What Robert Montgomery learned from PGW

Another short anecdote, taken from the Suffolk News-Herald for August 8, 1931, now concerning American actor and director Robert Montgomery (1904-1981):

ROBERT MONTGOMERY TAUGHT HOW TO DROP H's BY P. G. WODEHOUSE

Robert Montgomery learned how to drop his H's from no less an authority than P. G. Wodehouse for his role of the English butler in "The Man in Possession," his new Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer picture which will open Monday at the Chadwick Theatre.

Wodehouse, who supplied additional dialogue for the picturization of the H. M. Harwood stage farce, counseled Montgomery on the art of slicing the H's off his words on which they belong and taking them on where they have no business.

"That's the secret of English dialect," the noted British humorist told Montgomery. "Do anything backwards and you are sure to get a laugh."

Use of such Piccadilly outbursts as "Pip-Pip!", "Right Ho!", "Cherrio!" and "Chin-chin!" were suggested by Wodehouse to add emphasis to definite declarations.

"They add—well-er—they sound so bally—that is to say—well, bally— if you know what I mean!" advised Wodehouse, creator of Jeeves and other inimitable English fiction characters.

Sam Wood directed the new Montgomery picture with Charlotte Greenwood heading the supporting cast which includes Irene Purcell, C. Aubrey Smith, Beryl Mercer, Reginald Owen and Alan Mowbray.

Montgomery is seen as a young Englishman who poses as a butler for the attractive but penniless young widow who is trying to entangle his brother into a marriage for his money. All sorts of complications arise. In the end he marries the widow himself of course.

Wodehouse later mentioned him in 1935 as "Bob Montgomery" (The Luck of the Bodkins), and the next year Montgomery played James Crocker in a new adaptation of Piccadilly Jim by the MGM.

The Man in Possession (1931)

Wodehouse and the Anti-Tobacco League

A short anecdote about P. G. Wodehouse and the Anti-Tobacco League circulated between 1920 and 1921 among local American newspapers. This is the text as published in the Chico Record (California) on September 9, 1920:

THE MODERN WIFE

P. G. Wodehouse, the novelist and wit, was talking about the Anti-Tobacco League.

"They have taken our wine away from us," he said, "and they threaten to take away our tobacco. The modern woman, however, will balk them there.

"An anti-tobacco friend talked so eloquently at the house of a friend of mine the other day that a young municipal reformer rose and said solemnly:

"'My wife gave me a box of a hundred magnificent Egyptian cigarettes last night. I smoked one of them, but I now see so clearly the evils of cigarette smoking that I am going to go straight home and throw the rest in the fire.'

"The reformer's young wife then rose in her turn.

"'I'll go home with him,' she said, and she added, smiling brightly on the assembled guests:

"'My intention is to rescue the ninety and nine.'"

A very similar version appeared in the Arizona Republican on January 10, 1921, with minor changes including "beer" for "wine" and "block" for "balk". Probably there were others.

I have no idea where this originated, or whether the anecdote is genuine. For what it's worth, I haven't found it anywhere else without Wodehouse's name attached.