Wealthy Connie Allenbury is falsely accused of breaking up a marriage and sues the New York Evening Star newspaper for $5 million for libel. Warren Haggerty, the managing editor, turns in desperation to former reporter and suave ladies' man Bill Chandler for help. Bill's scheme is to maneuver Connie into being alone with him when his wife shows up, so that the suit will have to be dropped. Bill is not married, so Warren volunteers his long-suffering fiancée, Gladys Benton, to marry Bill in name only, over her loud protests.
Bill arranges to return to the United States from England on the same ocean liner as Connie and her father J. B. He pays some men to pose as reporters and harass Connie at the dock, so that he can "rescue" her and become acquainted. On the voyage, Connie initially treats him with contempt, assuming that he is just the latest in a long line of fortune hunters after her money, but Bill gradually overcomes her suspicions.
Complications arise when Connie and Bill actually fall in love. They get married, but Gladys decides that she prefers Bill to a marriage-averse newspaperman and interrupts their honeymoon to reclaim her husband. Bill reveals that he found out that Gladys was married before and that her Yucatán divorce was invalid, thus rendering their own marriage invalid. But Gladys reveals she obtained a second divorce in Reno, so she and Bill are legally husband and wife. Connie and Bill manage to show Gladys that she really loves Warren.
Harlow and Powell were an off-screen couple, and Harlow wanted to play Connie Allenbury, so that her character and Powell's wound up together.[5] MGM insisted, however, that the film be another William Powell-Myrna Loy vehicle, as they originally intended. Harlow had already signed on to do the film but had to settle for the role of Gladys Benton. Nevertheless, as Gladys, top-billed Harlow got to play a wedding scene with Powell. During filming, Harlow changed her legal name from Harlean Carpenter McGrew Bern Rosson to Jean Harlow.[5] She made only two more films before dying at the age of 26 in 1937.
Tracy had previously been enamoured with Loy, who was newly married to Arthur Hornblow Jr. at the time of this production.[6] Loy’s autobiography recounted the humorous atmosphere on the set.[7] For example, Tracy set up an "I hate Hornblow" table in the studio commissary, reserved for men who claimed to have been romantically rejected by Loy.[5]
Two passenger liners made cameos as the ship in the film, the SS Queen Anne: Cunard's RMS Berengaria (in the pierside view) and France's SS Normandie in an aerial shot.[citation needed]
Reception
The film was released on 9 October 1936, and earned $2.7 million at the box office[5] — $1,601,000 in the U.S. and Canada and $1,122,000 in other markets, resulting in a profit of $1,189,000.[1] It was one of the top twenty box-office successes of the year.[4]
