Movie remakes are not a modern phenomenon. The major studios were shameless with the practice, as when Warners filmed Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon three times in ten years. In the 1950s Columbia remade older winners like Craig's Wife (1928 and 1936), Sadie Thompson (1928 and 1932) and My Sister Eileen (1942), to name just three. Less well known is 1953's Let's Do It Again, a musical remake of Leo McCarey's genuine screwball comedy classic The Awful Truth (1937). The original starred Irene Dunne and Cary Grant as an almost-divorced couple that take turns sabotaging each other's romantic plans with new partners. The remake shifts the setting to backstage Broadway. It's a career misstep for star Jane Wyman, prompted by her relative success singing with Bing Crosby in Frank Capra's Here Comes the Groom. Among a battery of new songs is one bright number, Lester Lee and Ned Washington's "It Was Great While It Lasted." But reviewers thought the music distracted from the charm of the original material, as did some of the forced hepcat dialogue: "Man it's the most!" "Go girl go!" The most jarring addition is a beat dance number called "Zambesi Puberty Ritual." Producer Saul was bullish on the idea of pairing fellow Oscar winners Jane Wyman and Ray Milland, but the chemistry didn't gel. Aldo Ray and Columbia contractee Valerie Bettis are in as amorous diversions. Unimpressed, Columbia head Harry Cohn didn't give the film or its music the necessary promotional push. Ms. Wyman met her fourth husband on the film, music supervisor Fred Karger. Over the next eleven years they were married and divorced... twice.

By Glenn Erickson