Hands Across the Table (Paramount 1935, Fred MacMurray, Carole Lombard)

Hands Across the Table is a classic screwball romantic comedy with Carole Lombard as a gold-digging manicurist working in the barber shop of a swanky hotel who meets a former millionaire playboy (Fred MacMurray), who is himself about to marry for money.

Ralph Bellamy, predating his role in His Girl Friday, plays the heroine’s patient suitor. The ghoulish will want the opportunity to catch Marie Prevost, whose grisly, untimely demise was the subject of a ’70s Nick Lowe ditty on his Jesus of Cool album.

Hands Across the Table was the first in a set of films starring Carole Lombard and Fred MacMurray. It was followed by The Princess Comes Across (1936); Swing High, Swing Low (1937); and True Confession (1937).

production details
USA | Paramount | 80 minutes | 1935

Director: Mitchell Leisen
Script: Herbert Fields, Norman Krasna, Vincent Lawrence, Viña Delmar, Dorothy Parker,

cast
Fred MacMurray as Theodore Drew III
Ruth Donnelly as Laura
Murray Alper as Cabbie (uncredited)
Edward Gargan as Pinky Kelly (uncredited)
Ralph Bellamy as Allen Macklyn
Carole Lombard as Regi Allen
Astrid Allwyn as Vivian Snowden
Marie Prevost as Nona
Herman Bing as Barber (uncredited)
Marcelle Corday as Celeste (uncredited)
William Demarest as Regi’s Date Natty (uncredited)
Ferdinand Munier as Miles (uncredited)
Fred ‘Snowflake’ Toones as Snowflake (uncredited)
Joseph R. Tozer as Peter (uncredited)