User Reviews

Harry von Zell wants to spend his anniversary with his wife, Christine McIntyre, but boss Emil Sitka insists that he go to a convention with him. After Harry has left, Christine and her mother discover a torrid fan letter from Jean Willes and set out in hot pursuit in this typically violent Columbia short comedy.

It was the last short Harry made for Columbia; he had bigger fish to fry in his work with the George Burns-Gracie Allen show and other tv enterprises, and appearing in the lightly altered scripts from older Columbia shorts was no way to advance his career.

The director of this short was Edward Bernds, who had started out as a sound engineer and switched to directing shorts and comedy programmers in the mid-1940s. He held the distinction of being being nominated for Best Director by accident; when the Frank SInatra-Bing Crosby-Grace Kelly musical HIGH SOCIETY garnered a raft of nominations, Bernds was sent a certificate for directing the movie; in actuality, it was an identically named Bowery Boys movie. He proudly displayed the certificate for the rest of his long life.

I was shocked to see this film as it starred Harry von Zell...a man known as an announcer and occasional actor on the old "Burns and Allen" TV show. I had no idea he'd ever made any comedies and thought he was just famous for his lovely voice. Surprisingly, when I then looked, I learned von Zell made a string of comedy shorts for Columbia...the same folks who made most of the Three Stooges films. "His Baiting Beauty" was the final short he made for Columbia.

Harry is not happy, as his boss (Emil Sitka) insists he go off on a business trip. He would much rather stay home with his lovely wife and celebrate their anniversary, but business is business. However, after he leaves, his wife finds one of Harry's fan letters. It's from a woman and she's infatuated with his voice...and it proposes they get together. Now, the wife thinks Harry isn't away on business but is out fooling around with another woman. To make things worse, the woman who wrote the letter is a nut...and she shows up at Harry's room and she inexplicably wants him! So, if the wife does show up, she's bound to misinterpret things.

To me, the film was odd...as it played a lot like a Stooges film but von Zell was absolutely nothing like any of the Stooges. Instead, those around Harry ended up acting like the Stooges and doing much of the action. It is mildly funny...in a violent sort of way...but hardly a film I'd rush to watch.



By the way, Emil Sitka was apparently friends with the Three Stooges. In the 1970s, Emil joined the two remaining Stooges at public events, playing the third Stooge.