You’ll Find Out (1940)

You’ll Find Out (USA, 1940) 97 min B&W DIR-PROD: David Butler. SCR: David Butler, James V. Kern, Monte Brice, Andrew Bennison, R.T.M. Scott. DOP: Frank Redman. MUSIC: Roy Webb. CAST: Kay Kyser, Boris Karloff, Peter Lorre, Bela Lugosi, Helen Parrish, Dennis O’Keefe, Alma Kruger, Joseph Eggenton, Ginny Simms, Harry Babbitt, Ish Kabibble. (RKO Radio Pictures)

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In the early 1940s, big band leaders would sometimes be featured in acting roles, other than merely appearing on camera in musical numbers. Even so, they would be playing more or less themselves. Before Glenn Miller played “Phil” in Sun Valley Serenade (1941), and Harry James took the lead in Private Buckaroo (1942), Kay Kyser played himself in this very entertaining comedy-musical-mystery thriller. 

Kyser and his band The College of Musical Knowledge is set to play a concert for the 21st birthday party of Janis Bleachers (Helen Parrish) thrown by her boyfriend Chuck (Dennis O’Keefe).  She and all her co-ed girlfriends together for a shindig -gulp- set in a creepy old mansion owned by her widowed aunt Margo (Alma Kruger). Janis has mentioned to Chuck her belief that someone is trying to kill her. We already witnessed a car nearly hitting her before they get to the house. If the viewer still isn’t convinced, then all we need is for Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff and Peter Lorre to show up. Lugosi in a silver turban plays a so-called psychic named Prince Saliano who claims to communicate with Margo’s dead husband in the afterworld. Karloff is the “kindly” Judge Spencer Mainwaring, who blows up the bridge with a laser beam, so everyone has to spend the night. (Perhaps the last word on the old trope: “the bridge is washed out, you’ll have to spend the night”.) Peter Lorre appears as Professor Karl Fenninger, out there to discredit Saliano, but of course we don’t trust him, either. 

For anyone enamoured of the “old dark house” formula, it may not be much of a surprise why Janis’s life is endangered, but the movie has a lot of fun in getting there. The flick might be too leisurely for any suspense, because it is also a vehicle for a swing band, with vocal numbers by Ginny Simms (the Oscar-nominated song, “I’d Know You Anywhere”) and Harry Babbitt (“You’ve Got Me This Way”), plus comic relief with band mate Ish Kabbible (think of a 1940s Jerry Lewis). Make no mistake… Kyser is the hero of the piece, as he and his band blunder into secret passageways, gadgetry, and inadvertently uncover what these three guys are up to.

My viewing of the movie is courtesy of Warner’s 4-movie, 2-DVD set, Karloff & Lugosi Horror Classics. This is the only one in the collection in which the horror greats appear together. Although You’ll Find Out counts as one of the eight Karloff-Lugosi team-ups, the dynamic is more with Kyser and Lorre, as the band leader ill-advisedly confides in the professor everything that he discovers. Although a hit in its day, its modern day appeal is likely for the horror stars. (But I’m also a big band freak, so win-win.) The highlight for genre fans would be the seance set piece, where Lugosi is clearly relishing the role.

Although this is a comedy-musical, it does have a smoky atmosphere thanks to the moody cinematography by Frank Redman, who would fittingly lend his talent to RKO’s Saint, Falcon and Dick Tracy movies. Director David Butler was a veteran of comedy-musicals, including several Shirley Temple vehicles, the Hope-Crosby classic Road to Morocco and many Doris Day pictures. Genre fans will also want to check out his 1930 film, Just Imagine: a wonderfully daft science-fiction musical set in the future of 1980! (Trivia note: an unbilled Jeff Corey appears as a radio contestant in the opening scene.)

Fittingly, I had viewed this on a Thursday evening. It recalled the programmers that would be shown at the Nostalgic Cinema on Thursday nights, when you could stay to see the second movie for free. A nice memory.