Libeled Lady (1936) ***1/2

Libeled Lady (1936) is a breezy screwball that's great if you need a solid escapist farce with a stellar cast. William Powell and Myrna Loy (in their fifth of fourteen films together) don't have quite the same chemistry here as they do in the Thin Man movies (my reviews of the first and second films in that series here and here) but they are still delightful. Jean Harlow is saucy, as one would expect, but she's also got a tender side that she does well to portray. Spencer Tracy is the weakest link but he's more than serviceable in what is essentially the thankless straight man role.

Interesting tidbits about Libeled Lady: Harlow and Powell were an off-screen couple, and Harlow wanted to play Connie Allenbury. During filming, Harlow changed her legal name from her birth name of Harlean Carpenter McGrew Bern Rosson to Jean Harlow. She made only two more films before dying at the age of 26 in 1937. It has been rumored that Loy and Tracy had an affair during the shooting of the film.

You can find my Classic Screwball Comedies Ranked list here.