It Pays to Advertise (1931 film)

It Pays to Advertise is a 1931 American pre-Code comedy film, based on the 1914 Broadway play of the same name by Roi Cooper Megrue and Walter Hackett, starring Norman Foster and Carole Lombard, and directed by Frank Tuttle.^[1]

It Pays to Advertise
Lobby card
Directed by	Frank Tuttle
Written by	Ethel Doherty Arthur Kober
Based on	It Pays to Advertise by Roi Cooper Megrue and Walter Hackett
Starring	Norman Foster Carole Lombard
Cinematography	Archie Stout
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date	February 19, 1931 (1931-02-19)
Running time	63 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

Paramount also produced a French-language version of the film titled Criez-le sur les toits [fr] (1932), directed by Karl Anton.

Plot

Rodney Martin sets up a soap business to rival his father. With the help of an advertising expert and his secretary, Mary, he develops a successful marketing campaign. His father ends up buying the company from him, while Rodney and Mary fall in love.^[2]

Cast

• Norman Foster as Rodney Martin
• Carole Lombard as Mary Grayson
• Richard 'Skeets' Gallagher as Ambrose Pearle
• Eugene Pallette as Cyrus Martin
• Lucien Littlefield as Adams
• Judith Wood as Countess de Beaurien (credited as Helen Johnson)
• Louise Brooks as Thelma Temple
• Morgan Wallace as L. R. McChesney
• Tom Kennedy as Perkins
• Marcia Manners as Miss Burke
• Frank Coghlan Jr. as Office Boy (credited as Junior Coghlan)
• John Howell as Johnson
• John Sinclair as Window Cleaner
• Mischa Auer as Man Putting Sign on Car^[3]

Reception

The film received positive reviews. Photoplay wrote that it has "plenty of speed and lots of laughs", and praised the "perfect cast".^[2]

See also

• It Pays to Advertise (1919)
• It Pays to Advertise (1936)