There's fun to be had by all in this glamorous musical comedy with tons of Paramount contract stars (and some musical guests) from 1933. There's George Burns as a befuddled doctor, Gracie Allen as his bird-brained nurse (with LOTS of stories involving her wacky family), W.C. Fields as a helicopter flying adventurer, Peggy Hopkins Joyce as a social climber named Peggy Hopkins Joyce, Bela Lugosi as a Russian General, and Franklin Pangborn as the delightful sissy hotel manager, flustered by everything and anything. It all involves a hotel in Wu Hu China under quarantine and an inventor showing off his television like contraption, a similar plot devise later utilized in "The Big Broadcast of 1936".
There are lots of great scenes of pre-code innuendo between practically all of the cast, mostly Fields and Allen (writing his signature on her nurse's uniform collar after she asks for his autograph, he responds, "I'd like to write your epitaph!"), Fields and Pangborn ("Don't Let the Posy Fool You!"), and Fields and Joyce (particularly a scene of discovering some newly born kittens on the helicopter they are making an escape on). Some of them are downright dirty. Then, there are the musical numbers, which include songs by Baby Rose Marie and Cab Colloway, and a wacky production number featuring Sterling Holloway called "She Was a Chinese Teacup, But He Was Just a Mug!" that features giant puzzle pieces. Short and sweet, "International House" is the epitome of what makes great musical comedy-girls, gags and gowns.
There are lots of great scenes of pre-code innuendo between practically all of the cast, mostly Fields and Allen (writing his signature on her nurse's uniform collar after she asks for his autograph, he responds, "I'd like to write your epitaph!"), Fields and Pangborn ("Don't Let the Posy Fool You!"), and Fields and Joyce (particularly a scene of discovering some newly born kittens on the helicopter they are making an escape on). Some of them are downright dirty. Then, there are the musical numbers, which include songs by Baby Rose Marie and Cab Colloway, and a wacky production number featuring Sterling Holloway called "She Was a Chinese Teacup, But He Was Just a Mug!" that features giant puzzle pieces. Short and sweet, "International House" is the epitome of what makes great musical comedy-girls, gags and gowns.