You can tell that the "Maisie" films were popular, especially when you compare the first two or so to this one. The budget has gone up considerably by the time "Maisie Was a Lady" was produced. Not only are the production values better but the cast is of a higher level, too. Besides the incomparable Ann Sothern, Lew Ayres, Maureen O'Sullivan, C. Aubrey Smith and Paul Cavanagh are on hand, playing members of a wealthy family. When the drunken Bobby manages to lose Maisie her job in a carnival as the headless woman and then forgets he gave her his car so that she's arrested, a judge orders him to employ her at her headless woman's salary for the allotted period of time. After she nearly ruins his sister Abby's (O'Sullivan) engagement party, Abby changes Maisie's position to that of personal maid. Maisie discovers that the young woman is very much alone, especially after she realizes her fiancée only wants her money.

This is the best entry into the series of the ones I've seen, though Sothern is great in all of them, beautiful, sassy and vibrant. Maureen O'Sullivan is wonderful as the sweet and heartbroken Abby, and C. Aubrey Smith is great as the loyal, loving family butler. Lew Ayres, when he wasn't Dr. Kildare, seemed to be typecast as a drunken playboy a good deal before the war - it's a role he plays convincingly, though in life he was a deeply religious, health and work-oriented person. Handsome Paul Cavanagh plays Abby and Bob's dad, "Cap" who gets his comeuppance from Maisie.

Great fun and a must for Sothern fans.

Showgirl Maisie Ravier (Ann Sothern) gets fired from her sideshow job due to a drunken prank by rich jerk Bob Rawlston (Lew Ayres). He lends her his car but then she gets arrested and Rawlston claims to not remember the incident. The judge orders him to hire her for two months to replace her lost wages. She becomes a maid at the Rawlston mansion. Bob is a lousy drunk. His kind-hearted sister Abby (Maureen O'Sullivan) is getting married to the sleazy golddigging Link Phillips. Most of their friends are jerks. Their father Cap is often absent and the siblings are troubled.

The premise is a little ridiculous. There has to be a better way to get Maisie working as a maid in that mansion. Otherwise, it's a fine Maisie movie. It's not as jokey as the others. The suicide attempt sucks out a lot of the fun but the movie wasn't strictly fun in the mansion anyways. The jerk friends are annoying and it may be useful to have a feistier Maisie. She doesn't get into their face until Cap comes home. The acting is solid all around. It could use more humor. This is a more serious affair.

In this entry in the Maisie series our showgirl from Brooklyn finds herself involved with the Rawlston family. She gets involved because a drunken Lew Ayres reprising some of his role as drunken playboy Nick Seton from Holiday gets Ann Sothern fired from her carnival act.

Through some interesting circumstances Sothern winds up working for the Rawlston family whose head is Paul Cavanaugh who runs an airplane factory, son Ayres and daughter Maureen O'Sullivan who Cavanaugh thinking her a plain Jane just smothers completely. He is glad however that O'Sullivan has found Edward Ashley and maybe someone from the same social background to take her off his hands.

Ashley is from the same background, but what he is is a thoroughgoing WASP blue chip rat. When O'Sullivan finds he's two timing her it almost becomes tragic and our Brooklyn showgirl springs into action.

Of course things work out for the best as Maisie instills some common sense into these upper crust folks. It's always happy for Sothern except that when the next film in the series comes along you know it didn't work out.

I must also single out C. Aubrey Smith as the family butler who has instilled those same blue chip values that his employers have. He and Sothern have some great scenes together.

Maisie fans and others will like this.