Fueled by the wit of Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, and the frenetic timing of Howard Hawks, Twentieth Century is a battle of the sexes stripped of the romance: pure screwball, and one of the best. John Barrymore is seemingly unstoppable as a wild-haired Broadway mogul. Carole Lombard meets him farce for farce as his one-time protegé and lover Lilly Garland (née Mildred Plotke), Hoboken Cinderella to his Svengali, bromo to his seltzer, now en route to normality. They meet again, on the Twentieth Century, destined to renew their "little comedy." The Hawksian parade includes Walter Connolly's obsequious bookkeeper ("Say the word, O.J., and I'll kill myself"), Roscoe Karns' well lubricated press agent, and that little man who plasters the train with stickers reading, "Repent! The time has come," placing one right on the nose of Mr. Hays Office. ("A passion play is what the public wants!" says Barrymore.) Like the chalk lines on Barrymore's rehearsal stage, this very American tale goes everywhere at once at an amazing clip, and winds up exactly where it began. Welcome to the Twentieth Century.