General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Libeled Lady

Libeled Lady is a 1936 American screwball comedy directed by Jack Conway for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, in which a newspaper editor tries to defeat a five-million-dollar libel suit by arranging a fake marriage and a staged seduction¹^•². It stars Jean Harlow, William Powell, Myrna Loy, and Spencer Tracy, and it was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture³^•⁴.

Key fact	Detail
Release	October 9, 1936, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer; black and white¹^•⁵
Director / producer	Jack Conway; Lawrence Weingarten⁶
Writers	Maurine Dallas Watkins, Howard Emmett Rogers, and George Oppenheimer, from a story by Wallace Sullivan⁶
Lead cast	Jean Harlow (Gladys Benton), William Powell (Bill Chandler), Myrna Loy (Connie Allenbury), Spencer Tracy (Warren Haggerty)³
Runtime	98 minutes (TCM lists 1h 41m)¹^•⁶
Recognition	Best Picture nominee; 1936 domestic box office rank #13⁴^•⁷
Ratings	IMDb 7.8/10 (about 9,800 votes); Rotten Tomatoes 81% Tomatometer, 87% Popcornmeter⁸^•¹

Spoilers

Plot

The New York Evening Star's presses stop too late to kill a false story claiming that the heiress Connie Allenbury (Myrna Loy) has broken up another woman's marriage⁹. Connie and her father James (Walter Connolly) sue the paper for $5,000,000 in damages⁹.

Managing editor Warren Haggerty (Spencer Tracy), who has a habit of postponing his wedding to his longtime fiancée Gladys Benton (Jean Harlow) whenever a crisis hits the paper, delays the ceremony again to handle the lawsuit²^•¹⁰. His counter-scheme is to make the story true after the fact: if Connie actually does break up a marriage, she cannot claim libel¹⁰. Haggerty hires Bill Chandler (William Powell), a former employee, to marry Gladys in name only and then court Connie, so that Gladys can sue Connie for alienation of affections and the two suits can be traded away².

Bill joins Connie and her father on an ocean liner back to the United States and works the con, but the plan misfires twice over: Connie proves a step ahead of him at first, and then the two genuinely fall in love¹⁰^•⁴. In the resolution, Chandler, a clever lawyer, proves that his marriage to Gladys was not legal, Connie agrees to drop the lawsuit, and Haggerty finally marries Gladys¹¹.

Cast and production

The four leads are supported by Walter Connolly as James B. Allenbury, Charley Grapewin as the publisher Mr. Bane, and Cora Witherspoon as the shipboard gossip Mrs. Burns-Norvell; E.E. Clive plays the fishing instructor, and Hattie McDaniel appears uncredited as a maid in the Grand Plaza Hotel³^•¹². The screenplay is credited to Maurine Dallas Watkins, Howard Emmett Rogers, and George Oppenheimer from Wallace Sullivan's story, with Lawrence Weingarten producing⁶.

The film reunited William Powell and Myrna Loy two years after The Thin Man (1934), though their dynamic is reversed: instead of the married allies Nick and Nora Charles, Loy plays an uptight heiress set against Powell's schemer¹⁰. Off screen, Powell and Jean Harlow were engaged, and Harlow died of illness about a year after the film's release, a fact that has colored much of the film's later reception¹³.

Reception

Contemporary reviews were favorable. The New York Times (October 31, 1936) called it a thoroughly agreeable sardonic comedy and singled out "the perfect light-comedy foursome" of Harlow, Loy, Powell, and Tracy; Variety (December 31, 1935) called it a sockeroo comedy despite an overloaded plot¹⁴. Later assessments have been more mixed: a Slant Magazine review found the plot familiar and the climax rushed, while still praising the cast's chemistry¹³.

The film was one of the year's successes, ranking #13 at the 1936 domestic box office, and it received a Best Picture nomination, though it was not nominated in any other category⁷^•⁴. Modern aggregate scores remain strong: 7.8/10 on IMDb and 81 percent on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer⁸^•¹.

Place among screwball comedies

Libeled Lady is a late entry in the first wave of Hollywood screwball comedy, standing alongside films such as It Happened One Night (1934), My Man Godfrey (1936), and His Girl Friday (1940)¹⁵. Unlike many of these, it is noted for prioritizing plot mechanics over one-liners: the comedy grows out of the tangle of fake marriages, alienation suits, and a con job that keeps going wrong¹⁵. Its famous fishing sequence, in which the inexpert Chandler is schooled by a fishing instructor while Connie watches, is a frequently cited comic highlight³^•¹⁰.

Comparisons with The Thin Man recur in criticism. Reviewers generally place Libeled Lady a rung below that film, finding the plot more contrived and the Tracy-Harlow engagement subplot weaker than the Powell-Loy material, while crediting the same easy rapport between Powell and Loy¹⁴^•¹⁰.

Availability

The film is out of circulation on subscription streaming in some regions but remains widely available for digital rental or purchase; as of late 2026 listings, it rents from $3.99 and sells from $4.99 on platforms including Amazon Video and Apple TV¹⁶.

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Comedy and romantic films (individual works) › Comedies of the 1940s

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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