Professor Joan

Joan Davis the intellectual? Who'd have thought it? Certainly not fans of her 1940s radio shows, nor most of her movies at Fox. But Joan showed her versatility in the 1946 Universal comedy She Wrote the Book. In early scenes, she plays shy mathematics professor Jane Featherstone, faculty member of a small college. But throw in a train trip, and an unexpected knock on the head, and soon Jane is mistaken for Lulu Winters, author of the scandalous bestseller Always Lulu. What happens after that makes for one of Joan's best comedy films, one that has yet to have a proper DVD release.

Off-screen, of course, Joan was an extremely intelligent woman who made the most of her hard-earned talent as a comedienne, and successfully operated her own corporation, Joan Davis Enterprises. Want to know more about that? Well, here's my suggestion. Amazing what you can find in books these days, isn't it?