Bringing Up Baby

One of the landmark screwball comedies, Howard Hawks's Bringing Up Baby (1938) is an absolute laugh-riot. A fine mixture of wit and inspired silliness, the film never flags and serves as a showcase for its legendary stars.

Museum curator David Huxley (Cary Grant) is just about to complete a rare Brontosaurus skeleton, ensure a $1 million donation and marry his stuffy assistant (Virginia Walker). But things go awry when he runs into Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn), a madcap millionaire who tricks David into coming to her Connecticut escape with a baby leopard in tow. It turns out Susan's Aunt (May Robson) is David's would-be benefactor, and after an awkward first impression David tries to hide his identity. Insanity ensues as a dog buries David's dinosaur bone, Baby escapes and another leopard shows up, leading the local Sheriff (Walter Catlett) to conclude they're all nuts.

Bringing Up Baby is a perfect embodiment of Howard Hawks's thematic preoccupations. Presaging Gary Cooper in Ball of Fire (and Henry Fonda in Preston Sturges's The Lady Eve), David is a nerdy Professor completely caught up in his work, until the wacky and wild Susan shows him a good time. Susan is an odd character, halfway between the tough-minded Hawksian woman of legend and a scatter-brained stereotype, but either way she's an endearing and funny heroine. The film's endorsement of childish anarchy isn't worth much as a philosophy, but it makes for an entertaining comedy.

More than that, though, the movie is damned funny, as Dave and Susan stumble from one ridiculous situation into another. It's all ridiculously contrived but Hawks makes it work, though it drags a bit in the middle sections, with our goofy leads supported by a gaggle of hilarious supporting characters: the pompous big-game hunter (Charles Ruggles), the drunken handyman (Barry Fitzgerald), the neurotic psychiatrist (Fritz Feld), the incredulous Sheriff caught in the middle of it. A steady helping of wit and off-color humor ("I just went GAY all of the sudden!") adds an edge to the show's wackiness.

Cary Grant is in fine form, making an excellent straight-man for the first half and getting his own back later on. But it's really Katharine Hepburn's show, and she makes Susan's mixture of determination and ditziness endearing rather than obnoxious. Charles Ruggles gets a hilarious role, and May Robson's incredulous reactions to the lunatic goings-on are priceless. Smaller parts are farmed out to Barry Fitzgerald (The Long Voyage Home), Walter Catlett (A Tale of Two Cities), Fritz Feld and Ward Bond (The Searchers).

Bringing Up Baby is another comedy home run from Howard Hawks, and a career highpoint for both Grant and Hepburn.