[Screwball Sunday #3] My Man Godfrey

Deconstructing screwball

Catch up on the previous instalments of the Screwball Sunday series.

[Screwball Sunday #1] Defining the Genre

[Screwball Sunday #2] Shaping Screwball

And make sure you are subscribed to get future ones directly into your inbox! 

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Spoiler Alert! This post contains spoilers for My Man Godfrey (1936).

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The first two instalments of the series discussed screwball comedy from a theoretical standpoint, examining the genre at large and focusing on common themes and the genre’s influences using the examples of a wide variety of films. Today, we narrow it down to one film and use it as a basis to deconstruct the genre and break it down by components which we will tie into theoretical discussions from weeks one and two. 

This week’s post doesn’t include discussion questions – although I would love to hear your thoughts on the film and would love to discuss any other details I may have missed in writing this post – but I’ve included a list of fun facts that I’ve encountered while researching the film beyond just the source material!

Synopsis

Taking place during the Great Depression, My Man Godfrey opens in New York by the East River where socialite Cornelia Bullock finds homeless Godfrey Smith and offers him $5 to be her forgotten man as part of a scavenger hunt. He refuses and Cornelia falls on a pile of ashes as she walks away. Irene is delighted but also shows kindness which leads Godfrey to decide to be Irene’s forgotten man for the game to beat Cornelia. 

Back at the hotel where the game started, Godfrey is authenticated as a forgotten man and Irene wins that part of the game. Before leaving the premises, Godfrey expresses his contempt for the game and its players but Irene takes pity on him and decides to make him her protégé, hiring him as the new family butler. 

From there, the antics of the rich continue as the two sisters fight for Godfrey’s attention which ultimately ends with Irene feigning a fainting spell and falling into Godfrey’s arms who soon realises she is faking it. He puts her in the shower and turns on the cold water to which Irene responds with “I know you love me. You do or you wouldn’t have lost your temper,” hinting that his reaction means he actually cares.  

Godfrey quits but not before pawning Cornelia’s pearl necklace to save the Bullock family business, saving the family from financial ruin and eliciting an apology from Cornelia for her spoiled behaviour. This is also where his previous social status is revealed – Godfrey used to be among Boston’s elite but the loss of a woman he loved led him down a dark path from which he was saved by the undaunted spirit of the homeless men of New York. 

Godfrey uses the remaining money he got from the necklace to convert the dump he used to live in into a nightclub called “The Dump,” creating and offering jobs to the homeless men from the area. Irene finds him there, determined to win him over. She arrives with the mayor who has been arranged to marry them and leads a somewhat confused Godfrey into the marriage with a line, “Stand still Godfrey, it'll all be over in a minute.” 

My Man Godfrey (1936)

Socioeconomic Dynamics 

Perhaps even more prominently than other representatives in the genre, My Man Godfrey puts a heavy emphasis on the dynamics between the rich and the poor. As discussed in the previous Screwball Sunday posts, screwball comedy incited a rise of happy endings as a way to provide hope and reassure the audiences.¹ In this film specifically, this is done through Godfrey’s storyline where we see him climb the ranks from a homeless man into a proud business owner. 

Unlike the Bullock family and their wealthy friends, there is also an undertone of compassion attributed to Godfrey that the other wealthy characters lack – when he becomes a business owner, he makes sure to employ those in need of jobs. This is also a callback to the fact that it was precisely those homeless men who helped him when he was down after losing his own wealth before the events of the film and further establishes the spirit of the poor as kind and compassionate. In a way, it is also a callback to the fact that Irene employed him when he needed it but, at the same time, the rest of her family and social class barely saw him as a human being when he was brought into the hotel as a forgotten man in the film’s opening. 

His clever work to pawn the necklace and save the family from financial ruin also plays into screwball comedy’s tendency to mock the wealthy.² It is a homeless man that ends up saving them, after he was saved by the homeless himself, showing the lower class’s wit and compassion, something that the wealthy lacked. 

Through depictions of the poor as more considerate, harder-working people, the film aims to appeal to the working class of the period and invoke feelings of hope during what was a difficult time financially for many across the United States. In its mockery of the wealthy, the film provides a bit of comedic relief while also fueling the portrayal of the poor as ‘better’ people to appeal to its working class audiences.

The Spoiled Heiress Phenomenon

By default, screwball comedy features the so-called battle of the sexes which uses the banter between the male and the female leads to create sexual tension in a time when explicit sexual references weren’t allowed to be featured in film. The genre often features the archetype of a spoiled heiress that adds to the banter, creating not only a gendered dynamic but also further playing into the socioeconomic differences, effectively mocking the upper class. The general moviegoing audiences at the time of the Great Depression could relate to the working class man and his initial hostility towards the upper class characters but, just like the male lead in the film, they needed to see the quirky and witty side of the spoiled heiress to fall in love with her. 

My Man Godfrey perfectly features this dynamic. The two Bullock sisters represent the spoiled heiresses, both obnoxious and scheming in their own ways, with Irene showing a bit more compassion towards a forgotten man but ultimately showing her privilege in her insistence to make Godfrey fall in love with her whether he likes it or not. Godfrey is the perfect working class – or in this case, jobless – man. He shows hostility towards the sisters in the very first scene, refusing to play a part in their game, then making it clear what he thinks of the way the rich treat the poor once he does agree to feature as Irene’s forgotten man in the scavenger hunt. Layers are added to this scene in particular later on when the audience learns of Godfrey’s background because it serves as a clear testimony to what he’s learned since losing his wealth and how the homeless men helped him and changed his perspective, making him view the lower class with a lot more respect than we see other wealthy characters do.

The contrast of the two characters’ personalities and the good-natured quirks Irene shows, painting her more as oblivious due to her wealth rather than malicious, ultimately lead to romance that the audience can’t help but root for.

My Man Godfrey (1936)

The Hays Code

Many will define screwball comedies as sex comedies without sex and the last week’s exploration of the genre’s influences touched on the ways in which The Hays Code affected how sexual tension was portrayed on screen. My Man Godfrey perhaps isn’t as heavy on innuendo as some other examples mentioned last week, but there is undoubtedly a layer of double entendres and hidden meanings throughout. 

For example, the character of Carlo is quite ambiguous in what his role in the Bullock household is. He is Mrs. Bullock’s protégé who lives with the family and ultimately had a hand in nearly leading the family into financial ruin. His exact role within the household is not clearly specified but there are hints at him being a live-in gigolo. 

There are several lines throughout the film, including the “Stand still Godfrey, it'll all be over in a minute” at the very end of the film when Irene guides Godfrey to get married, that hint at sex and further add to the comedy and the sexual tension between the leads. 

Definite Screwball

As shown throughout this post, My Man Godfrey ticks all the boxes of what a screwball comedy is. It features the mockery of the wealthy and examines the dynamics between different social classes. It depicts a battle of the sexes by involving the character of a spoiled heiress determined to pursue a man she fancies. It features witty dialogue which fuels the sexual tension between the characters. And the opening scavenger hunt, creates a perfect absurd situation to start off the film with and create a sense of comedy. 

The film also leaves us with a message, aiming to teach the Bullock family – as well as the audience – about common decency, compassion, and the fickle nature of a social status.

Fun Facts

1. My Man Godfrey was the first movie in Oscar history to be nominated in all four acting categories, though it didn’t win in any.

2. It remains the only film to ever receive a nomination in each of the acting categories without a nomination for Best Picture.

3. William Powell who plays Godfrey was the one who suggested Carole Lombard for the role of Irene, despite the two being divorced for three years at the time of filming.

4. I found a blooper reel for the film on Youtube and I think it may be the oldest blooper reel I’ve ever watched!

1. Muscio, Giuliana. “Cinema and the New Deal.” Hollywood’s New Deal, Temple University Press, 1997, pp. 65–104.

2. Everson, William K. Hollywood Bedlam: Classic Screwball Comedies. Carol Pub. Group, 1994.