The comedy Arsenic and Old Lace was a Broadway sensation about the peculiar goings-on in a seemingly dignified house. The play launched a popular film starring Cary Grant. It also inspired playwrights Reginald Denham and Edward Percy to create their own tale of eccentric older women. In 1940, the stage version of Ladies in Retirement was launched. The production which takes an almost-humorous look at mental illness was quite a success and led to a 1941 film version directed by Charles Vidor (director of 1944’s Gilda) and starring Ida Lupino, Elsa Lanchester, Evelyn Keyes and Louis Hayward.
Set in an English country house, the story concerns the home’s dowager owner, Leonora Fiske (Isobel Elsom) and her housekeeper Ellen Creed (Lupino). Their life is quiet and reserved. But, that’s soon to change when Ellen learns that her two eccentric sisters are being booted from their London home by their landlord who finds their strange behavior increasingly alarming. Ellen begs Miss Fiske to allow her sisters to “visit,” and the woman reluctantly agrees. Soon, Miss Fiske finds the behavior of her guests—Emily (Lanchester) and Louisa (Edith Barrett)--to be unbearable. Emily is aggressive and rebellious while Louisa acts like a child (a really bad, deranged child). They fill the house with dead birds and brush and behave in other unseemly ways. Miss Fiske wants them out! But, Ellen knows that if she evicts her sisters they’re sure to end up in the madhouse. Ellen quickly realizes that she must protect her family at any cost. The result is a rather startling plan which could mean the undoing of all three sisters.
This film, by today’s standards, is rather tame. However, it is still an interesting thriller in its own quiet way. Lachester and Lupino give excellent performances. Ida Lupino was in her early twenties at the time. Though the character of Ellen was meant to be in her sixties, Vidor wanted to take a chance and cast the versatile Lupino in the role. With make-up and harsh-lighting, Lupino looks almost inhuman and ageless as if she’s a creature that exists purely on the basis of her own energy.
Not often remembered, the film has a steady following and always has. It is notable as having elements of Psycho—twenty years before Hitchcock’s immortal thrilled. Perhaps Mr. Hitchcock was as inspired by Ladies in Retirement as its writers had been by another work of art.
Set in an English country house, the story concerns the home’s dowager owner, Leonora Fiske (Isobel Elsom) and her housekeeper Ellen Creed (Lupino). Their life is quiet and reserved. But, that’s soon to change when Ellen learns that her two eccentric sisters are being booted from their London home by their landlord who finds their strange behavior increasingly alarming. Ellen begs Miss Fiske to allow her sisters to “visit,” and the woman reluctantly agrees. Soon, Miss Fiske finds the behavior of her guests—Emily (Lanchester) and Louisa (Edith Barrett)--to be unbearable. Emily is aggressive and rebellious while Louisa acts like a child (a really bad, deranged child). They fill the house with dead birds and brush and behave in other unseemly ways. Miss Fiske wants them out! But, Ellen knows that if she evicts her sisters they’re sure to end up in the madhouse. Ellen quickly realizes that she must protect her family at any cost. The result is a rather startling plan which could mean the undoing of all three sisters.
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