neumu [ cinematronic ]




	The Lady Eve
	Preston Sturges Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda, Charles Coburn 1941 Special Edition — English subtitles; video introduction by writer/director Peter Bogdanovich; audio commentary by noted film scholar Marian Keane; Edith Head costume designs; scrapbook of original publicity materials and production stills; original theatrical trailer; 1942 broadcast of Lux Radio Theater adaptation performed by Barbara Stanwyck and Ray Milland.		If "Sullivan's Travels" is comic maestro Preston Sturges' humane apex — his deepest and most multi-faceted film — and "The Palm Beach Story" is his quintessential screwball comedy, "The Lady Eve" is the writer/director's most heartfelt romantic comedy. Happily, its passion, embodied by leads Barbara Stanwyck and Henry Fonda, doesn't preclude the tart, loopy humor that infuses all of the celluloid wonders in the Sturges canon. A father/daughter con-artist team (Charles Coburn and Stanwyck) makes hay on the cruise-ship circuit by ensnaring wealthy men in various crooked schemes. On one fateful voyage, the thieves take aim at a guileless herpetology expert (Fonda) when they learn that he's heir to a fabulous brewery fortune. But the connivers don't count on the daughter succumbing to feelings for the mark as they try to fleece him. Fonda's rich nebbish is a nerd for all seasons, and Stanwyck's femme not-so-fatale is a thrilling mix of glamour, slyness and vulnerability.