Carlo is billed around eighth or ninth in the cast list for My Man Godfrey<\/em>, which just goes to show you how many funny characters La Cava has coming and going in this freewheeling farce, which many consider the premiere example of the genre that came to be known as screwball comedy. In fact, according to screwball scholar and sometime practitioner Peter Bogdanovich, the term itself was coined by a Variety review of My Man Godfrey<\/em> in which the critic noted that star Carole Lombard \u201chas played screwball dames before, but none so screwy as this one.\u201d Here she stars as spoiled rich girl Irene Bullock, whom we first meet tagging along with her conniving older sister Cornelia (Gail Patrick) on a scavenger hunt, in which members of the Manhattan elite try to score points by bringing eclectic items like farm animals or a \u201cforgotten man\u201d to their black tie party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Irene\u2019s instantly smitten with William Powell\u2019s dignified hobo Godfrey, probably because of the elan with which he shoves her snooty sister Cornelia into an ash pile. Godfrey helps Irene win the contest, and in return she hires him to be the Bullocks\u2019 new butler. Chaos reigns at the family\u2019s Fifth Avenue apartment, one of those lavish, gleaming soundstage sets that offered an irresistible fantasy to 1936 (or 2026) audiences. There\u2019s something of a revolving door for the service staff at the Bullocks\u2019 place, but the shrewd, secretive Godfrey proves a far more adept manservant than anyone imagined from a bum living in a service container down by the river. His common sense wisdom and special set of skills come in handy, as a typical night on the town for Bullock gals involves stealing a carriage horse and hiding it in the kitchen. (La Cava gets incredible comic mileage out of an offscreen neigh.)<\/p>\n\n\n The effortlessly urbane Powell provides the suave center of the swirling madness, fixing all the Bullock\u2019s problems while going to great lengths to conceal his real identity \u2013 a twist that isn\u2019t exactly difficult to guess given the actor\u2019s manner and bearing. Powell initially refused to take the role unless his former spouse Lombard was cast opposite him, which may be the first and last time in Hollywood history that an actor ever lobbied to cast his ex<\/em>-wife. (Powell was engaged to Jean Harlow at the time.) It\u2019s easy to see why he thought she was indispensable. Irene, as scripted, is such a loopy character that the entire picture rests on her shoulders. If we find her annoying, the whole thing collapses in on itself. My Man Godfrey<\/em> is unthinkable without Lombard\u2019s endearing ability to be completely out of her mind. The audience must, like Godfrey himself, surrender to her dizzy charms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s to La Cava\u2019s great credit that the madcap shenanigans never feel forced or shrill. The long, elegantly constructed scenes accumulate characters and momentum like a snowball rolling down a hill. There\u2019s always someone like our friend Carlo, barreling in with a mouthful of banana and imitating a gorilla. Maybe the most relatable is the Bullock girls\u2019 exhausted father, played by Eugene Pallette, who when facing possible jail time for financial malfeasance, looks around at his family and figures that if he goes to prison it will be the first peace and quiet he\u2019s had in twenty years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This was a glorious period in American cinema during which everyone spoke as quickly as possible. Even bad jokes sound funny if you say them fast enough. (Though My Man Godfrey<\/em> doesn\u2019t have many of those.) I recently attended a seminar by critic Jake Mulligan at which he convincingly argued for Carole Lombard being one of the key voices in establishing how people were going to talk in 20th<\/sup> century movies. She helped set the tempo with the rapid-fire, machine gun elocution that dominated screen comedy until boring \u201crealism\u201d came along and everyone started mumbling like regular people. And where\u2019s the fun in that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n “My Man Godfrey” is streaming on Amazon Prime Video<\/a>, Kanopy<\/a>, Hoopla<\/a>, and a variety of ad-supported services<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/godfrey-still1-1024x769.webp\")
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