Franke Harling Arthur Johnston John Leipold Tom Satterfield |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 67 min. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
You're Telling Me! is a 1934 pre-Code comedy film directed by Erle C. Kenton and starring W.C. Fields. The film is a remake of the silent film So's Your Old Man (1926), also starring Fields, and both films are adapted from the story Mr. Bisbee’s Princess by Julian Leonard Street. It was released by Paramount Pictures.
Plot
Sam Bisbee is an optometrist and amateur inventor. His daughter Pauline is in love with Bob Murchison, but Bob's upper-class mother disapproves of the Bisbee family. Sam's wife Bessie is ashamed of him because he prefers to act as himself rather than feigning sophistication. Pauline is the one woman who truly loves Sam, accepting her father as he is.
Sam receives a letter from a tire company expressing interest in one of his inventions, puncture-proof tires that can resist bullets. However, his opportunity becomes a disaster when a police car is mistakenly used as the subject of his demonstration. The car's tires fail to resist Sam's bullets and the police chase after him.
During the train trip home, feeling that he has failed completely, Sam contemplates committing suicide by drinking a bottle of iodine, but decides against it at the last minute. On the train, he meets a woman who also has a bottle of iodine. Mistakenly thinking that she is also pondering suicide, Sam tries to dissuade her by telling her about his own troubles. Sam does not know that the woman is Princess Lescaboura, who is moved by Sam's story and secretly decides to help him.
The next day, the princess visits Sam's town and informs its residents that he had once saved her life. As a result, the townspeople begin to treat Sam with respect, including Mrs. Murchison. Sam, believing that the princess is a fake, quietly congratulates her on her successful ruse.
At a new golf course, Sam is awarded the honor of driving the first ball. While Sam is at the tee, Mr. Robbins, the president of the tire company, arrives at the course. The company has found Sam's car and tested the tires themselves, and they are interested in pursuing his invention. Robbins offers Sam $20,000, but the princess says that she wants the patent for her own country. She exchanges bids with Robbins until Robbins finally raises his offer to $1,000,000 with a royalty for every tire, and Sam accepts.
Now that his family is wealthy and respected, and with his daughter Pauline married to Bob, Sam is happy but does not realize that the princess was genuine. As the princess is about to drive away, Sam congratulates her for what he believes was a trick, and she replies "You're telling me!"
Cast
- W.C. Fields as Sam Bisbee, optometrist
- Adrienne Ames as Princess Lescaboura
- Joan Marsh as Pauline Bisbee
- Larry "Buster" Crabbe as Bob Murchison
- Louise Carter as Mrs. Bessie Bisbee
- Kathleen Howard as Mrs. Edward Quimby Murchison
- Del Henderson as Crystal Springs mayor Brown
- Nora Cecil as Mrs. Price, town's spinster
- George Irving as Mr. Robbins, president of National Tire Co.
- James B. "Pop" Kenton as Doc Beebe, Sam's friend
- Robert McKenzie as Charlie Bogle, Sam's friend
- Tammany Young as the Caddy
Production
The sequence at the golf course is largely the routine that formed the nucleus of Fields' earlier short film The Golf Specialist. This was filmed at the Lakeside Golf Club in Burbank, California, which was also used in Fields' short The Dentist (1932 film).
The triumph of Fields' character over his circumstances, and the happy ending thanks to a windfall profit, would be repeated later in 1934 in It's a Gift.
The film was provided only a cursory review in William K. Everson's 1967 book The Art of W.C. Fields as it was then unavailable because of ownership issues. These issues were resolved and the film is included in the Universal DVD set W.C. Fields Comedy Collection, Volume Two. Everson mentions that the name of the film's minor character Charlie Bogle was adopted as Fields' writing pseudonym for several of his later films.