This is a marvelous film and is a perfect example of light comedy from the 1930s. The writing and acting by the wonderful ensemble cast is absolutely dynamite and hard to beat. On top of that, it makes for great social commentary.

William Powell plays Godfrey, a hobo brought home as part of a scavenger hunt. One of the girls in the family, ultra-dippy Carole Lombard, arranges for him to become their new butler and he is absolutely perfect at his job in every way and does a lot to get this rich but totally flighty family to function well, as when the movie starts it is like a madhouse instead of a family home. The zaniness going on is a lot of fun to watch, but you really have to feel for the father (Eugene Palette) having to put up with freeloaders like Mischa Auer, a stupid wife, one even stupider daughter and another who is a cold little thing. And, on top of everything else, the family is spending him into oblivion.

Where the film goes I don't want to tell as it would ruin it. However, be prepared for some of the funniest characters and dialog you've seen in a long time. This film is a wonderful example to young whipper-snappers that they DID make terrific movies in the olden days!

For his second Academy Award nomination for Best Actor William Powell was loaned to Universal for My Man Godfrey. At the time this film was made there was a lot of buzz about Powell working with Carole Lombard who only a few years earlier he had been married to. They needn't have worried. The split was an amicable one and Powell and Lombard got along great on the set and created along with Director Gregory LaCava one of the classic screwball comedies of the Thirties.

In fact My Man Godfrey got a whole host of nominations, for LaCava for Best Director, for Carole Lombard, for Mischa Auer for Best Supporting Actor and Alice Brady for Best Supporting Actress. In the very first year of the Supporting categories, My Man Godfrey had nominees in all the acting categories, but failed to win any awards. Curiously enough, it wasn't nominated for Best Picture.

The Bulloch sisters Carole Lombard and Gail Patrick a pair of ditzy society girls are on a scavenger hunt which takes them to the city dump where they are to find a forgotten man. The expression is taken from Franklin D. Roosevelt who called those who were out of work and without hope forgotten men. The phrase had a lot of currency back in the day.

In fact My Man Godfrey's origins are rooted in the Depression Years. When Powell turns down Patrick's invitation to be her trophy in the scavenger hunt, he accepts Lombard's. It turns out he's no ordinary forgotten man, he is the heir to a large estate held by a prominent Boston WASP family. But that's a fact he conceals from the Bulloch sisters when he's hired as their butler.

His time with the Bulloch family is a learning experience indeed for both of them. The Depression hasn't hit these two girls, but it almost does save for Powell's financial acumen.

As I said the film is firmly ground in those years of the Depression and the New Deal. It's hard to fathom, but when FDR took office on March 4, 1933, twenty five percent of the workforce was unemployed. Today if the number reaches above five percent the doomsayers are calling it a depression. I remember an uncle of mine telling me that when he graduated high school in 1937 a year after My Man Godfrey he could not get work for over 2 years until America went on a war footing before Pearl Harbor. After that he got drafted and didn't have to worry about a job for a few years. He might have been living just like the men in the city dump, but for the fact my grandparents had jobs and kept a roof over everyone's head.

Mischa Auer plays Carlo, a kind of permanent houseguest of Alice Brady as Mrs. Bulloch. In today's world long after the Code has been repealed, Auer might well have been more explicitly gay.

Eugene Palette is Mr. Bulloch who freely admits he lives in a house of scatterbrains. Though he got no nominations his playing of the Bulloch patriarch set a standard for him in playing a host of put upon fathers.

In 1957 My Man Godfrey was remade with David Niven and June Allyson co-starring. Neither of the leads lacked for the charm needed to put over the story, but instead of The Great Depression, David Niven is an illegal alien looking to get a visa. You don't quite feel for him as you do for the jobless and hopeless William Powell.

If My Man Godfrey is ever remade in the modern era, let's hope they keep the economic underpinnings of this classic screwball comedy, even if they don't take it back to the Depression Years.

Godfrey (William Powell) is a bum in the dumps during the Great Depression. Spoiled socialite Cornelia Bullock (Gail Patrick) offers him $5 to be part of a scavenger game. Godfrey is not happy and corners her younger sister Irene Bullock (Carole Lombard). Flighty Irene explains that everybody brings back something unwanted. Godfrey volunteers to go back with Irene to be the forgotten man and win the game for her. She wins and he berates the whole crowd. She hires him as the family butler and looking to make him her protégé. Mean-spirited Cornelia wants him fired. The wealthy chaotic family is a mess.

Comedy does change from era to era. The most interesting aspect of these early talkies is that the rom-com formula isn't set yet. It would be more formulaic for Godfrey to couple with Cornelia. The couple first has to hate each other before they fall in love. Although Lombard is older than Patrick, Irene is suppose to be the younger sister. It would feel better to have the older gentleman fall for the older sister. Irene is too flighty and it's hard to take her puppy love that seriously. She is much better as a student of life learning from Godfrey.