Robert Williams and Jean Harlow

Platinum Blonde was an early Capra and an early Harlow film.  He had yet to create his classics and she had yet to perfect her screen persona of the tough chick.  Although top billing goes to Loretta Young, the real star is Robert Williams.   He appeared in a couple of silent films but in 1931 he was being groomed for stardom.  In his fourth movie made in 1931, he carries this film.

Williams plays a reporter, Stew, sent to do a story on the son of a wealthy woman who broke a promise to a girl.  Translation:  He had sex with her and then did not marry her.   At the mansion he meets the boy's sister, Ann.  They fall in love and get married, much to the disapproval of her mother.  A female reporter, Gallagher, who works with Stew, would have likewise preferred if the nuptials never took place as she secretly pines for him.

Stew is a cocky, middle class reporter.  He soon finds himself uncomfortable with the wealthy lifestyle and Ann's friends.  Stew finds himself turning to Gallagher, as they have far more in common.  Stew's and Ann's differences come to a head  when Ann and her family return home to find Stew throwing a party with his common friends.

Although this sounds like a love triangle, and it is, Platinum Blonde is foremost a comedy.  This is due almost entirely because of Williams.  He has the look of a supporting actor, but the charm of a leading man.  He makes such simple lines sound much funnier than they deserve to be, "I am white, male and over 21. I've never been in jail... that is, not often."  My favorite line of his is, "Yeah, I know those bluenoses. Their ancestors refused to come over on the Mayflower because they didn't want to rub elbows with the tourists... so they swam over!" 

Harlow and Young are in thankless roles.  Williams is the star and commands every scene he appears.  Like James Cagney, he carried some inner energy with him that keeps your attention.  He could have gone on to a great career but health care in 1931 had a long way to go. Robert Williams died of appendicitis just three days after Platinum Blonde was released.

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