The Constant Woman (1933)

Fantastic!

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Remember those classic spoofs about movie making (usually the silent era) where a whole line of productions are being filmed right next to each other, only separated by a tent? You could have a melodrama of a young widow arguing over the rent with the mustache twirling landlord, a romantic scene of lovers interrupted by the husband, or a crazy cream pie fight? Then comes along the inevitable bar right where the director simply yells "action!" and it seems that a dance begins between the crazy action going on. Fists fly, bodies fly through doors, off balcony's, and bottles hit heads. Yet nobody seems hurt when the director yells "cut!"That's what happens here with this low budget pre-code drama starring Conrad Bagel as a high class traveling performer who hits the skids when Hus wife goes on the road, leaving their young son with him and is suddenly killed just after Nagel finds out that she's been unfaithful. Nagel hits the bottle, and in a truly amazing fight sequence, is getting drunk in a saloon where a fight just like I describe erupts. Nagel comes out only with a hangover, but his concerned old friend (Leila Hyams) goes off on him for neglecting his impressionable son.This is one of those B grade dramas from studios on lower Santa Monica Blvd. churned out dozens of titles like this, often not very good. That's not the case here as in spite of technical inferiority's got it right. It's all about Nagel's desperation to make good, and with the help of a good woman, he does just that. But will a romantic future between Nagel and Hyams be possible with the son against the relationship? Predictable? Yes. But boring? Hardly not. This keeps the viewer's interest without resorting to clichés, and if they are there, I was too taken by the film to notice. While there aren't a lot of circus sequences, the final involving a loose tiger and a fire is truly nail biting.

Leila Hyams was a perfect leading lady whose unaggressive personality made her fit in with any of the MGM leading men of the time (Robert Montgomery, William Haines etc) but with "Freaks"(1932) she mustered up more personality than usual as the feisty circus girl thrown over by her "strong man" live in lover and happy to be romanced by Wallace Ford. Circus movies seemed to bring out the best in her and in this oddly named "Hell in a Circus" (my Alpha copy) she is the lady known as Lou, the "constant woman" (the movie's other, more predictable title) who is the glue that holds the circus together.Expanded from a Eugene O'Neill 1913 one act play "Recklessness", originally confined to the library but now set in a travelling circus. A more rugged looking Conrad Nagel plays Walt Underwood, stage manager for the troupe of players of which his wife is the star and idolized by her son Jimmie (Tommy Conlon who turns in a sensitive performance). Of course Marlene (Claire Windsor) is not worthy of them and even though Walt has bought the company to keep their marriage together, she thinks nothing of leaving them flat when the big time (and her lover) beckon. Paying her a surprise visit Walt and Jimmie are too late - she has died in a fire in sordid circumstances and although Walt paints her as a good woman to Jimmie he has done the job too well as Jimmie grows to hate Lou, who he thinks is trying to take his mother's place.The truth is Walt has found some incriminating letters which raises questions about whether Jimmie is really his son (although he never tells Jimmie) and it sets him on a downward alcoholic spiral. After searching for him high and low Lou and the circus workers find him in a sleazy speakeasy run by a bullying Fred Kohler and have to wreck the joint to get him out of the manager's clutches. Lou sits up with him all night (to sober him up), Jimmy accidentally sees her and that's how the misunderstanding begins. She gets him back on his feet with a weekly broadcast but their news to Jimmie of their forthcoming marriage has Jimmie running off to join the circus......The other reviewers are right, there is more plot in this movie than a Victorian gaslight melodrama but all the actors bring their A game. Fred Kohlar chews up all the scenery in sight and Stanley Fields proves he can also play a "lovable lug", Claire Windsor also does well with her short but vicious role of Marlene and it is directed with flair by Victor Schertzinger who penned some memorable tunes ("The Love Parade" etc) for Paramount in the early musical days. Oh and Mickey Daniels from the original "Our Gang" plays a soda jerk.In 1929 Conrad Nagel was the name on every studio head's lips as in "Get Conrad Nagel" - all due to his beautiful speaking voice and handsome blonde looks. He was even the M.O.C. for M.G.M's all star revue "Hollywood Revue of 1929" but a falling out with Louis B. Mayer saw his star plummet although it was nice to know he still had what it took in a little poverty rower of 1933.

Eugene O'Neill rides again in this multi-plotted "Hell in a Circus" expansion of his one-act, 1913 stage play, Recklessness. If anything, there is now too much plot – noir in spades! – but you can't say that interest ever sags. If, like me, you don't give a hoot for the son who hates dad's new girlfriend plot, you can concentrate on dad's battle with the bottle or his struggle to hold on to his traveling, penny-ante stage show instead. The Alpha DVD is three minutes shorter than the original 76-minute release, because it has shortened or deleted a musical interlude with The Three Ambassadors. Conrad Nagel does his best to hold our interest, despite his poorly motivated role, and he does receive solid support from battling Stanley Fields, Claire Windsor as the cheat and Leila Hyams as the taken-for-granted Lou. The climax indicated by the changed title (the original release called The Constant Woman – a reference to the Hyams character – did zilch in the way of box office business) is pretty exciting, despite (or maybe because of) the obvious use of stock material. Ably directed by Victor Schertzinger (on loan from Paramount), the movie is now available on a pretty good Alpha DVD under the "Hell in a Circus" title.

In a trim and workmanlike 70 minutes, we get barnstorming theatricals, an unfaithful wife, a bastard child, a hotel fire, a circus fire, a speakeasy brawl, and crackling pre-Code dialogue, including this reminiscence from an ex-roustabout: "Why, when I was with the circus, if you had only one black eye they thought you was a pansy!" Victor Schertzinger achieves some resourceful directorial tricks, not always placing the camera where you expect and injecting some expressionistic touches. The cast is game, with Claire Windsor a particular delight as the rotten, selfish wife who gets bumped off in the second reel.It's a Poverty Row epic -- from Tiffany Studios, to be precise -- but it has what they used to call moxie. And the quick pace and unflinching Depression milieu recall Warners-First National at its best.