Every Girl Should Be Married

Cary Grant met his future wife Betsy Drake on the set of the appropriately titled Every Girl Should be Married. Grant plays well-known baby specialist Madison Brown, who is Dr. Spock in everything but name. After a chance meeting with headstrong young Anabel Sins (Drake), poor Brown finds his every move and thought monitored by Anabel, who intends to become his wife come heck or high water. Upset that Brown steadfastly resists her charms, Anabel decides to make him jealous by playing up to her boss Roger Sanford (Franchot Tone). When Brown still won't bite, our plucky heroine mounts a campaign enlisting everybody in town to wear down the doctor's resistance. Nowadays, this is called "stalking"; in 1948, it was called "funny." Produced, directed and written by Don Hartman, Every Girl Should be Married was a box-office winner to the tune of $775,000.
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Review: Times have changed since 1948. Many romantic comedies are still built on the premise that a woman will do anything to get her man, but they're not as blatant about it as Every Girl Should Be Married. This is one of the problems with Every Girl -- it's a little too above-board about the motives of its heroine. In spite of the fact that she professes to be in love with her intended prey, it's hard to shake the feeling that what she really feels is infatuation -- and that her motivation for pursuing him has more to do with a determination to simply be married than a determination to be married to this particular individual. And when her future husband abruptly does an about-face and agrees to marry her, it not only isn't believable, it comes across as an act of pity, rather than a realization that he does indeed love her. Adding to this problem is Betsy Drake. Her performance is actually good and quite skillful, but she lacks the requisite natural spark that this kind of role demands and that puts the audience at ease. (By contrast, when Katharine Hepburn hunts Cary Grant in Bringing up Baby, it seems entirely natural, not least because something in Hepburn's being makes it seem that way.) However, there are still some good laughs in the screenplay, Grant is his usual excellent self, and the dream house Drake sets up is charming. If the viewer can get past the datedness, it's a modest little entertainment.