It’s Love I’m After (Blu-ray Review)
Director
Archie MayoRelease Date(s)
1937 (November 25, 2025)Studio(s)
First National Pictures/Warner Bros. Pictures (Warner Archive Collection)- Film/Program Grade: A
- Video Grade: A
- Audio Grade: A
- Extras Grade: B
Review
Bette Davis played the quintessential temperamental stage actress in the 1950 drama All About Eve. Thirteen years earlier, she had ventured into similar territory with a screwball comedy involving a tempestuous relationship with a fellow thespian in It’s Love I’m After.
Joyce Arden (Davis) and Basil Underwood (Leslie Howard) are famous actors who deliver magnificent performances to sold-out audiences. They also are lovers, and backstage things are less than ideal for them. After a performance of Romeo and Juliet, a young fan sneaks backstage. She’s wealthy socialite Marcia West (Olivia de Havilland), and she’s so infatuated with Basil that she declares she’s in love with him. This doesn’t sit well with her fiancé, Henry Grant, Jr. (Patric Knowles).
Henry confronts Basil and the actor agrees to help him get his girl back. Watching Basil and his butler Digges (Eric Blore) act out one of Basil’s original plays, Henry gets an idea. If Basil pays a visit to Marcia’s family and acts boorish and condescending, Marcia will detest him. There are, however, two problems with the plan. Basil doesn’t know that Henry’s fiancee is the same young woman who visited him in his dressing room. Also, Basil promised Joyce that they’d get married right after their last performance, since their hot-and-cold relationship had derailed their marriage plans several times before.
It’s Love I’m After benefits from an excellent, well directed cast. All three above-the-title leads have roles that showcase their abilities to maximum effect, Archie L. Mayo’s direction is fast-paced, and the movie offers plenty of laughs.
Howard easily slips into the role of Basil, a John Barrymore-type actor with great talent and an even bigger ego. The film project was inspired by Howard’s request for a comedic roles after a series of dramatic parts, one of which, coincidentally, was Romeo and Juliet (1936). As he plays Romeo to Joyce’s Juliet in the famous Shakespearean death scene, he whispers nasty asides to her. With Marcia, he dismisses her wide-eyed obsession as a childish crush but he’s not above taking advantage of it. His best scenes are with Davis, as their fiery exchanges can segue to romance in an instant. Handsome, self-assured, and dignified in bearing, Howard handles the film’s lighter moments adroitly.
Davis was the last actor added to the cast. Filming had begun well before she was assigned to the film. She wanted to play Marcia West, recognizing correctly that the role offered greater screen time. But the role of Joyce is a perfect showcase for Davis’ talents. She has a field day as Joyce and she’s far better here than in her later screwball comedy effort, The Bride Came C.O.D. With glaring eyes and stiff body language, she conveys tension and fury when Joyce and Basil argue but in their romantic scenes, she’s relaxed and a softness and vulnerability surface. Her delivery of barbed insults during the Romeo and Juliet performance, softly spoken between Shakespeare’s lines, establishes Joyce as Basil’s equal in both temperament and abrasive wit. That Davis nails both facets of her character’s personality is testament to her versatility. She’s such a strong screen presence that in the long intervals when she’s off screen, the film loses a good deal of energy.
De Havilland is charming as stage-struck Marcia. In her first encounter with Basil she’s all dewy-eyed fan enchanted with the magic she’s just seen him create on stage. Later, as the unwitting dupe in the plot contrived by Basil and Henry, she dismisses his rudeness to her shocked family by saying, “Little rules for little people.” De Havilland was a fairly new Warner Bros. contract player. Two years later she would co-star with Howard in Gone With the Wind.
Knowles has little to do as Henry other than serve as conduit to set the plot in motion. Overshadowed by the famous, flamboyant Basil, his Henry sort of diminishes in the actor’s presence, yet we feel for him. Bonita Granville has a small role as a precocious teenager with a penchant for peeking through keyholes and spreading gossip.
Stealing his every scene and even the picture itself is character actor Eric Blore as Basil’s devoted butler, Digges. A veteran of several Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers films, he was usually cast as a butler or waiter and supplied superb comic relief. In It’s Love I’m After, he surpasses himself with some wonderful moments, alternating as straight man and comic. With facial expressions of indignation, exasperation and contempt, and impeccable timing, Blore is a prime asset to the picture, a whimsical presence who greatly enhances the film’s shenanigans.
It’s Love I’m After was shot by directors of photography James Van Trees and Tony Gaudio (uncredited) on 35mm black & white film with spherical lenses and presented in the aspect ratio of 1.37:1. Black side mattes fill out the screen. The Blu-ray features a new 4K restoration of the film. Clarity and contrast are excellent with no visual imperfections. Details such as stage costumes for Basil and Joyce, decor in Basil’s dressing room, patterns on Joyce’s dresses and Basil’s ascots, and the elaborate furnishings in Marcia’s home are nicely delineated.
The soundtrack is English 2.0 mono DTS-HD Master Audio. English SDH subtitles are an available option. Dialogue is intelligible throughout, vital in a film that depends on verbal repartee. Davis’s rapid-fire exchanges and Blore’s superb delivery are essential in establishing the film’s farcical tone. Heinz Roemheld’s score is serviceable and never overwhelms dialogue.
Bonus materials on the Blu-ray release from the Warner Archive Collection include the following:
- Porky’s Building (7:51)
- Porky’s Bedtime Story (7:22)
- Theatrical Trailer (2:51)
Porky’s Building – Directed by Frank Tashlin, this 1937 black & white Looney Tunes cartoon features rival contractors Porky Pig and Dirty Digg competing to build a new City Hall after submitting identical low bids. The city commissioner declares that they will both build their own, and whoever finishes first will win the contract. This results in a frenetic race filled with lots of sight gags.
Porky’s Bedtime Story – In this 1937 black & white Looney Tunes cartoon directed by Bob Clampett, Porky Pig and his buddy Gabby Goat are warned by their boss they they will be fired if they get to work late again. They try to go to sleep early but they’re disturbed by loud noises, bugs, and a violent thunderstorm. Arriving at work the next day, they’re in for an ironic surprise.
It’s Love I’m After is a witty film with a solid script by Casey Robinson, adept direction by Archie L. Mayo, and a first-rate cast. There are plenty of one-liners and comic insults to keep the zaniness percolating, and several laugh-out-loud moments. Bette Davis proved that she could handle broad comedy as well as melodrama. De Havilland showed that she could hold her own alongside two formidable co-stars. She would soon become one of Warner Bros. major leading ladies. Eric Blore’s hilarious performance is reason enough to check out It’s Love I’m After.
- Dennis Seuling