By Violet LeVoit
Lady Gangster
Brief Synopsis
A radio broadcaster tries to reform a gangster's moll who has been sent up the river.
Cast & Crew
Read More
Florian Roberts
Director
Faye Emerson
Dot Burton
Julie Bishop
Myrtle Reed
Frank Wilcox
Kenneth Phillips
Roland Drew
Carey Wells
Jackie C. Gleason
Wilson
Film Details
Genre
Drama
Adaptation
Crime
Release Date
Jun
6,
1942
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc.
Distribution Company
Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc.
Country
United States
Screenplay Information
Based on the play Ladies They Talk About by Dorothy Mackaye and Carlton Miles (production date undetermined).
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 2m
Sound
Mono
Color
Black and White
Theatrical Aspect Ratio
1.37 : 1
Film Length
5,525ft
Synopsis
Dot Burton, an aspiring actress, helps a gang of bank robbers to hold up a bank. The men escape but the police are suspicious of Dot's actions and arrest her. District Attorney Lewis Sinton asks Dot to turn state's evidence, but she continues to plead her innocence. Radio broadcaster Kenneth Phillips sees a newspaper article about Dot's case and broadcasts a statement lambasting the district attorney for arresting her while the real criminals go free. Sinton responds by suggesting that Phillips help in the investigation. He willingly agrees and begins by questioning Dot. Face to face, Phillips and Dot realize they know each other from childhood and Phillips arranges to have Dot released into his custody. Although Dot intends to go straight, when she overhears the other members of the gang plan to divide up her share of the stolen money, she hides the money from them. Dot intends to atone for her part in the crime by returning the money. Later, encouraged by Phillips to forget about the past, she starts to tell him of her involvement, but when he refuses to take her side, she confesses to Sinton and is sent to prison. There Dot is befriended by Myrtle Reed, but two other convicts, Lucy Fenton and Deaf Annie, ally against her. Soon Carey Wells, one of the bank robbers, dresses as a woman and visits Dot in prison. Deaf Annie reads his lips and tells Fenton that Dot knows where the stolen money is hidden. In the meantime, Myrtle has convinced Dot to let the guilt-ridden Phillips help her get paroled from prison. Fenton bides her time and when Dot comes up for parole, she suggests to the warden, Mrs. Stoner, that she offer to grant Dot parole in exchange for the money. Stoner makes the same suggestion to Phillips, who refuses. Fenton then convinces Dot that the suggestion was Phillips' idea, and Dot plots her revenge against him. She agrees to turn over the money if Phillips will pick it up alone and then gets word to the gang about the arrangement. Then, by accident, Dot learns that Phillips is innocent. She tries to stop him, and when Stoner refuses to allow her to phone him, she escapes in order to warn him of his danger. By the time Dot arrives, the gang has attacked Phillips, but she is able to lead him away. The gang holds Dot hostage, but eventually they are captured by the police. Phillips plans to marry Dot after she is paroled.
Director
Florian Roberts
Director
Cast
Faye Emerson
Dot Burton
Julie Bishop
Myrtle Reed
Frank Wilcox
Kenneth Phillips
Roland Drew
Carey Wells
Jackie C. Gleason
Wilson
Ruth Ford
Lucy Fenton
Virginia Brissac
Mrs. Stoner
Dorothy Vaughan
Jenkins
Dorothy Adams
Deaf Annie
Dewolf Hopper
John
Vera Lewis
Ma Silsby
Herbert Rawlinson
Lewis Sinton
Peggy Diggins
Mary
Charles Wilson
Detective
Bill Phillips
Stew
Frank Mayo
Walker
Leah Baird
Matron
Ken Christy
Bank guard
Sol Gorss
Policeman
Fred Kelsey
Policeman
Daisy Bufford
Black woman
Jack Mower
Sergeant
Joan Winfield
Nurse
Crew
Film Details
Genre
Drama
Adaptation
Crime
Release Date
Jun
6,
1942
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc.
Distribution Company
Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc.
Country
United States
Screenplay Information
Based on the play Ladies They Talk About by Dorothy Mackaye and Carlton Miles (production date undetermined).
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 2m
Sound
Mono
Color
Black and White
Theatrical Aspect Ratio
1.37 : 1
Film Length
5,525ft
Articles
Lady Gangster -
Director Robert Florey's career uniquely spans B-movies, A-listers and the avant garde. While the French-born director was responsible for the Marx Brothers' feature length debut The Cocoanuts (1929), as well as other studio pictures like Murder In The Rue Morgue (1932), he's most beloved for his utterly unique and Deco-stylish experimental short The Lif eAnd Death Of 9413, A Hollywood Extra (1928) (made in partnership with montage sequence innovater Slavko Vorkapich). Even while slumming in B-noirs like this one, under the pseudonym "Florian Roberts," aficionados of that art film can spot similarities in close-ups, dutch angles, and the comings and goings of nobodies in this bare story about a bank robber (Faye Emerson, soon to be daughter-in-law to the Roosevelts) whose heist involving a purloined dog leads to jailhouse trouble. A Remake of pre-Code Stanwyck picture Ladies They Talk About (1933), Jackie Gleason can also be spotted here in an early role.
By Violet LeVoit
By Violet LeVoit
Lady Gangster -
Director Robert Florey's career uniquely spans B-movies, A-listers and the avant garde. While the French-born director was responsible for the Marx Brothers' feature length debut The Cocoanuts (1929), as well as other studio pictures like Murder In The Rue Morgue (1932), he's most beloved for his utterly unique and Deco-stylish experimental short The Lif eAnd Death Of 9413, A Hollywood Extra (1928) (made in partnership with montage sequence innovater Slavko Vorkapich). Even while slumming in B-noirs like this one, under the pseudonym "Florian Roberts," aficionados of that art film can spot similarities in close-ups, dutch angles, and the comings and goings of nobodies in this bare story about a bank robber (Faye Emerson, soon to be daughter-in-law to the Roosevelts) whose heist involving a purloined dog leads to jailhouse trouble. A Remake of pre-Code Stanwyck picture Ladies They Talk About (1933), Jackie Gleason can also be spotted here in an early role.
By Violet LeVoit
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
According to the CBCS, the film was cast by mid-April 1942. Production dates cannot be confirmed by Hollywood Reporter production charts, however. Florian Roberts was a pseudonym of Robert Florey, and according to modern sources, this film marked the only time he used a pseudonym. The play by Dorothy Mackaye and Carlton Miles was also the basis of the 1933 Warner Bros. film Ladies They Talk About, directed by Howard Bretherton and William Keighley and starring Barbara Stanwyck. Although the Variety review of the 1933 film stated that the play had been produced in Los Angeles with Mackaye in the lead, the SAB included in the file on the film in the AMPAS Library noted that the play had never been published or produced. According to the SAB, the play was retitled Gangstress. Although there is a copyright statement on the opening title card, the film is not listed in copyright records.
