The Reckless Age
About The Reckless Age
Lord Harrowby takes out a $100,000 policy that pays if his wedding to heiress Cynthia Meyrick is called off. The company sends Dick Minot to see that the ceremony happens. Dick falls for Cynthia, and she for him. An impostor claims to be Harrowby and is kidnapped. A chorus girl threatens a breach-of-promise suit. Minot ends that threat by showing she is already married. Reginald Denny is Dick. Ruth Dwyer is Cynthia. William Austin is Harrowby.
Cast & crew
More about The Reckless Age
Harry A. Pollard directed Rex Taylor’s script from Earl Derr Biggers’s novel Love Insurance. Universal released it on 17 August 1924. It runs seven reels, about 70 minutes. It remakes the 1919 Paramount film Love Insurance, now lost. John Steppling is Spencer Meyrick. May Wallace is Auntie. Tom McGuire is Martin Wall. Fred Malatesta is Manuel Gonzales. Fay Tincher is the Duchess of Lismore.
Themes
Making
Pollard’s job is the insurance man’s job: keep two people married who should not be, while the man on the case wants the bride. The impostor and the chorus girl are the obstacles Taylor keeps from the novel.
Music
Silent.
Preservation
A print survives. The 1919 Paramount version of the same novel does not.
Notes
- Some synopses spell the bride Cecilia. The cast list says Cynthia Meyrick.
- Henry A. Barrows is John Thacker. Frederick Vroom is Owen Johnson. William E. Lawrence is John Paddock.
- Hayden Stevenson is Henry Trimmer. Frank Leigh is George Jenkins.
- The 1919 Love Insurance, with no surviving print, used the same Biggers novel.
- The policy is against a cancelled wedding, not against a death.
Scenes
- Harrowby insures the wedding for $100,000 against cancellation.
- Minot is sent to protect the match and falls for Cynthia.
- He stops the chorus girl’s suit by producing her marriage.
Influenced by
- Love Insurance (Earl Derr Biggers)
- Love Insurance (1919 film)
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (The Reckless Age (1924) by Harry A. Pollard.webm)
