GIFT OF GAB (1934)
Article 2158 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-11-2007
Posting Date: 7-10-2007
Directed by Karl Freund
Featuring Edmund Lowe, Gloria Stuart, Ruth Etting

This movie recounts the tale of the rise, fall and redemption of a con man turned radio announcer.

What this movie seems to be most famous for is for being an early pairing of Karloff and Lugosi. Maybe someday somebody will add this scene as an extra to some Lugosi or Karloff collection somewhere; this could sate the curiosity of fans of either star without necessitating their having watch any more than two minutes of the movie. It’s basically a musical/comedy with decent music but bad comedy; unfortunately, it’s one of the latter scenes (a woeful murder mystery parody that bears only the slightest whiff of horror, but serves as the only qualification for the movie for this series) that features our horror stars. Edmund Lowe is well cast as the fast-talking Phillip Gabney, but when the story isn’t cliche-ridden, it’s muddled. The primary interest here is star-spotting; Alexander Woollcott appears as himself, Andy Devine pops up as a waiter, Sterling Hollaway is a sound effects man, Billy Barty is a baby, etc. etc. Curiosity value aside, this one is largely a waste of time.