Susan Slept Here Through Police Misconduct

This movie was considered scandalous upon its release. The title alone was shocking. Despite the fact that the “sleep” was quite literal. They weren’t shocked at the bit I felt particularly unsettling, the bit where she’s only in the story at all because of police misconduct, which we’ll get to. I mean, the overall plot has its problems as well, which we’ll also get to, but the title alone was apparently enough to set people off. The Chicago board of censors declared it for adults only, and honestly I can see that. Though I think a lot of what’s going on here would fly under the radar for a lot of kids.

Mark Christopher (Dick Powell) is an Oscar-winning screenwriter. However, he wants to write Serious Drama—a recurring problem in movies about screenwriters—and so he walks away from a paid position and settles into his apartment to write a Serious Drama. And gets writers’ block. He writes a script, but Maude Snodgrass (Glenda Farrell), his secretary, makes it clear that it sucks. Some police friends of his (Horace McMahon and Herb Vigran), remember that he wants to write about juvenile delinquency and bring him Susan Landis (Debbie Reynolds).

Mark agrees to take Susan in to keep her from being sent to a prison work farm. You know, because it’s Christmas and all. His fiancée, Isabella Alexander (Anne Francis), is not thrilled about the whole thing. His old Navy buddy, Virgil (Alvy Moore), thinks the whole thing’s funny but bails pretty much right away. And then the cops show up to take her back to the work farm because their lieutenant found out, and rather than let that happen, Mark marries her. But only until she turns eighteen and they can get an annulment.

Because an important part of the plot is that Susan is seventeen. She’s got a letter from her mother, who’s in Peru with her own new husband, letting her get married. But she’s still only seventeen and has no visible means of support. Mark doesn’t, either, but they let him live on his own anyway. Anyway, he tells her that he’s 35—a year older than her mother—and tells everyone he’s 29. (Powell was 49 and Reynolds was 22; it’s not impossible that he actually was older than her mother.) And while he marries her to keep her off the prison farm, she falls in love with him immediately.

I agree that Mark doesn’t seem to have much in common with Isabella, from what little we see of her, but he feels like he’s going to settle into “old bachelorhood” with Virgil. He’s got his maid, Georgette (Maidie Norman), and Maude, and if he can just start writing scripts, everything should be fine. Now, there’s a script that would’ve caused great scandal in the ‘40s. Even though clearly, both Mark and Virgil are of age.