In 1890, two students at Oxford force their rascally friend and fellow student to pose as an aunt from Brazil--where the nuts come from.In 1890, two students at Oxford force their rascally friend and fellow student to pose as an aunt from Brazil--where the nuts come from.In 1890, two students at Oxford force their rascally friend and fellow student to pose as an aunt from Brazil--where the nuts come from.
- Awards
- 1 win
Russell Burroughs
- Teammate
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaSomewhat a landmark film for 20th Century-Fox, as it was the first film they offered the exhibitors under the recently-established terms of the consent decree, conditions that no longer allowed a film studio or company to force the exhibitors to book a large block of films from the same company in order to get any film from that company in a production season. They could still require the exhibitor to make bookings in blocks of five, and "Charley's Aunt" was the first of the five offered. The other four could have been turkeys, but they had to be booked in order to get "Charley's Aunt."
- GoofsIn all Oxbridge (Oxford and Cambridge) colleges it is a strict rule that only fellows (and their attendant guests) are allowed to walk on the grass within the college grounds. However, in the film, students and others persistently ignore this regulation.
- Quotes
[first lines]
Student: Good afternoon, Mr. Redcliff.
- ConnectionsEdited into Myra Breckinridge (1970)
Featured review
Box office with Benny
Since Brandon Thomas's play Charley's Aunt debuted on the London stage its popularity is unabated to this day. Somewhere in this world there's a stock company doing this material and some actor regaling his audience with the image of that cigar smoking matronly aunt in drag.
For an English play this 1941 version boasts a mixed cast of Americans and English players that 20th Century Fox assembled. Purists would surely object to this mixed cast. But Darryl Zanuck in casting Jack Benny in the lead had guaranteed box office with one of the most popular radio stars around.
James Ellison and Richard Haydn are trying to make time with a pair of young girls visiting Oxford played by Anne Baxter and Arleen Whelan. They kind of blackmail their roommate Jack Benny into donning the drag he will be using for one of the Oxford theater society plays into being Haydn's long lost aunt from Brazil.
Trouble is that the long lost aunt has at the same time turned up in the United Kingdom. Kay Francis for reasons of her own has decided to visit her nephew Richard Haydn at Oxford. After this the story becomes hilariously confusing as both Edmund Gwenn as Baxter's guardian and Laird Cregar as Ellison's father become quite taken with Benny in drag. Think of Joe E. Brown in Some Like It Hot.
Gwenn is an old miser who enjoys a rich income being the guardian of Baxter and her fortune. As for Cregar in real life he was three years younger than Ellison his son. But Cregar was a classically trained character actor could play a variety of parts. Back in the day Charles Laughton whose career Cregar's was starting to resemble said that the censor's could never censor the gleam in his eyes. Cregar had an exponential gleam in this and other parts. Sadly he would die within a few years.
Probably an English production would capture the entire essence of Charley's Aunt. But the British were never blessed to claim Jack Benny as one of their own.
For an English play this 1941 version boasts a mixed cast of Americans and English players that 20th Century Fox assembled. Purists would surely object to this mixed cast. But Darryl Zanuck in casting Jack Benny in the lead had guaranteed box office with one of the most popular radio stars around.
James Ellison and Richard Haydn are trying to make time with a pair of young girls visiting Oxford played by Anne Baxter and Arleen Whelan. They kind of blackmail their roommate Jack Benny into donning the drag he will be using for one of the Oxford theater society plays into being Haydn's long lost aunt from Brazil.
Trouble is that the long lost aunt has at the same time turned up in the United Kingdom. Kay Francis for reasons of her own has decided to visit her nephew Richard Haydn at Oxford. After this the story becomes hilariously confusing as both Edmund Gwenn as Baxter's guardian and Laird Cregar as Ellison's father become quite taken with Benny in drag. Think of Joe E. Brown in Some Like It Hot.
Gwenn is an old miser who enjoys a rich income being the guardian of Baxter and her fortune. As for Cregar in real life he was three years younger than Ellison his son. But Cregar was a classically trained character actor could play a variety of parts. Back in the day Charles Laughton whose career Cregar's was starting to resemble said that the censor's could never censor the gleam in his eyes. Cregar had an exponential gleam in this and other parts. Sadly he would die within a few years.
Probably an English production would capture the entire essence of Charley's Aunt. But the British were never blessed to claim Jack Benny as one of their own.
- bkoganbing
- Mar 17, 2015
- Permalink
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Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Karlova tetka
- Filming locations
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
- Runtime1 hour 20 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
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