MY SISTER EILEEN (1942)

This property has a long history. Ruth McKenney wrote a series of stories which appeared in The New Yorker in the 1930s about herself and her sister, two young women living in Cleveland, Ohio who moved to New York City, with Ruth trying to become a published writer and her younger sister Eileen trying to break into acting. They were presented as fiction but were based on their real lives. (Autofiction, anybody?) A collection of those stories was published in 1937 as My Sister Eileen. In 1940, material from the last two chapters which focused on their time in New York was turned into a hit Broadway play. While it was still running, Columbia turned it into a movie with Rosalind Russell and Janet Blair as the sisters. A stage musical adaptation, Wonderful Town, with music by Leonard Bernstein, was a hit in 1953. A completely different musical movie, titled My Sister Eileen, was released in 1955. Later it became a one-season TV show with Elaine Stritch. Under review here is the 1942 movie. Though I've not seen or read the original play, this is probably fairly faithful to it as almost all the action is set in the girls' one-room apartment. The film begins in Columbus, Ohio as Ruth, working for the Columbus Courier, writes a rave review in advance of her sister's stage debut in A Doll's House. Eileen is replaced at the last minute and when the false review runs, Ruth is fired. The two head to New York (perhaps because, if they can make it there, they can make it anywhere), and rent a basement apartment in Greenwich Village with lots of problems. The feet of people walking along the sidewalk are constantly visible, as are pestering kids and drunks, and a streetlight shines in at night. The beds are hard. There is rumbling and noise from subway repair blasting from under the floor. 

They have to deal with occasional visits from a psychic (a hooker in Production Code disguise) who used to live there. They become friendly with a dim but hunky football player who calls himself The Wreck (and is constantly singing, "I'm a ramblin' wreck from Georgia Tech") and asks to live in their kitchen for a couple of days while his in-laws visit—they don't approve of the Wreck and don't know that they're married (in the play, the two are in fact not married; the movie marriage is another sop to the Code). Ruth gets involved with the editor of The Manhatter (read: The New Yorker) who works to get her published, while any number of men become enchanted by the blonde and curvy Eileen. The climax features Ruth and a conga line of Portuguese sailors who have docked at the piers. All is more or less resolved at the end. This has a screwball pace which gets tiring after a while, but the performances anchor the film. Rosalind Russell couldn't be better as Ruth as she balances finding a job with protecting her sister and falling in love with the editor. Janet Blair is fine as Eileen, playing her in a not-quite scatterbrained fashion. With my propensity for handsome supporting men, I quite liked Gordon Jones, running around in a sweaty tank top (at right), as the Wreck. Brian Aherne, as the level headed editor, sometimes disappears into the background with all the crazy antics that take center stage. George Tobias is the Greek landlord, and others making an impression include Grant Mitchell, Elizabeth Patterson, Allyn Joslyn, and June Havoc. I’ll try to track down the 50s musical one of these days. Pictured top left are Aherne and Russell. [TCM]