Lake Neuron

I noticed the 1945 movie “Christmas in Connecticut” on TCM’s schedule today. I was stunned over the holidays last year to find that I was the only person in my family who’d seen it. It’s hilarious, and if you miss it on TCM today I strongly suggest you find the DVD somewhere.

The plot of the movie is that Barbara Stanwyck plays a Martha Stewart-type food columnist — except that she’s a complete fraud. She has no beautiful country home, no husband, and doesn’t cook; all of her recipes come to her from a friend. Her editor knows this, but the publisher (Sydney Greenstreet) doesn’t, and when a war hero (Dennis Morgan) returns to the states but has no place to spend the holidays the publisher decides that it would be great publicity for Stanwyck’s character to host him. Stanwyck must find a fake husband, a fake country home, and a way to make people think she’s cooking delicious meals. Naturally, the fake husband becomes an impediment when Stanwyck and Morgan fall in love.

I love “Casablanca,” of course, and in addition to Greenstreet this movie has the wonderful character actor S.Z. Sakall (sometimes billed as S.Z. “Cuddles” Sakall), who played Carl the maître’d in “Casablanca.”

If you like old movies as I do, this one’s a treat.