Today is Edmond O’Brien’s day here at TCM and later tonight (much later, as in 1:30 a.m., EST) will be showing the little seen 1953 drama, The Bigamist. Starring O’Brien (of course) with Joan Fontaine, Edmund Gwenn, and Ida Lupino, who also directs, the film takes a personal and sensitive look at the life of a man who ends up married to two women, both of whom he loves. Given the controversial topic and the time of its release, 1953, one would think the movie would have a far harsher, more disapproving take on the subject and yet it’s as nonjudgmental and understanding as a movie could be. Ida Lupino flew under the radar as a director in the then (and still) male-dominated occupation and, as a result, could make movies like The Bigamist that, since they weren’t expected to have a wide release anyway, could deal with such topics head on.
Ida Lupino began her acting career in the thirties in England before moving to Hollywood and achieving mild success when big roles in They Drive by Night and High Sierra made her, if not a big star, at least a recognizable face and name. While at Warner Brothers, she faced suspension on several occasions for either refusing to appear in certain movies or doing her own rewrites which exacerbated her already strained relationship with Jack Warner. Faced with fewer acting jobs as a result, she decided to try her hand at directing and succeeded critically, but not commercially, as her films never received a wide release.
In 1953, Lupino took on both directing and acting responsibilities for The Bigamist, written by her former husband, Collier Young, who was now married to Joan Fontaine, the co-star of the movie. Lupino not only showed her directing skill once again but proved no one directed her better than herself. Her performance is subdued and restrained, as is every other performance in the movie. There’s not a wild, over-ripe moment from any actor in the whole movie. Histrionics are out when Lupino steps behind the camera.
(SPOILER ALERT – PLOT SPOILERS BEGIN)
The story begins with Harry Graham (Edmond O’Brien) and his wife, Eve (Joan Fontaine), at the social services office of Mr. Jordan (Edmund Gwenn) who is working with them on their application to adopt a child. Eve is unable to have her own child and adoption is something both of them are eager to do to start a family. When Mr. Jordan asks them to sign a privacy waiver so he can look into every aspect of their lives before clearing the adoption, Harry hesitates. This immediately raises red flags for Mr. Jordan who begins prying into Harry’s life with vigor. Harry is a traveling salesman and spends half the week in Los Angeles, away from Eve and his home in San Francisco. Mr. Jordan heads to Los Angeles to see what he can uncover about Harry there and discovers he hasn’t checked into a boarding room in months. Instead, he discovers Harry, going by Harrison, is living in a house instead. When he stops by to see a surprised Harry, Harry tells him they can have lunch tomorrow and is just about to close the door when a baby cries from the other room. Harry has another family and Mr. Jordan has just caught him red-handed.
When asked by Mr. Jordan how he could do such a thing, Harry explains and the movie goes into flashback. It’s here that Harry explains how he met Phyllis (Ida Lupino) in Los Angeles on a “Homes of the Stars” tour (in a great His Girl Friday moment, one of the homes on the tour belongs to Edmund Gwenn, the movie’s own Mr. Jordan) and the movie details their growing love for each other while, at the same time, making clear that Harry never falls out of love with Eve. He loves two women and can’t bear to leave either one of them. When he gets Phyllis pregnant, he now finds himself looking at raising two families as well. At this point the movie brings us back to the present as we build to the amazingly level-headed, understanding, sympathetic conclusion.
(SPOILERS END)
If you skipped over the spoilers section, there’s one plot element that must be mentioned outside of it without giving away anything. During the course of the film, there is an unplanned, out-of-wedlock pregnancy. This is not treated in any way as evil or shameful but, rather, as an act of love between two people. When the father arrives at the boarding house to see his pregnant lover, the landlady doesn’t greet him with a disdainful and scornful, “Oh, it’s you,” that might have happened in a dozen other movies but instead with, “Oh good, you’re here. She really needs you.” The whole movie plays as if it was actually made by adults, for adults, not by someone with a social message they wanted to preach to a captive audience. And the ending is something else altogether. To say it leaves the question open as to how the three characters will resolve their relationship is an understatement. It literally leaves all three speechless, saying nothing to each other, just exchanging glances as the story reaches a stopping point rather than an ending.
After The Bigamist, Ida Lupino directed exclusively for television. RKO, after initially agreeing to distribute it, changed their mind forcing Lupino and Young to distribute it themselves which all but insured it would never succeed. Of course, it did succeed, on its own terms, and holds up today as one of Lupino’s best efforts, both as an actor and a director. It also succeeds as a guide on how to make a movie on a controversial topic that is understanding, restrained, and sympathetic.