If You Could Only Cook. 1935. USA. Directed by William A. Seiter. Screenplay by F. Hugh Herbert, Howard J. Green, Gertrude Purcell. With Jean Arthur, Herbert Marshall, Leo Carrillo, Lionel Stander. 72 min.
This underrated romantic comedy offers an ingenious variation on a classic 1930s plot device---the incognito romance that temporarily dissolves class barriers. Herbert Marshall is an automobile executive who, frustrated by his company's resistance to his innovative designs and pressured into an engagement with his socially ambitious fiancée, walks out on his business and takes to the streets. There he encounters plucky, unemployed Jean Arthur, who mistakes him for a fellow job-seeker and proposes they pose as a married couple to secure positions in the household of an eccentric Italian pasta manufacturer (Leo Carrillo) who insists his cook be happily married.
Director William A. Seiter, an underrated master of star comedy, demonstrates his particular gift for distilling the essence of his actors and presenting them at their quintessential best. Marshall reveals unexpected warmth as the stuffy businessman gradually learning to appreciate simple pleasures, while Jean Arthur perfects the blend of cynicism and vulnerability that would make her one of Hollywood's most distinctive comediennes.