Adam's Rib

A woman shoots and wounds her husband in the flat where she finds him with his mistress. At the trial the prosecutor is Adam Bonner and the defence counsel is his wife, Amanda Bonner. They are married and go on living in the same house. Amanda turns the case into a question of equality: what would the jury say if a man had done the same thing. The fight in the courtroom moves home and the marriage becomes as endangered as the case. George Cukor directed. Spencer Tracy plays Adam and Katharine Hepburn plays Amanda. The screenplay was written by a married pair of writers, Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin. It is the sixth of the nine films Tracy and Hepburn made together and is usually taken as the best of them; the two had been together since 1941. The screenplay was nominated for the Academy Award in 1950. Gordon and Kanin drew it from what friends of theirs who were lawyers had actually lived through. What is still argued about is that it makes its case for equality inside a comedy, taking Amanda's argument seriously and then having her withdraw it for the sake of the marriage. Who it is for: viewers who like classic Hollywood comedy and the Tracy and Hepburn pairing. Who it is not for: anyone needing the politics to hold. The ending ties the case Amanda won to a personal accommodation, and that retreat was criticised at the time too.