Society Doctor (1935)
At the Mayfair.
A.S.
Published: February 4, 1935
The latest of the hospital films belongs in the glib and mechanically facile department of photoplay manufacture which is certain to please some of the people all of the time. If, during the presentation of "Society Doctor," loud and helpless guffaws happen to explode in an isolated spot in the auditorium, you can be pretty sure that there is a doctor in the house. For the new film at the Mayfair, in its comico-dramatic description of the kaleidoscopic life in a metropolitan hospital, manages to seem a trifle bogus even when it is being most earnest. To observe, for example, the gay abandon with which the nurses and the internes fraternize after dark is to be convinced that all this is happening in a theatrical hotel instead of a sternly disciplined hospital.
Very likely this is getting away from the photoplay's intentions. Since, in any event, the Mayfair's audience seemed to find it rather fun, perhaps it will be more useful to describe "Society Doctor" as the flashily implausible tale of a gifted interne who becomes so grieved over the incompetence of his superiors that he almost allows one of his wealthy lady patients to set him up in private practice. His favorite nurse is so disappointed in him when he announces his plan that she promises to marry his comrade, another interne. Shortly thereafter he is badly perforated by the bullets of an escaping thug and, on what he believes to be his deathbed, he announces his love for the nurse and his decision to remain loyal to the spirit of the Hippocratic oath. Then, in one of the most lurid operation scenes in years, he persuades his best friend to operate on him, directing the work himself with the help of mirrors.
"Society Doctor" is played in spotless white and with an appropriate sense of glamour and nobility by Chester Morris, Virginia Bruce and a promising newcomer, Robert Taylor. It impressed this column as an ecstatically foolish fable, but who is one against so many?
SOCIETY DOCTOR, adapted from Theodore Reeves's play, "The Harbor," by Michael Fessier and Samuel Marx; directed by George B. Seitz and produced by Luclen Hubbard for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Dr. Morgan . . . . . Chester Morris
Madge . . . . . Virginia Bruce
Dr. Ellis . . . . . Robert Taylor
Mrs. Crane . . . . . Billie Burke
Dr. Waverly . . . . . Raymond Walburn
Dr. Harvey . . . . . Henry Kolker
Mrs. Harrigan . . . . . Dorothy Peterson
Frank Snowden . . . . . William Henry
Mary . . . . . Mary Jo Mathews
Harris Snowden . . . . . Robert McWade
Moxley . . . . . Donald Meek
Telephone operator . . . . . Louise Henry
Hardy . . . . . Johnny Hines
Harrigan . . . . . Addison Richards
Albright . . . . . Bobby Watson
