Another comedy I recommend is the wacky, risqué tomfoolery of International House (1933).  An assortment of people meet at the title hotel in China to witness and bid upon a Chinese inventor’s new invention — television!

Several countries send delegates to persuade inventor Dr. Wong (Edmund Breese) to sell the rights to them; Dr. Wong, however, would prefer to deal with the Americans.  The problem is that the American representative, Stu Erwin, is stuck in the desert with playgirl Peggy Hopkins Joyce.  Joyce was notorious in real life for marrying and then leaving millionaires; here she plays herself, poking fun at her somewhat shady reputation.

Most people remember this comedy as the one where W. C. Fields arrives at the International House in an auto gyro and then drives his car out of it and speeds all around the hotel.  Then there’s Bela Lugosi in a rare comedy role as the Russian general plotting to take the invention to Mother Russia.  In sequences seen on the inventor’s “radioscope,” famous radio personalities of the era sing:  Rudy Vallee, Cab Calloway (performing “Reefer Man”) and Baby Rose Marie (who grew up to costar in many movies and the TV classic “The Dick Van Dyke Show.”).

George Burns and Gracie Allen have an extended routine and there’s a positively wacky musical number about a coffee mug that’s romantically pursuing a china teacup.  There’s something for everyone in A. Edward Sutherland’s International House, which speeds by like an express train on the fast track to cinematic Funnyland.  My rating:  ☆ ☆ 1/2.  (10:2).