The Wistful Widow of Wagon Gap (1947)

 The Wistful Widow of Wagon Gap (1947)

Chester Wooley and Duke Egan (Bud Abbott & Lou Costello), two traveling salesmen are trapped in a violent western town when framed of killing a local.

Facing dangling at the end of a rope (at Vasquez Rocks!) or inheriting the dead man’s debts, widow, and many orphans, they choose the latter immediately to regret it when Chester is overworked day and night.

Apparently, no one had found the legal loophole which allowed for this before; but now that it is found everyone in town agrees to abide by it, (oddly, even the town’s criminal element – how easy would it be to kill the widow to get rid of her?) And so, in the second act, Chester the supposed killer, along with everyone in town, realizes he is now leading a charmed life, and that no one dare hurt him lest the same fate befall them as it did him.

It’s not long before the character begins to abuse this invulnerability, (oddly mirroring developments in some contemporary superhero films,) and to rub everyone in town the wrong way; but his superpower is short-lived when the rumor surfaces that the railroad is interested in purchasing the widow’s land.

Most of the humor is situational (and there is more than enough of it, including some classic bits like ‘the frog in the soup’; see if you can find the editing trickery as the plate is switched back and forth between the two characters,) rather than character driven. Bud and Lou’s characters, other than their mutual laziness, cowardliness, greediness, clever stupidity, boastfulness, etc. are never truly well defined.

Marjorie Main momentarily reveals a side we never see elsewhere (too, bad, since she’s good!) immediately to revert to her rough, tough, pioneer woman persona.