How a near-fatal accident and a last-minute edit saved a classic screwball comedy
In short: When producer Leo McCarey was hospitalized after a car crash, his film My Favorite Wife stalled. The plot grew thin, and the humor vanished. To save the project, McCarey devised a wild, meta-textual solution: he brought back a minor character to comment on the film's own narrative problems.
Released in 1940, My Favorite Wife is a screwball comedy starring Irene Dunne and Cary Grant. The plot, inspired by Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s 1864 poem Enoch Arden, follows a woman who returns home after being shipwrecked for seven years, only to find her husband has just remarried. The film was a significant success for RKO, ranking as their second-biggest hit of 1940, yet its production was fraught with instability.
The film’s original producer, Leo McCarey, had signed Grant and Dunne without a script following their success in 1937’s The Awful Truth. However, a near-fatal car accident left McCarey sidelined for much of the shoot, forcing Garson Kanin to take over as director. Even after filming concluded, the movie struggled; previews showed that the narrative lost its comedic momentum about two-thirds of the way through. McCarey, working from his hospital bed and later the editing room, realized the film needed a radical fix to resolve its unraveling plot.
McCarey’s solution was to reintroduce a judge—a character who had appeared in the opening scenes but was subsequently dropped. By having this judge comment directly on the story’s complications, the filmmakers managed to salvage the pacing. The addition was so effective that it became the film’s standout element. Gail Patrick, who played the second wife, contributed to the dialogue, drawing on her own legal studies. This creative pivot proved successful, and the film remains a celebrated example of the genre, later inspiring remakes like 1963’s Move Over, Darling.
Opens the Intellect+ feed with this card first. Swipe up for the next one.
Sources
- Summary by Intellect · source: My Favorite Wife
- Also: Wikidata — My Favorite Wife · CC0
To cite this card, link to https://intellectplus.co.uk/app/entertainment-my-favorite-wife.
How we source, check and correct cards: Editorial standards.
General information, not professional advice. Spotted an error? Flag the card or see corrections and complaints.
Intellect Plus is a visual educational discovery platform for exploring fascinating facts and ideas. Brain Food, Not Brain Rot. What is Intellect Plus?
Related
More in Films · More in Entertainment · Latest · A–Z · All topics
