Ms. Hale is Having a Baby

As Jacqueline Walsh (Barbara Hale) is about to take her wedding vows to her second husband, Herbert Fletcher (Robert Hutton), she faints.  Her uncle, Dr. William Parnell (Lloyd Corrigan) believes she is pregnant. The father of the child is her first husband, Vernon Walsh (Robert Young), whom she divorced after he was named as the co-respondent in the divorce of Wanda York (Janis Carter). Though Vernon protested his innocence, Jackie does not believe him, and wants him to surrender any claim on the pending child. Vernon, however, sees the baby as a way to get her back. Our film is And Baby Makes Three (1949)

This is a potentially cute film that would have been considerably better had it been about 15 minutes shorter (it's 84 minutes). The plot, which is entertaining up to a point, goes completely over-the-top by the end. It felt as though the writers had no idea how to end the film, so they just kept throwing elements into a blender to see what they could get. What they got was a mess.

Given that they have little in the way of a script, Robert Young and Barbara Hale work well together. Both were second (and in Mr. Young's case, third) choices for their roles. Columbia initially assigned Evelyn Keyes the part of Jackie, and she refused - she ended up on suspension (AFI catalog). Both Ronald Reagan and Robert Cummings were offered the opportunity to play Vernon. Both said no.

In a sense, Ms. Hale has the more outlandish part. Either we have to believe that she left her marriage, found Herbert, went to Reno, and came back to her wedding in under two months, or we have to believe that in more than three months (it takes 6 weeks to get a divorce in Reno, and it is hard to believe that she agreed to marry Herbert immediately after leaving Vernon), she didn't realize that she was pregnant.  It's somewhat mind boggling.

Barbara Hale started as a model; by 1943, she was off to Hollywood, a contract with RKO, and her first picture - an uncredited role in Gildersleeve's Bad Day. She worked in films, primarily in B pictures, until 1958 (she would make a few more films between 1968 and 1978), when she was offered the role of Della Street in Perry Mason (which ran from 1957-1966). She originally considered declining the role - she had three small children at home, and was spending her time with them (Medium.com article), but her friend Gail Patrick (who was producing the show with her husband Thomas Cornwell Jackson) said that the role was small and was show was only going to last for 18 episodes! Ms. Hale would go on to star in 332 episodes and 31 TV movies with her good friend Raymond Burr (the final 4 movies were filmed with Paul Sorvino and Hal Holbrook subbing for the Perry Mason character. Mr. Burr died in 1993). Ms. Hale was married for 46 years to Bill William. She was intrigued with him from the start - it took him awhile to realize she was the woman for him (Eddie Muller commentary on The Clay Pigeon). The couple had three children, one of who is the actor William Katt (who starred in The Greatest American Hero, and as Paul Drake, Jr. in several of the Perry Mason films). Ms. Hale died in 2017, at the age of 94.

Both Billie Burke (Mrs. Fletcher) and Melville Cooper (Gibson, the Butler) are wasted. Ms. Burke, in particular, is doing a retread of roles she's done before - she's the mother who is afraid of scandal (her son's fiance's pregnancy by another man), and who dithers around echoing her husband (Nicholas Joy as Marvin Fletcher). She doesn't even have a name - she's just "Mrs. Marvin Fletcher".

Though her part is minimal, and rather irrelevant to the main story, Janis Carter takes what she has and runs with it. She's amusing as the predatory Wanda; the character is added at the last minute (like a lot of things in this film) to stretch it out a bit. Sure, she's not really necessary, but she is fun to watch.

This was the second film produced by Santana Productions, Humphrey Bogart's production company. Founded in 1948 and named after his boat, Santana produced 7 films, 5 of which starred Bogart. At the time, the Santana films didn't do well financially, but In a Lonely Place (1950) is now regarded as one of the best of Bogart's films, and highly regarded as a film noir (here is Eddie Muller introducing it on TCM's Noir Alley).

New York Times review called And Baby Makes Three "A thin joke is stretched beyond the point of fun." The review in Variety was positive. Regardless, the film did not do well at the box office, and it's really not surprising. One is bored about an hour in.  There are better Barbara Hale films (try The Clay Pigeon, in which she starred with her husband ). This is not one of her best. 

A small treat - we recently were able to participate in a tour of the Library of Congress Packard Campus. Part of the tour was a visit to the Cold Room, where nitrate copies of films from many studios are housed. In the Columbia vault, I found a can with a nitrate copy of And Baby Makes Three!  You can see it below (thanks to my husband for taking the picture - follow the link to see more of his work):