Passport Husband
Cast & Crew
James Tinling
Stuart Erwin
Pauline Moore
Douglas Fowley
Joan Woodbury
Robert Lowery
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
At the Club Habana, Henry Cabot, a bumbling busboy, is infatuated with the club's dancer, Conchita Montez. As Tiger Martin, the leader of a gang of thieves, gives Conchita a diamond bracelet, he is arrested. After Tiger is deported, Duke Selton, of Tiger's gang, pays a visit to Conchita and tells her he believes that Blackie Bennet, the leader of a rival gang, is responsible for tipping off the police about Tiger's citizenship. With hopes of winning her for himself, Blackie offers Conchita a better diamond bracelet and calls Tiger a "cheap ape." Insulted, Conchita throws the bracelet out the window, and it lands on Henry's head. Henry, who has been fired from his job for breaking dishes, returns the bracelet to Conchita, who promises to get his job back for him. When Blackie informs Conchita that she will also be deported unless she marries an American, she tells Henry that she is wanted in her own country for political crimes. Henry then accepts her proposal, and they are married right away. Jealous, Blackie wants Henry killed, but his attorney, H. C. Walton, reminds him that Henry must remain alive for their scheme to work. Just then, Duke receives a telegram from Tiger, who, having heard about Conchita's marriage, instructs Duke to kill Henry. When Henry learns the real reason that Conchita married him, he tells her he is going to file for an annulment. Blackie and Walton decide that the only way to stop the annulment is to convince Conchita to move in with Henry. As she is moving her belongings into Henry's apartment, Henry arrives and tells her to go. Blackie and Walton are satisfied, however, as they believe that the annulment will now be denied because Conchita attempted the move. As Conchita is leaving, the landlady, who has intercepted a telegram for Henry, informs her that he has inherited a million dollars from his Uncle Charlie, who invented the pinball machine. Henry's friend, Mary Jane Clayton, then arrives, and when the landlady tells her that Conchita is moving in again, Mary Jane sends a second telegram, which voids the first. She then goes to the apartment and tells Henry that he should make Conchita prove her love by cleaning the entire apartment. As Conchita finishes the cleaning, Mary Jane's telegram arrives, and Conchita leaves humiliated. Having heard about Henry's possession of his uncle's pinball machine business, both gangs attempt to extort distribution rights out of him. The gangs gather at Blackie's apartment, but Henry siphons smoke in to make the crooks think there is a fire. After accepting Henry's proposal of marriage, Mary Jane locks Conchita in the revolving door of the building. One by one, the crooks jump out the window into a fire net, where the authorities are waiting to take them away. After ushering the last crook out the window, Henry is so happy that he too falls out the window.
Director
James Tinling
Cast
Stuart Erwin
Pauline Moore
Douglas Fowley
Joan Woodbury
Robert Lowery
Harold Huber
Edward S. Brophy
Paul Mcvey
Lon Chaney Jr.
Joseph Sawyer
Max Wagner
Regis Toomey
Alan Davis
Lane Chandler
Allen Fox
Charles Judels
George Davis
Theresa Harris
Paul Kruger
Phillip Morris
Eddie Hart
Victor Mike Kilian
Robert Dalton
Romaine Callender
Wade Boteler
James Blaine
Lee Shumway
Stanley Blystone
George Magrill
Billy Wayne
Don Marion
Frank Moran
Syd Saylor
Murray Alper
Heinie Conklin
Ruth Warren
Harrison Greene
Irving Bacon
Crew
William H. Anderson
Robert Chapin
Nick De Maggio
Karen De Wolf
Haldane Douglas
Robin Harris
Herschel
Bernard Herzbrun
Samuel Kaylin
Thomas Little
Edward Snyder
Hilda Stone
E. Clayton Ward
Sol M. Wurtzel
Lester Ziffren
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The plot summary was based on a screen continuity in the Twentieth Century-Fox Produced Scripts Collection at the UCLA Theater Arts Library. This marked the first screen credit for story writer Hilda Stone, the wife of Twentieth Century-Fox producer John Stone. The Produced Scripts Collection contains an undated 1937 article from the LAEx Magazine, entitled "'Arabian Nights' Adventure of the Poor Theatre Usher," which was the basis of Stone's story. According to the article, a Russian showgirl asked a nineteen-year-old theater usher in New York to marry her, without telling him that, as an illegal immigrant, she feared she would have trouble returning to the U.S. after a planned trip to England. After their marriage, the dancer left, vowing to divorce the usher, and because the usher heard nothing further from her, he retained the hope that she would return. A couple of years later, during the trial of racketeer "Lucky" Luciano, the usher read in the newspapers that his wife was one of Luciano's "sweethearts" and realized that she married him so that she could travel freely anytime the gangster sent for her. The usher then had the marriage annuled. The Produced Scripts Collection contains a treatment entitled "Meet the Countess," based on Stone's story, by Charles Belden and Jerry Cady, but it is not known if any of this material was included in the final film.
