Common Law Reviews

Bennett of the sophisticated manner and voice is living with sugar daddy Cody in Paris when she agrees to model for impoverished artist McCrea. They fall in love and she abandons money for art by moving in with the painter. The story is comprised of stormy breakups and reconciliations, with abortive attempts by Cody to sabotage the affair. Bennett is happy with the arrangement and refuses to consider marrying McCrea until he is called home to Tarrytown, New York, proving he has been a closet conservative all along. The family exerts pressure on them to give up their decadent European lifestyles and tie the knot. There was some titillation over the scene wherein Bennett peels off her clothes for the artist, and the suggestion of Bennett, naked and posing, is well carried through. Mainly though, one is left wondering why she left the sugar daddy in the first place. The lively and literate piece became an RKO money-maker in a very lean Depression year. Remake of silent versions in 1916 and 1923.