Craig's Wife (1936)

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After several light comedy roles, Rosalind Russell proved her salt as a dramatic film actress in this 1936 adaptation of George Kelly's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Craig's Wife. Russell plays Harriet Craig, whose obsession with keeping her house and its furnishings spotless has driven away most of… More After several light comedy roles, Rosalind Russell proved her salt as a dramatic film actress in this 1936 adaptation of George Kelly's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Craig's Wife. Russell plays Harriet Craig, whose obsession with keeping her house and its furnishings spotless has driven away most of her friends. Harriet's husband Walter (John Boles) loves her and will not brook any criticism of her fastidiousness. But even he has a breaking point: this comes when, during a moment of dire crisis, she reveals that she is more concerned with her own well-being than her husband's. Walter declares his independence by smoking a cigarette in Harriet's spotless living room, strewing his ashes all over her nice clean rug, smashing one of her precious vases, and walking out on her. The final image is of Harriet Craig standing alone in her "perfect" house, so benumbed by events that she fails to notice that her armful of roses is leaving a path of petals on her hitherto unsullied floor. Previously filmed in 1928, Craig's Wife was remade in 1950 with Joan Crawford as Harriet Craig. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Rating, Runtime: Unrated, 1 hr. 15 min.
Directed By: Dorothy Arzner
Genres: Drama, Classics

In Theaters: Sep 25, 1936 Wide

Critic Reviews

Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com
The young Rosalind Rusell gives a tour de force performance as the obsessive wife in Dorothy Arzner's 1936 critique of patriarchal culture.
Fernando F. Croce, CinePassion
An indictment of a system where womanhood is made to deform itself
Michael W. Phillips, Jr., Goatdog's Movies
A masterpiece of double meaning, pulled off with wit and verve.

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Featured Audience Ratings

William S

A film so criminally undervalued and a little forgotten, it's also a much better version of the play than it's glossy and somewhat misogynistic Crawford remake. It's pioneering director, Dorothy Arzner, was unique in two ways. Not only the only woman director making… More
A film so criminally undervalued and a little forgotten, it's also a much better version of the play than it's glossy and somewhat misogynistic Crawford remake. It's pioneering director, Dorothy Arzner, was unique in two ways. Not only the only woman director making big studio pics during the Hollywood Golden Age but also a lesbian who made no secret of her sexuality. Most surely a gay icon as well as a feminist one. Her version of Craig's Wife is very much a crack at the male dominated studio system of the time (good on her!!). Arzner's Harriet Craig is also a much more sympathetic character than the one being justly (?!) punished in the remake (which, of course, was produced and directed by men)