Vanity Street

"Vanity Street" 1932 directed by Nick Grinde, written by Frank Cavett, Edward Roberts, and Gertrude Purcell. Columbia Studios.

Charles Bickford, Helen Chandler, Mayo Methot, George Meeker, Arthur Hoyt, Raymond Hatton, Ruth Channing, Dolores Ray, Claudia Morgan, May Beatty, Kathrin Clare Ward, Ann Fay.

Very intriguing tale of an unemployed woman in NYC who throws a cinder block through a window to get fed and to get a place to sleep. Helen Chandler, fresh from "Dracula", is fine in this film with hard boiled Charles Bickford as her plainclothes police officer mentor. Special notice to Mayo Methot who makes this little picture that much better for her superb performance as Follies star, Fern Cavan, who is taken in by gigolo, Val French, played wonderfully by George Meeker. Val French, being a low-life parasite, frames a dowager named Mrs. Dantry who is smitten by his smooth good looks.

Director Grinde expertly keeps the camera moving through the busy New York sidewalk after the show gets out and we meet several interesting people. There are flaws but this is an entertaining slice of life in a time machine called film.

Helen Chandler, George Meeker, and Mayo Methot