Broadway playwright William C. de Mille directed 53 pictures in his three decade career, but by 1932 he knew he couldn't compete with his younger brother Cecil B's reputation in Hollywod. But before stepping aside into his later career as AMPAS president (as well as founder and faculty member of USC's film school), he put his mark on movies like this one, a class-tinged romantic comedy based on the 1925 play White Collars. Wealthy William Van Luyn (Conrad Nagel) wants to help the less fortunate family of his new bride Joan (Leila Hyams), but, in an act of proud reverse snobbery, they refuse. To diffuse the class divide, Joan suggests William move in with her family, including little sister Helen (Bessie Love), to really understand what it means to be middle class. A presumably exhausted Bessie Love found time in her 60-hour studio workweek to make this and five other pictures this year, but her effervescent pep still overshadows everyone else in the cast. Remade as Rich Man, Poor Girl in 1938.

By Violet LeVoit