Frankie And Johnnie Were Lovers, Kind Of -With Mae West’s She Done Him Wrong In Mind   

DVD Review

By Sam Lowell

She Done Him Wrong, starring Mae West, Cary Grant, 1933

 

“Frankie and Johnnie were lovers right from the very start, they swore they would be true to each other, just as true as the stars above, he was her man but he was doing her wrong,” hummed Ralph Stanley as he thought about the film that he had just watched, Mae West’s She Done Him Wrong, where a version of the old traditional tune served as background music and one of Lady Lou’s (Mae West’s character here) stage numbers. He thought as him hummed that that was the beauty of the old traditional, anonymous tunes that had been handed down orally by our forebears since he had remembered the version which Sam Eaton his old friend, political comrade, and folk aficionado had played for him long ago, Mississippi John Hurt’s Frankie and Albert, same wronged sentiment but different verses learned by him by some forbear down in the Delta back in the 1920s sometime.       

That was not exactly the version that Lady Lou sang either not when Ralph looked it up in the Arise and Sing, the folk song “bible” used this day by budding folkies and old-timers, although given the Frankie and Johnnie names which could be either male or female nicknames no wonder there could be a certain amount of confusion. What is more important though in the film the one doing the “wrong” gee is all switched up. It is the “she” not “he” doing the wrong. Doing wrong big time as Lady Lou leaves a trail of broken hearts across the screen, leaves every guy but one hanging by his toes.

Here is how Lady Lou played the game, how a woman played the man’s game in the man’s world of the “Gay Nineties” and lived to tell about it. The Bowery in New York City was wide open for every kind of corruption, of every dirty deed and Lady Lou was out to grab her share, no quarter given. As the film opened Lady Lou was keeping company with a well-connected saloon-keeper whom she gammed onto after her previous fancy man got caught stealing some diamonds that the lady was addicted to having on her person just to keep her warm and cozy on those cold winter night. A half dozen other guys including a sidewalk Lothario, a barroom bouncer, a backroom political and a snitch were all in the hunt for those diamonds to win her heart, if she had a heart. She blew them all off, gave them the air in the end except for the Captain, played by a very young and not yet distinctly film handsome Cary Grant.           

Yeah, Lady Lou had the itch for the Captain, had it so bad it spawned the famous movie line about “coming up to see her sometime” to keep away the lonely nights. The Captain though was undercover as crime and corruption cop working as a guy running a Mission to save souls, if you can believe hard-bitten task among the damned of the Bowery. He was out to run the saloon-owner and bunch of other guys into the slammer. And did so, did so with ease. Of course there was some side action, that guy up in stir escaping to see his Lady Lou and getting the brush-off by her although not before offing that guy who snitched on him. The sidewalk Lothario also got the heave-ho. Lady Lou though seems to have lived a charmed life since even though she killed a Madame who was giving her trouble over the Lothario the Captain (known on the street as the Hawk) turned out to have been captivated by her charms and they go off in a carriage as the Hawk tries to make an honest woman out of Lady Lou. Good luck, brother, good luck.      

Here’s the beauty of this film though for feminists, Lady Lou is her own woman and she will use up men as fast as she can and think nothing of it, a little role reversal in this wicked old world and unusual in a day when a  lot of women’s film roles were as damsels in distress. Yeah, she done wrong by the fistfuls. Here is where Ralph was scratching his head though. Old Lady Lou was, well, full-figured in today’s speak and while that designation which previously had had negative connotations is being broken down by popular full-figured female actors like Melissa McCarthy it was not then the norm. Personally Ralph, although he liked and had married a full-figured woman, couldn’t figure Lady Lou’s attraction to the Hawk. If memory served him right Cary Grant went for those thin wispy types like Katherine Hepburn and Audrey Hepburn so go figure. All Ralph knew was that back in the day, back in the 1890s he would have stayed very clear of Lady Lou. Yeah, he knew she would do him wrong, very wrong.