Girls Will Be Boys (1934) Reviews

Best known today as the wife of famed caricaturist Al Hirschfield, actress Dolly Haas enjoyed a long and fruitful career in England and Europe. One of Haas' best vehicles is the gender-bending British farce Girls Will Be Boys, in which she plays the granddaughter of the Duke of Bridgewater (Cyril Maude). Because her name in the film is "Pat," our heroine is assumed to be a boy by her woman-hating grandpop, and she does nothing to dissuade him of this belief, dressing up in drag when she goes to meet him for the first time. The rest of the picture is a reverse Charley's Aunt, with Pat endeavoring to be "one of the guys" under the most trying of circumstances (yes, she even smokes a cigar at one point). For a one-joke film, Girls Will be Boys is surprisingly substantial, managing to keep the audience amused for 71 minutes. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi