Word: grandpas
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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Most titanic rebel in the group of legendary rebels which You Can't Take It With You assembles in the living room of a shabby urban household is Grandpa Vanderhof (Lionel Barrymore), retired for 35 years because he decided one morning 'that working was no fun. His daughter, Penny Sycamore (Spring Byington). writes plays because someone once delivered a typewriter to the house by mistake; his son-in-law (Samuel Hinds) manufactures fireworks in the basement; his granddaughter, Essie (Ann Miller), studies ballet with a ferociously impecunious Russian (Mischa Auer); and the assorted camp followers of the Vanderhpf...
...follows the party to jail, then into court, then into the newspapers, then into a board meeting at the Kirby bank in a series of scenes which lifts the feud between the Kirbys and the Vanderhofs to the plane of that between the Montagues and Capulets. By the time Grandpa Vanderhof and Banker Kirby (Edward Arnold) eventually symbolize their inevitable meeting of minds by sitting down together to play Polly-Woily-Doodle on harmonicas. their duet affords some of the emotional impact of a Beethoven symphony...
...these was Grandfather Mitch Stuart, who fought for the North because the Union recruiting station was nearer, who narrowly escaped hanging by his own men for killing a fellow soldier, fathered 19 children by two wives, died violently by ambush when he was past 80. As an old man, Grandpa Stuart scandalized a spiritualist meeting by yelling: "Come out, all you dead babies and have a drink on old Mitch Stuart...
...characters are stencils: the shaggy, hard-cidery old grandpa; the devoted, 'disapproving old grandma; the pre-Freudian, high-neck-and-long-sleeves maiden aunt; the warm-hearted servant girl (Peggy O'Donnell). Some of the humor gets grey hairs: The tenth time grandma upbraids grandpa for swearing is scarcely as funny as the first. The narrative, toward the end, begins to stagger and stutter. And Mr. Brink (Frank Conroy) stays up in the apple tree long enough to make the captious wonder if it isn't time for the leaves to turn. But that may be because...
Other impressions of Every Day's A Holiday: snowy-haired Charles Winninger in typical foxy grandpa mood, Negro Swing-Trumpeter Louis Armstrong leading a torchlight procession, the plushy mustiness of the turn of the century, and a few gags, all mothered and murmured by Miss West. Typical examples: Q. "You mean he made love to you?'' A. "Well, he went through all the emotions. . . ." "Keep a diary and some day it'll keep you. . . ." "She's not as strait-laced as she's laced...