Ann Sheridan Movies

Back in the 1930s, the "Search for Beauty" contests were designed to scout the hinterlands of America and England for beautiful girls and handsome men who might qualify as movie contractees -- though most the winners were drawn from the ranks of Hollywood residents. These contests, coupled with a play by Schuyler E. Gray and Paul R. Milton, formed the basis for this 1934 comedy. Real-life "Search for Beauty" winners Larry "Buster" Crabbe and Ida Lupino (both of whom had already appeared in a few films) head the cast in this story of a contest staged by a two-bit "physical culture" magazine. When the winners, Don Jackson (Crabbe) and Barbara Hilton (Lupino), realize that they've been hired exclusively to pose in bathing suits for the pin-up trade, they leave for the greener pastures of a legitimate health farm. The magazine's crooked publishers try to extort money from Don and Barbara, but they're foiled by a local justice of the peace (Frank McGlynn Sr.) who turns out to be an agent of the U.S. Department of Justice! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this romantic comedy, a Parisian businessman heads for South American for a busman's holiday. There he hopes to have some fun and negotiate a deal concerning the mining of valuable nitrate deposits. Naturally, he carries the necessary contract with him. Knowing this, two con-artists conspire to steal it from him. The unwitting businessman is also pursued by a man-hungry spinster and a love-struck, nosy switchboard operator who taps his phone and ultimately saves his bacon. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Paramount Pictures' annual college musical of 1934 is a pip, as they used to say. Jack Oakie plays Finnegan, a conceited gridiron hero whose prowess on the football field is exceeded only by his appreciation of the ladies. But his strutting manner and accompanying overbearing ego have alienated his one-time best friend Larry Stacey (Lanny Ross), a serious, more scholarly type who deeply resents the adulation heaped on Finnegan. Things go wrong for Finnegan after he graduates, as he pins his hopes on a job offer from a business firm that folds soon after. He finally shows up at Stacey's department store, where Larry -- the owner's son -- has taken over as general manager; and Larry, finally having the advantage over Finnegan, seeks to humiliate him in the course of helping him out with a menial job. But as it turns out, Larry is no sterling success either -- he's turned his father's once-thriving department store into a haven catering only to the very rich, of whom there were precious few in the midst of the Great Depression; Larry is also such a self-involved prig in his own way, wallowing in self-pity where Finnegan wallows in self-adulation, that he scarcely notices that his own secretary (Helen Mack) is almost dying in her unrequited love for him. In order to save his business, Larry's father, J. P. Stacey (eorge Barbier), turns to Finnegan, the football hero who used to sell 60,000 tickets a week on the playing field -- Finnegan understands ballyhoo, and what the public wants, and is put in charge of the store, and also becomes captain of a football team fielded by the store. Soon the place is jumping, especially when Finnegan brings back his old college team waterboy Joe (Joe Penner) and his duck mascot Goo-Goo, and fetching blonde cheerleader/singer Mimi (Lyda Roberti). Larry is reduced to running a department in the store and finally decides its time to step up and take on Finnegan head-to-head, joining the store's football team. But there's treachery and dirty tricks afoot -- in between a bright score by Mack Gordon and Harry Revel -- when Stacey's takes on a team fielded by their arch-rival store, Whimple's, in a bitter grudge-match fueled by the two owners' mutual dislike for each other. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Because of its heavy reliance on slapstick (a no-no for features in the late '20s), this picture, very loosely based on the Ernest Thayer poem, got mixed reviews. But with comedians like Wallace Beery, Ford Sterling, ZaSu Pitts, and Sterling Holloway in the cast, it's a surprise that anyone wouldn't expect slapstick! Casey (Beery) is a junk dealer whose helper is the 13-year-old Spec (the very freckled Spec O'Donnell). He's in love with Camille, who runs a millinery stop (Pitts), but he is taken away from the small town where he lives when he is signed up by the New York Giants. Casey seems to be more interested in beer drinking than he is in playing baseball, so he is introduced to Trixie, a Floradora girl (Iris Stuart), in the hopes that this will distract him from the brew. Casey's rival for Camille attempts to get him drunk so he will miss the Big Game. Spec shows up in time to get him up to bat. Unfortunately, Casey strikes out and all his friends and fans leave him -- except for Spec. And when he arrives home, Casey finds that Camille is waiting for him. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide