Gambling Lady

A syndicate runs every gambling house in town, and the one that earns least is the honest operation of Mike Lee. Pressed to allow cheating, Mike takes his own life, and his daughter Lady is left to make a living the only way she knows. She builds a name as a gambler among the rich, and when she falls out with the syndicate she considers a marriage proposal from Garry Madison, who comes from an old family. What the film really asks is whether that marriage can work against the difference in class and the ties she already has. Archie Mayo’s Warner production was made before the Hays Code was enforced in earnest. It is the first of six films Barbara Stanwyck and Joel McCrea made together, with Pat O’Brien and Claire Dodd in the cast. The record’s summary presents Mike’s death as though he simply walked away.