Collar City Brownstone: Dear Wife

Dear Wife is another movie that I never heard of before and glad I found it on Netflix. Dear Wife stars William Holden as Bill Seacroft, Joan Caulfield as Ruth Seacroft, Mona Freeman as Miriam Wilkins, Billy De Wolfe as Albert Kummer, Edward Arnold as Judge Wilkins, and Mary Philips as Edie Wilkins. Dear Wife was released on November 15, 1949. The movie was directed by Richard Haydn.

Dear Wife is actually a sequel to a movie called Dear Ruth. I wanted to watch that movie too and review it first before reviewing this one. However, Dear Ruth is not available for streaming on either Netflix or Amazon. Dear Ruth goes into how Ruth and Bill met.

Joan Caulfield and William Holden as Ruth and Bill Seacroft.

Ruth Seacroft has a younger sister named Miriam who is always causing some type of trouble. Miriam and Ruth's father Judge Wilkins is running for a State Senate seat. Miriam is against her father running because he is in favor of demolishing over 100 homes to make way for an airport. That means that over 100 families will be displaced. Miriam believes that her brother in law Bill would make a better candidate so she signs him up to run without his knowledge.

At first Bill Seacroft plans to withdraw his name, but after he has a meeting with a woman named Tommy Murphy he decides to run for the senate seat because he feels very strongly that the airport should not be built at the expensive of displacing so many families. Ruth and Bill live with her parents, so calamity breaks out in the Wilkins household when father and son in law are running for the same senate seat.

To add tension to Ruth and Bill's marriage, Bill works as a teller at a bank and does not make enough money to provide for Ruth which is why they are living with her parents. Bill feels guilty that he cannot yet provide better for Ruth.

Tommy Murphy is the woman in front on the right hand side.

Tommy Murphy is Bill Seacroft's campaign manager. Bill Seacroft loves and cares very much for Ruth, but she becomes jealous of Tommy. One day Bill and Judge Wilkins have an argument and Bill decides to move out of Judge Wilkin's house. Ruth refuses to go with him instead of standing by her man. After Bill leaves, Ruth takes a job with a real estate company. One day Ruth is at a lovely apartment that she is showing to potential renters. One the people who show up is Bill. Bill got himself a better paying job and can afford a nice place. While at the apartment Bill and Ruth get to talking and it looks like they will reconcile when Tommy shows up. Tommy and Bill have a lunch engagement regarding the campaign. Bill and Tommy try to explain that it is all business but Ruth keeps interrupting them and will not let them explain. After Tommy and Bill leave for lunch Ruth decides to take a job in Chicago with the real estate company she now works for.

Ruth really got on my nerves because when things got tough she was too spoiled of a brat to stand with her husband. She nearly threw her marriage away because she was too stubborn and hot headed. Thank God for her father who took things into his own hands to try to get her not to leave for Chicago and face her husband. Judge Wilkins knew that Bill and Ruth loved each other and if Ruth left she would be making the biggest mistake of her life. The only thing standing in Ruth's way was her pride.

Despite the seriousness of what happens to Bill and Ruth, this movie is also quite funny. Miriam Wilkins is so funny and so is the Judge. If you want to know how this movie ends you will have to watch it yourself, but I am sure that you can guess.