The New Pictures

The Bishop Misbehaves (MetroGoldwyn-Mayer). If the Bishop of Broadminster had not been a reader of mystery stories he would never have guessed, on entering the deserted inn, that a robbery had just taken place there. He would not have been able to find Reginald Owen, Lillian Bond, and Dudley Digges tied in a closet and the stolen jewels in a pewter pot from which he removed them, leaving his visiting card.

Flavored with young love and London fog, furnished with an assortment of sweatered rogues talking Cockney out the sides of their mouths, the plot capers at the Bishop's gaitered heels as he discovers that the crime was planned by Hester (Maureen O'Sullivan) and Donald (Norman Foster) to "get back the stolen papers." Walter Connolly made a great success as the Bishop in the Broadway version of Frederic Jackson's play last winter, but it is hard to believe that anyone could be as good as Edmund Gwenn is in this adaptation. He is even convincing when his Episcopalian relish for a nice little crime gets the young people into trouble and he has to turn dramatic to save them. Lucile Watson is the Bishop's sister, longtime president of the Primrose League, who knows how to tie up crooks because she has had so much experience tying up Christmas packages.

His Family Tree (RKO) is the one about Pat and Mike. Pat (James Barton) is Patrick Murphy, an aging Dublin saloonkeeper who, arriving in the U. S. to discover what has become of his son Charles, finds him running for Mayor of Central City, Iowa, and married to a social-climbing snob who has changed their name to Murfree. Mike Donovan (Addison Randall) is Charles Murfree's campaign publicity manager. It is Mike who becomes attached to Murfree's daughter Elinor but it is Pat who horrifies Mrs. Murfree by his frowzy appearance, dances an authentic jig at a political rally, conducts a senile romance with a female ward-leader named Oulihan (Maureen Delany) and finally wins the election for his son by appearing on a rostrum to denounce Murfree's rival for attempted kidnapping.

Based on the highly debatable theory that the Celtic character is the most charming and the most comical of human phenomena, His Family Tree is principally a frame for James Barton's elaborate embroideries in brogue, blarney, eye-twin-kling and jig-steps. That an obsolete comicstrip narrative is not actually offensive is due to the skill of Joel Sayre and John Twist who adapted it for the screen. Good shot: Barton's skit of a drunk trying to read a newspaper which ends when he has rolled it helplessly into a soggy ball.

James Barton's father was a minstrel. His mother sang the lead in the original Black Crook company. He began his stage career at 5, played boat shows, tent shows, summer stock, vaudeville and burlesque, put in 15 years on Broadway, danced in the Ziegfeld Follies. His press-agent publicized him as "the man with the laughing feet." Professionals rated him as the world's No. 3 hoofer (No. 1, Bill Robin son; No. 2, Fred Astaire). But his reputation never satisfied him until he played Jeeter Lester in Tobacco Road (TIME, July 2, 1934). Barton tried out for the part, was picked to succeed Henry Hull, who was going to Hollywood, where Barton later followed him. Barton arrived by train, sending his Lincoln across the U. S. with his bicycle and six of his 40 dogs.

RKO, where he had a two-picture con tract which His Family Tree completes, kept photographers from meeting his train. Reason: six years ago Barton's face was badly scarred in an automobile accident. All pictures of him have to be retouched. Before he acts he uses many layers of grease paint, reshapes his nose with putty. Like all old-line troupers, he tried to take a hand in stage-managing his pictures. This brought on arguments. One day he almost quit because it seemed to him there were not enough chickens around a farmhouse set. Another time he got into a furious fight about his dialect, which Director Charles Vidor criticized. "Oh, it ain't Irish, isn't it?" he yelled. "Well, let me tell you, Mr. Know-It-All, it's been Irish enough to earn me a good living for 25 years. If any man could tell good from bad Irish it wouldn't be a thick-talking Dutchman like yourself."

Barton has a spasm if anyone puts a hat on the bed or whistles in the dressing room. He never fails to drop coins into blind men's cups. In Hollis, L. I. he has a big house, owns a yacht and three automobiles. His wife is his sole business manager, rehearses and prompts him, takes care of the dogs, carries his spending cash for him in her stocking.

Special Agent (Warner) differs from other recent pictures of its school in that its hero (George Brent) is not a G-Man but a T-Man. He works for the Treasury Department and it is his business to bring a slimy racketeer (Ricardo Cortez) to justice by showing that he has not paid his income tax. The T-Man, operating under cover as a newshawk, does so by means of paying court to the racketeer's pretty blonde accountant (Bette Davis), to the popping of corks, headlines and machine guns.

Without doing anything to corroborate the theory of Tsar Will Hays, voiced in Manhattan last week, that the cinema has entered a new era, Special Agent is a workmanlike, journalistic melodrama, made by specialists in this type of entertainment. Good shot: the magazine which Racketeer Carston pulls out of the top drawer of his desk: True Gang Stories.

She Married Her Boss (Columbia) does not get down to business until Claudette Colbert sprinkles perfume behind her ears, slips into her negligee, deposits herself suggestively on a chaise longue and waits for the man she has just married to come to her,

Before that time Miss Colbert has been a thoroughly efficient executive secretary to a hard-headed department-store owner (Melvyn Douglas). Because his household is rapidly going to pot, he suddenly decides to make his secretary his wife. It is not until their wedding night that Miss Colbert learns what sort of marriage it is. While she waits on the chaise longue, he goes to bed in another room.

Such routine drama is brought to a finish without a general walkout by a series of polite antics at which Miss Colbert is expert. Most notable occurs when Douglas buys a department store in Philadelphia, sends his wife down to whip it into shape. One night capable Manager Colbert decides to have some fun. This she proceeds to do by spending the evening with a friend in one of the store's show windows, fitted out with living-room furniture and a number of wax figures. As the evening wears on, whiskey is sent for, the piano is played, and by the time photographers arrive Miss Colbert and friend have attained a state of pleasant inebriation.

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