The Plot Thickens (1935)

A couple is arguing on  park bench as a policeman watches. She (Louise Latimer) calls the other man (Richard Tucker). He picks her up in his car, but the boyfriend (Owen Davis, Jr.) punches him.Tucker's butler (Arthur Aylesworth) sees Tucker quarrelling with another man. He is sweet on the maid (Barbara Barondess). He follows her and Paul Fix, the chauffer, he thinks, but it was Tucker in the wrong car. Tucker kisses Latimer, and she gets out of the car, then turns to see him shot. She runs into Davis at a service station, and he sends her away and stays to take care of things.

Our old buddy James Gleason is the lieutenant assigned to the case. Aylesworth says he found Tucker in his study. Gleason does not want Hildegard Withers (ZaSu Pitts) on the case, but she butts in anyway. All of the suspects are giving phoney alibis. Pitts finds a jewel that may be a clue, and sticks it in her purse. It turns out to be the Sultan emerald, stolen in Europe years before. A policeman comes in and handcuffs her, but when he finds out who she is, she is released. She meets Latimer as she comes into the police station, and sets out to prove her innocence. Davis is grilled by Gleason, and finally confesses that he drove Tucker home, but insists that he left him in the garage, which leaves the mystery of who took him into his study.

Fix has resigned because Aylesworth threatened to kill him, and Barondess tells this to Gleason. Aylesworth confesses that he was the one who brought Tucker into the house. Pitts slips into the study, and Fix knocks her out and steals a silver cup. As she recuperates, Pitts finds that a like tray had been on display in the Cosmopolitan Museum. She goes to view it, and while she is there a guard is killed. As Gleason comes to investigate the case, the cup is stolen. Gleason finds it in a box in the check room, but they determine that it was a bogus one that had been taken from Tucker's house and switched with the real one in the museum. Later, Gleason finds the real one in the base of a clay bust being taken from the museum by a young woman. She leads him to the gang, which is led by Fix. He also was the one who killed Tucker.

Pitts is badly miscast in this role. She whines too much, and cannot match up with the crusty but lovable Gleason.


Aylesworth


Latimer