After studio publicist Lanny Morgan sends waning Wonder Pictures movie star Annabel Allison to prison as part of an unsuccessful publicity gimmick, he is fired by Allison and the studio’s head, Howard Webb. Ever resourceful, however, Lanny hires an actress to play his sickly mother and tricks the gullible Allison into having him re-hired. Then, to promote her new project, A Maid and a Man , Lanny talks Allison into posing as a maid and moves her in with the Fletchers, a middle class suburban family. Determined to maintain her glamourous facade, Allison, now called Mary Mason, brings in Lanny to wax the Fletchers’ floors and arrange for a caterer to prepare a lavish dinner. During the dinner, Mrs. Fletcher’s brother, the “Major,” a penniless inventor, brings home two “financiers,” Bailey and Martin, whom Mr. Fletcher later discovers are actually fugitive kidnappers. Once exposed, the kidnappers hold the Fletcher household hostage, while Webb orders Lanny to retrieve Allison, whose film is about to go into production. Lanny’s arrival at the Fletcher house is badly timed, however, and a terrified Allison sends him away before the kidnappers discover him. Bailey then forces the actress to pick up the ransom money with him. On the way back to the house, Allison leaves a bill from the ransom money at a newsstand and consequently has her prison “mug shot” printed in the newspapers. Desperate to rescue their star without involving the police any further, Webb and Lanny hire extras to pose as policemen and, with the unwitting help of Vladimir Dukov, a frustrated “serious” movie director, stage a phony raid on the Fletchers’ house. After a series of fake and genuine shootouts with the kidnappers, Allison overwhelms her foes with a jiu-jitsu maneuver and rescues both herself and Lanny. As soon as Allison’s subsequent international publicity tour ends, the incorrigible Lanny begins plotting yet another stunt for his favorite star. More on Wikipedia or Mubi
Watch The Affairs of Annabel (1938)
