Wonkette Movie Night: Arsenic And Old Lace

'Look I probably should have told you this before but you see, well, insanity runs in my family. It practically gallops.'

Aug 09, 2026

Mortimer Brewster, a best selling author, was an avowed bachelor, but his heart was captured by Elaine Harper and they have quickly gotten married. They rush home to Brooklyn to tell their families. Mortimer needs to tell his beloved spinster aunts and Elaine needs to tell her father who is another kind of Father, the Rev. Harper. Mortimer tells his sweetheart they are off to Niagara Falls to celebrate; Elaine is to pack, they leave in an hour.

But not so fast!

This is where things get crazy for Mortimer and the world seems to spin out of control as he desperately tries to hold it together. As his aunts Martha and Abby are thrilled over his wedding, they insist on a celebration; but not having a toast with wine is for the best in this home. Teddy Roosevelt also lives with his aunts, that is Mortimer’s delusional brother. It seems the Brewster family has a long history of mental illness, as another brother, Jonathan, is criminally insane and believed to be imprisoned.

The real insanity begins when Mortimer discovers a dead body in the storage of the window seat. Believing that Teddy is now a killer, Mortimer sets in motion the plan to institutionalize him in a sanitarium. But Mortimer is about to get the surprise of his life when his sweet old aunties admit that they are the killers, in fact they have a basement full of bodies, poisoned with elderberry wine that was tainted with arsenic and strychnine. Seems Martha and Abby are geriatric versions of Dexter. They feel they are doing a great service to these lonely old men, giving them peace.

Things go from bad to worse as the deranged Jonathan shows up with his own murder victim and an accomplice, Dr. Einstein. Looking like Boris Karloff after he kissed a weed whacker, Jonathan is cruel and creepy and demands that his aunts let him stay the night. Jonathan needs to hide from the cops and dispose of his victim’s body; he has discovered a conveniently dug grave in the cellar and also his aunts’ secret.

As the front entrance to the aunts’ home becomes nearly a revolving door of characters coming and going, Mortimer tries to hold everything together even as it is going to hell. He is surrounded by people that all want something from him. One of his brothers wants to kill him and the other wants to be called Mr. President; his fiancée wants to go on their honeymoon; his aunts want him to just forget the whole bodies in the basement issue; the local cop wants him to read his screenplay; and a cabbie just wants to get paid.

What Mortimer wants is to start the day all over, and enjoy his time with his new bride. He might get what he wants, in some form or another, after all this is a Cary Grant flick and that man always seems to come out on top.

Apparently some people think my cat Harry is Cary in feline form. They may be onto something.

Arsenic And Old Lace stars Cary Grant, Jean Adair, Peter Lorre, Josephine Hall, Priscilla Lane, Raymond Massey, John Alexander, and Edward Everett Horton. Directed by Frank Capra.

Arsenic And Old Lace is available for free on the Internet Archive; $5.99 in the usual places; $3.99 on Google Play. A colorized version is available for free on Alugha.

To make requests and see the movie lists and schedules, go to WonkMovie.

The animated short is Hang On To The Night, with a song by Tegan and Sara; directed by Lisa Hanawalt and animated by Nicole Stafford.

Next week’s Movie Night selection is The Devil And Miss Jones (1941), available for free with ads on The Roku Channel and Plex; $3.99 in the usual places. With library card on Kanopy.