The Lady Eve (1941) on Netflix
Aboard an ocean liner, the con artist Jean Harrington and her father, "Colonel" Harrington, plan to fleece Charles Pike. He is a shy snake expert and the heir to a brewery fortune.
- Netflix4.4/5
- IMDb7.7/1025,768 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes100%
Trailer
Plot summary
Jean Harrington works the ocean liner from South America to New York with her father, "Colonel" Harrington, and his partner Gerald, and their mark is Charles Pike, heir to the Pike's Pale brewery fortune. Charles is a snake expert who has spent a year up the Amazon, and he would rather read about reptiles than talk to any of the women competing for his attention. Jean trips him as he walks past and soon has his interest. Her feelings for Charles get in the way, and she shields him from her father's card play and calls the scheme off. Muggsy, the minder who watches over Charles, suspects she is after his money.
Cast
Show all 20 cast
- Wilda Bennettas Party Guest (uncredited)
- Evelyn Beresfordas Party Guest (uncredited)
- Georgie Cooperas Party Guest (uncredited)
- Kenneth Gibsonas Party Guest (uncredited)
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Lady Eve (1941)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The film almost had an entirely different cast. Brian Aherne was wanted for the male lead, and in August 1940 Fred MacMurray and Madeleine Carroll were announced as co-stars; the next month Darryl Zanuck lent Henry Fonda to play opposite Paulette Goddard, who was then replaced by Barbara Stanwyck.
- Paramount producer Albert Lewin told Preston Sturges that the first two-thirds of his script would need an almost one hundred percent rewrite. Sturges objected, and Lewin gave way: "Follow your witty nose, my boy; it will lead you and me and Paramount to the Elysian pastures of popular entertainment."
- Hollywood's censors rejected the script outright, objecting to the definite suggestion of a sex affair between the two leads that lacked compensating moral values. A revised script was submitted and the Hays Office approved it.
- Barbara Stanwyck compared Sturges's set to a carnival. He paraded through it in a beret or a feathered cap with a white cashmere scarf and a loud print shirt, telling visitors the outfits let the crew find him in the crowd, and he wore a bathrobe to set the mood for Stanwyck's bedroom scene.
- The Amazon of the opening was Lake Baldwin at the Los Angeles County Arboretum in Arcadia, California, and the Professor Marsdit that Fonda's snake expert mentions is an anagram of Raymond L. Ditmars, the American Museum of Natural History's famous reptile expert.
- Stanwyck's con artist Jean Harrington was still being used as a model in 2023: James Mangold gave her to Phoebe Waller-Bridge as a key reference for Helena Shaw in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.
