Beauty and the Boss

Bank executive Josef von Ullrich should be paying attention to the figures in the company ledgers, not the figure of the pretty stenographer sitting alongside his desk. So he fires her and ultimately hires an efficient mouse of a young woman who is plain, practical and will always strike the right keys. What's more, Josef knows she will never become an attractive distraction to him. But the wallflower is about to blossom.

A Depression-era working girl goes from ugly duckling to graceful swan, and wish-fulfillment reigns in Beauty and the Boss, a sometimes racy pre-Production Code comedy. Marian Marsh portrays the emerging beauty and Warren William is the boss in this second and last pairing of the stars of Under 18.

The old reliable Paul Frank/Ladislaus Fodor stage play The Church Mouse was streamlined for the movies in the form of BEAUTY AND THE BOSS. The "beauty" is fetching Marian Marsh, a stenographer in a staid Viennese financial institution. The "boss" is Warren William, a wealthy baron with a habit of dallying with pretty girls, then letting them down gently. But Marsh, who has a Cinderella complex, isn't about to be cast aside. The diffident Charles Butterworth injects a few genuine laughs into the pat and predictable proceedings.