There’s something so appealing about comedies produced during the Golden Age of Hollywood, particularly those made in the Pre-Code era, a time in which artistic expression within the film industry was driven by the simple but effective adage of “anything goes” – and few films demonstrate this with more elegance or nuance than Kansas City Princess, a straightforward but brilliant comedy that is positively brimming with life and the kind of unhinged energy we would expect from this generation of films. Directed by William Keighley, who collaborated with screenwriters Sy Bartlett and Manuel Seffin in the crafting of this hilarious and irreverent film, it tells the story of a pair of hair-brained manicurists that find themselves in a precarious situation, and have no choice but to go on the run or else face terrifying consequences. Keighley, who was one of the more reliable of the journeymen directors working at the time and was the hand at the helm of many exceptional comedies during this era in which Hollywood comedies were at their peak, was able to craft a compact and delightfully charming film that never overstays its welcome, assembling a terrific cast and telling a story that is worth every minute of our time. Kansas City Princess is a wonderfully eccentric film that knows exactly how to handle some of its more morally questionable subject matter in favour of a heartwarming and thoughtful account of these two idiotic characters and their bizarre adventures through Missouri and beyond.

The boundary between a successful Golden Era comedy and one that is merely serviceable is found in determining the extent to which it is just going through the motions, or if it is designed to actually be doing something slightly more complex. Kansas City Princess does seem like a relatively simple work on the surface – it runs just over an hour, and hits all the predictable beats. However, the manner in which it approaches the material is where its greatest successes reside, since it doesn’t take too long to realize that we are watching something extraordinarily special. The story is unfurnished and predictable, but Bartlett and Seffin write it with incredible conviction, not wasting any time in creating an endless cavalcade of hilarious jokes and insightful comments on the nature of America at this particular time in the nation’s history – as much as we would be conditioned to view Kansas City Princess as simply an outrageous comedy, it has more nuance than a cursory glance may suggest, a wonderful discovery for anyone expecting just a simple comedy. It obviously doesn’t veer off too far from what we’d anticipate, but instead uses this space to add some subversive commentary on the state of America at the time, in the awkward stage between the Great Depression and the gradual rise towards the Second World War – and while it would be several years before the country got involved in the conflict, the liberal use of Paris as a setting for the third act of the film hints at a more global perspective going into the creation of the film, a unique and compelling choice that feels very much unique and exciting in comparison to more traditional comedies produced at the time.

For a film as seemingly formulaic as it appears to be on the surface, Kansas City Princess is surprisingly elegant when it comes to the slightly deeper subject matter that we find peppered liberally throughout. This is not a film that is afraid to break from tradition in some small but integral ways, especially when it comes to developing these characters and making them more than just thinly-veiled archetypes. Undeniably, the studio system did mean that Keighley was slightly more restricted (and his very presence is indicative of this – he was uniformly reliable and capable of pulling together memorable films out of very little, with the only stimulus he needed being a good script and a strong group of actors. Kansas City Princess features a couple of different styles, starting out as a very traditional mainstream comedy, armed with rapid dialogue and hilarious situations, before becoming an outrageous screwball comedy in which the actors are giving genuinely strong performances, both verbally and physically, and then becomes a darkly comedic satire on international relations. Like the characters at the heart of the story, Kansas City Princess is a film that is frequently in flux, leaping between styles in much the same way our protagonists’ voyage between cities – and its this consistent motion that helps keep the film fresh and exciting, with many of its genuinely interesting moments coming through in how it handles the shifting tone, which not only keeps us invested in the story, but allows the film to feel far more inventive than it may have otherwise have been in a more traditional setting.

Casting was integral to comedies at the time, because as much as the scripts may have been filled to the brim with the most hilarious jokes, they only became effective if the right actors were given the roles. Not only was it important to find performers with the ability to handle the fast-paced dialogue, but also had the unique comedic sensibilities to inhabit these characters. In this regard, you could not do better than Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell, two of the most exceptionally gifted comedians of their generation, and the kind of ever-reliable stars that single-handedly managed to draw audiences in to see their antics. You knew when one of them was the female lead of a film that the results were going to be nothing short of spectacular – and here we saw them working together (after the enormous success of a previous pairing between the two), playing the parts of ditzy but resourceful young women that find their way out of any situation through a combination of street-smarts and luck. Blondell and Farrell were exceptionally gifted, and Keighley manages to bring out some of their most genuinely compelling work, giving them characters that are complex and interesting, without leaning too heavily into the aspects that may distract from the humour at the heart of the film. The studio system was designed for stars like Blondell and Farrell to shine, and with the safety of a director who could pull out interesting elements from them both, they were clearly in good hands, giving spirited performances in Kansas City Princess that are both hilarious and heartwarming.

The Golden Age of Hollywood produced countless works that are both comforting and invigorating, and while it sometimes takes a bit of time to acclimate to the specific style of humour and how jokes functioned back then (with the oscillation between quick-fire zingers and more lengthy bouts of levity being definitive of this era of filmmaking), it’s not difficult to get lost in the worlds being constructed by these filmmakers, who simply sought to create charming comedies that are both insightful and interesting, more than anything else. Keighley was a great director who knew all the techniques to make something into a rousing success, and the forthright dedication with which he approaches this story helps us get truly invested in these characters and their varying misadventures. It does help that the cast is well-equipped to accompany us on this journey, and we feel secure under their care. As a whole, Kansas City Princess is just a delight, a simple but effective comedy that knows how to land all the jokes, and manages to be a suitably compelling satire that is never too focused on hitting jokes that it knows it can’t see through to the very end – and for this reason alone, it deserves a special place in Hollywood history, at least amongst the canon of incredibly funny and charming films that manage to work through the eccentricity to find nuance in more complex subject matter, even if it isn’t very obvious at first.