The chance to see three Hollywood legends in their salad days is the best reason to see Consolation Marriage which stars Pat O'Brien, Irene Dunne, and Myrna Loy. It's the story of two people who think they've settled for second best in the marriages they make.
Irene is jilted by Lester Vail who marries a rich girl and Pat O'Brien is similarly given the heave ho by Myrna. One night Dunne and O'Brien meet in a café and the two fall for each other, but not without a bit of nostalgia for their lost loves. They marry and have a baby girl, but both of them have Vail and Loy come back in their lives.
I think you can tell where this one is going. What's kind of strange is that Loy who played the perfect wife for years and years after The Thin Man is the other woman here against Dunne who also played perfect wives and mothers. Dunne and O'Brien never worked together again, but almost 40 years after Consolation Marriage came out, Pat and Myrna were cast as Burt Reynolds's parents in The End, one of the last films for both of them.
Consolation Marriage is a pleasant Depression era soap opera with three screen legends and a nice performance also by John Halliday as O'Brien's boss who kind of likes Dunne himself and wishes she were really free.
Irene is jilted by Lester Vail who marries a rich girl and Pat O'Brien is similarly given the heave ho by Myrna. One night Dunne and O'Brien meet in a café and the two fall for each other, but not without a bit of nostalgia for their lost loves. They marry and have a baby girl, but both of them have Vail and Loy come back in their lives.
I think you can tell where this one is going. What's kind of strange is that Loy who played the perfect wife for years and years after The Thin Man is the other woman here against Dunne who also played perfect wives and mothers. Dunne and O'Brien never worked together again, but almost 40 years after Consolation Marriage came out, Pat and Myrna were cast as Burt Reynolds's parents in The End, one of the last films for both of them.
Consolation Marriage is a pleasant Depression era soap opera with three screen legends and a nice performance also by John Halliday as O'Brien's boss who kind of likes Dunne himself and wishes she were really free.