Barrymore Bedlam On Campus

Why Sacrifice a Smoke For Publicity's Sake?, Says Jawn, Who'll Not Lay That
Cigarette Down To Pose With Co-Stars Marjorie Weaver and George Murphy

Frolic and Football in Hold That Co-Ed (1938)

Stars In Person at Frisco's Warfield Theatre

Can deep south governor John Barrymore peddle enough influence to win humble State College a nationwide gridiron pennant? The site isn't emphasized, but dialogue and incidents point to Louisiana, where Kingfish Huey Long was lately dominant until assassin intervention in September 1935. Three years past made the Dixie plutocrat fair game for laffs, so long as references stayed obscure, with Barrymore's buffoon only suggested by real-life Long and events in Louisiana. Hold That Co-Ed is otherwise a "football musical" out of that 30's bank to which studios made annual deposit. The brand was safe and therefore prolific, but wait, Hold That Co-Ed lost money for 20th Fox, $219,000 in fact, despite being modestly done on a $678K negative cost. Was patronage tiring of collegiate capers? It's maybe not coincidence that there was less of such after 1938.

A reason, maybe the reason, to watch Hold That Co-Ed, is Barrymore. His hair askew and face bandaged (is that explained?), Jack gives way to abandon of the corrupt, but comic, sovereign he plays, his lines spat at cue cards held offscreen. The collapsed profile could still muster magic on good days, and was not so prideful as to burlesque at less than full-tilt as here. To direction of that was lent George Marshall, ideally suited to Hold That Co-Ed and farcing done broad. Marshall had guided comedy in smaller doses, at Fox in fact, during silent days when he oversaw two-reelers that maintained high laughing standard. Hold That Co-Ed plays casual and  amuses all the more for that. Marshall, who often as not showed up for work in ball cap and zip-up jacket, keeps a merry pace and gives livelier account of campus life than Paramount had on longer, and slower, occasions when they addressed higher yearning (romance in Co-Ed's instance is between George Murphy and Marjorie Weaver, but they barely register in the face of Barrymore bellowing). Former Our Gang-er Johnny Downs is among the student body, and sharp eyes will spot Glenn Morris, a same year Tarzan, mingled amongst collegiates. Hold That Co-Ed turns up occasionally on the Fox Movie Channel.