Merrily We Go to Hell (1932)

A young woman at a party (Sylvia Sidney) is smitten by a charming drunk reporter/playwright (Fredric March); and it only gets worse from there on.

They, of course, marry.

He gets his first play produced; but the casting (Adrianne Allen) is problematic to his wife who does the best to be 'modern', but to no avail.

There must be a breaking point.

Not quite the acidic Comedy one might expect from the title (which is simply a favorite toast of the writer,) this is instead a serious Drama, though not quite deadly serious as there are still light moments.

Other that the supposed ‘happy ending’ this is about as realistic as possible a portrait of an alcoholic and his enabler.

Unlike The Lost Weekend we don’t see the crazy D.T. as-seen-from the-alcoholic’s point of view; instead, we witness how one who loves him, or those around him, might see the situation: He’s always late when he bothers to show up at all; and in some cases, he even needs to be brought in, senseless, by his drinking buddies.

March is as believable a drunk as you are likely to see on the big screen.

With Richard "Skeets" Gallagher, George Irving, Esther Howard, Florence Britton, Charles Coleman and Cary Grant.