A Tragedy at Midnight
Brief Synopsis
Cast & Crew
Joseph Santley
John Howard
Margaret Lindsay
Roscoe Karns
Mona Barrie
Keye Luke
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
When Greg Sherman broadcasts his weekly radio show, on which he solves real-life mysteries, listening policemen decide that they must stop Greg, for he often embarrasses them by solving their cases before they. The commissioner assigns bumbling cop Cassidy to the case, and his opportunity soon arrives. After his show, Greg attends a yacht party while his wife, mystery writer Beth, stays overnight with her sister. After the party, Greg returns to the apartment he and Beth borrowed from their friends, Dr. Hilary and Alta Wilton, while their own apartment is being redecorated. Greg sees a woman in Beth's bed and, assuming that she is Beth, goes to sleep. In the morning, however, Beth returns to the apartment and, seeing the woman, believes that Greg is having an affair. Determined to get a divorce, Beth storms out, after which Greg discovers that the woman in the bed has been stabbed to death. Cassidy arrives and arrests Greg for the murder, but when Beth learns about the corpse, she and the Sherman's intrepid Chinese butler, Ah Foo, help Greg escape. Using the dead woman's hat as a clue, Greg and Beth discover that she was Evelyn Dennis, then go to her apartment, where they learn the name of her paramour, Charles Miller. When they hear on the radio that the police have used dental records to identify the dead woman as Joan Adams, Beth and Greg are mystified, and so question the Wiltons. Upon learning that Joan, her best friend, was murdered, Alta faints, and Dr. Wilton takes her to the hospital, saying that she has a heart condition. The Shermans deduce that Evelyn assumed the stage name Joan Adams when she became an actress, that she had an apartment under each name, and received Charles Miller at one, and at another, nightclub owner Reesi. When Greg questions Miller, Miller states that he did not know about Evelyn's other name or paramour, but when he leaves, Greg follows him to Maxim's, Reesi's club. The jealous Miller attempts to murder Reesi, then escapes when he fails. Greg and Beth, after finding that Reesi has an alibi for the time of Evelyn's death, return to Evelyn's apartment. They hide in the closet as a man searches the apartment, then is shot by another intruder, who escapes before the Shermans can identify him. The murdered man is Miller, and because Reesi had been arrested before the shooting, the police suspect that Greg is behind the second killing as well. Meanwhile, Landeck, the sponsor of Greg's show, pesters the manager, Swanson, about whether Greg will appear in time for his broadcast. Greg and Beth go to the hospital to see Alta, who is in a drug-induced coma. Greg deduces that Dr. Wilton is responsible for her state, and that he also killed Evelyn, whom he mistook for Alta, and Miller, who surprised him when he was searching Evelyn's apartment. Wilton admits that he wanted to kill Alta because of her infidelities, but he escapes before the Shermans can capture him. Greg and Beth then rush to the station, where Greg is about to name Wilton as the killer when he appears in the studio and shoots at Greg. Ah Foo apprehends the doctor, and as the police take him away, Landeck promises Greg a bonus for his thrilling work.
Director
Joseph Santley
Cast
John Howard
Margaret Lindsay
Roscoe Karns
Mona Barrie
Keye Luke
Hobart Cavanaugh
Paul Harvey
Lilian Bond
Miles Mander
William Newell
Wendell Niles
Archie Twitchell
Noel Madison
Theodor Von Eltz
John Harmon
Charles Mcavoy
Vivien Oakland
Marin Sais
Janet Beecher
Chester Clute
Tim Ryan
Helena Phillips Evans
George Chandler
George Humbert
Elliott Sullivan
Paul Scott
Bud Jamison
Ralph Peters
Ben Taggart
Patricia Knox
Mady Laurence
Lucille Brown
Nora Lane
Alan Baldwin
Tom Seidel
Herbert Evans
Eddie Lee
Sam Bernard
Robert Fiske
Joe North
Dorothy Gulliver
Jacqueline Dalya
Franco Corsaro
Dick Winslow
David Mckim
Billy Benedict
Ted Crane
Lester Dorr
Jayne Hazard
Marilyn Hare
Adele Rowland
Cecil Weston
Irene Shirley
Lois Collier
Hal Cooke
Richard Kipling
Roy Butler
Crew
Isabel Dawn
Sam Duncan
Cy Feuer
Hal Hudson
Harry Knight
John Victor Mackay
Edward Mann
Ernest Miller
Robert North
Adele Palmer
Murray Seldeen
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The working titles of this film were Woman in the Dark, That Certain Lady and X Marks the Spot. According to information in the file on the film in the MPAA/PCA Collection at the AMPAS Library, the PCA rejected an October 1941 version of the script. The PCA informed Republic that it was rejecting the script because of "the specific suggestion that the murdered woman was being kept by two men, in two separate apartments at the same time." After the PCA gave the studio specific suggestions about how to make it appear as if "Joan Adams/Evelyn Dennis" was not being kept by the two men, the script was rewritten and approved.
