Product Description

Jean Arthur and Ray Milland shine in this screwball comedy written by Academy Award® winner* Preston Sturges. Mary Smith (Arthur) is a poor working girl who literally has a fortune dropped in her lap when a wealthy financier (Edward Arnold) tosses a sable coat out a window and it lands on her. Everyone automatically assumes she's his mistress, and soon her fairytale-like rags-to-riches lifestyle threatens a very real romance with an inept waiter (Milland). It's a "delightful comedy" (Leonard Maltin's Classic Movie Guide) full of misunderstandings that showcases high-society slapstick at its best!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7351 in DVD
• Brand: Universal Studios
• Released on: 2008-04-22
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, Dolby, DVD, Full Screen, Subtitled, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, French
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 88 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
Of all the screenplays Preston Sturges wrote for Paramount before becoming the greatest comic director of his generation, 1937's Easy Living seems the most like something he would have filmed himself--a satirical fable about chance, class, and the absurdity of the American dream. Jean Arthur is a New York secretary riding to work atop a double-decker bus when a fur coat miraculously descends from the sky and settles on her shoulders. The fur, however, has not dropped from Olympus but from the hand of a millionaire (Edward Arnold) who has just tossed it from a nearby roof to punish his wife. But as if it were a magic fleece (the mythical reference is almost certainly intended by the erudite Sturges), it makes its wearer invincible, conferring an aura of prosperity, celebrity, and power on the previously average working girl. No folk tale is complete without a prince: Sturges's is the millionaire's son, Ray Milland, who is trying to pass as an apprentice stockbroker. Directed with a light, elegant touch by Mitchell Leisen, the film lacks the crazy energy it would have had under Sturges's own hand, but this remains one of the great screwball comedies (in a year that also saw The Awful Truth and Nothing Sacred). --Dave Kehr

Customer Reviews

One of the great screwball comedies comes to DVD; more Jean Arthur, please!
Jean Arthur was one of the greatest screen actresses of the 1930s and early 1940s, but because she worked semi-independently (she had non-exclusive contracts with Paramount, RKO, Columbia and United Artists), her combined work has been little seen in these days of box sets. With a great Preston Sturges script, and expert direction by the much-underrated Mitchell Leisen, EASY LIVING is one of the best examples of her work: a working-class girl (Arthur) is sitting atop an open-air bus when a millionaire (the inimitable Edward Arnold) flings his wife's fur coat out the window and it lands on Arthur's head. Hilarious complications ensue, which include a young Ray Milland as the millionaire's son and the always-great Mary Nash (Hepburn's mother in THE PHILADELPHIA STORY) as the coat-less wife. But it is Jean Arthur, whose wonderful combination of dizziness and indomitablility, that make this spin merrily along, and it is a delight form start to finish. Columbia (Sony) has the bulk of the best Arthur titles in its library (MR. DEEDS, MR. SMITH, YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU, MORE THE MERRIER, TOO MANY HUSBANDS, TALK OF THE TOWN, ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS), but the MCA/Paramount titles are also pretty prime (A FOREIGN AFFAIR, THE PLAINSMAN, SHANE and EASY LIVING), and a mini-box set would be greatly anticipated. MCA has done extremely well by several of its great Paramount stars (Lombard, Dietrich) but we need more Colbert, more Stanwyck, deHavilland, Rogers, Russell, Goddard, Fontaine et al. The announcement of some other gems on their release schedule (the divine MIDNIGHT and THE MAJOR AND THE MINOR) is cause for celebration; let's hope this really is the beginning of a great trend!

A RARE COMEDY DELIGHT.
In retrospect, this little 1937 flick holds up as one of the funniest screwball comedies of the thirties. Loud millionaire J.B. Ball tells his extravagantly aggressive wife (Mary Nash) that she cannot keep her $58,000 Sable coat. Ball throws it out of the upper window of their mansion where it happens to fall right on top of bewildered Mary Smith (Arthur), who's travelling on an open-air bus. Mary's a poor gal who works for a magazine similar to BOY'S LIFE. Arnold is seen buying Mary a new hat by pussy-cat faced gossip Franklin Pangborn and soon she gets more than just a hat: practically all of New York is at her feet. The scene where she and Milland wreak havoc at the now-obsolete automat is truly inspired and hilarious, as is Luis Alberni - as Louis Louis - when he shows Mary her new "quarters" -- i.e. "And make it snappa...Thaank Yewww". The rather offbeat cast works wonders with the great Preston Sturges script: Milland and Nash make a weird son and wife to the always good (and always loud) Edward Arnold, but somehow it makes for better screwball; the whacko cast helps push the one-joke material through to a happy finish, and the movie helped establish Jean Arthur as a comedienne of the first rank. P.S. While listening to Arthur's wonderfully off-beat voice, I realised it reminded me a little of Julie Harris (!).

A fine, early screenplay by Preston Sturges!
Jean Arthur, Edward Arnold, a baby Ray Milland, and the beginnings of what became known as the Sturges Players combine for a tight little screwball comedy. This was not available on video until just recently, but if you enjoy the old madcap comedies, ala MY MAN GODFREY, NOTHING SACRED, and Preston Sturges romps like PALM BEACH STORY, THE LADY EVE, etc, I'm confident in recommending EASY LIVING. I didn't notice Sturges wrote it until the final credits, but that didn't alter my feelings. This is an under-appreciated jewel!