THE LETTER by William Wyler
by Andre Soares
The Letter (1940) 
Director: William Wyler. Screenplay: Howard Koch, from W. Somerset Maugham’s 1927 play. Cast: Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall, James Stephenson, Gale Sondergaard, Frieda Inescort, Sen Yung
UNFAITHFULLY YOURS
The Letter is one of the best films made during the Golden Age of the Hollywood studios. Bette Davis’s calculating murderess, William Wyler’s tough-as-nails direction, Gale Sondergaard’s mysterious blackmailer, James Stephenson’s forceful defense attorney, and Tony Gaudio’s atmospheric cinematography are only a few of the flawless ingredients found in this classic tale of murder and deceit. Even the silly moralistic ending — imposed by the Production Code — fails to detract from the effectiveness of this first-rate melodrama.
The Letter was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including best picture, best actress, and best director.
Synopsis:
In the dark of night, a series of gunshots are heard in a Malayan rubber plantation. Leslie Crosbie (Bette Davis) walks out the door of her house firing shots at local playboy Jeff Hammond, who falls dead on the ground. When later questioned, Leslie claims that she was defending her honor.
Everyone, including husband Robert Crosbie (Herbert Marshall), is convinced that Leslie is telling the truth. Even so, an inquest is required by law. Robert hires a family friend, Howard Joyce (James Stephenson), to act as Leslie’s attorney but Howard starts having doubts about Leslie’s version of the events. Howard’s suspicions are confirmed when his clerk, Ong Chi Seng (Sen Yung), offers to sell him a letter Leslie had written to Hammond on the day he was killed. In the letter, Leslie desperately asks Hammond to come visit her.
Howard confronts Leslie with a copy of the letter, forcing her to confess that she and Hammond had been having an affair. Because of his friendship with Robert, Howard agrees to forsake his code of legal ethics in order to buy the incriminating evidence. The letter is in the possession of Mrs. Hammond (Gale Sondergaard), a mysterious Eurasian woman who demands that Leslie come see her in person with the requested $10,000 for the letter.
Following an intense meeting in a room bathed in shadows, Mrs. Hammond gets her money and Leslie gets her letter. Without the evidence, Leslie is acquitted of her crime. Robert remains in the dark about the whole matter, until he tries to withdraw $10,000 from his savings account in order to buy a rubber plantation in Sumatra. At this point, Leslie is forced to confess to her husband about both her affair with and her murdering of Hammond. Despite it all, Robert forgives his wife. Mrs. Hammond, however, is not nearly as understanding. When Leslie goes out for a night stroll, the Hammond widow stabs the Hammond killer to death.
Notes:
The W. Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) play, which opened in New York on September 26, 1927, was based on a short story by Maugham published in 1925. The play starred Katharine Cornell (1898–1974).
An earlier version of The Letter (1929) starred Broadway actress Jeanne Eagels (1894–1929). W. Somerset Maugham’s play would be remade in 1947 (as The Unfaithful, with Ann Sheridan), and for television in 1982, with Lee Remick. Many other variations of the basic plot have also been filmed.
In 1938, Merle Oberon and Walter Huston starred in a Lux Radio Theatre version of The Letter.
Herbert Marshall (1890–1966), the clueless cuckolded husband in the 1940 version of The Letter, can also be seen in the 1929 film. In the earlier version, Marshall plays the lover who gets shot dead by jealous-as-hell Jeanne Eagels.
One major difference between the two versions is that in the 1929 film, the lover is an actual role. (In the 1940 version, he’s briefly seen being shot in the back and falling dead on the ground.) Marshall does remarkably well as the seducer who is ready to abandon the British "seducee" for his East Asian mistress.
Bette Davis (1908–1989) also starred in the remake of another Jeanne Eagels vehicle, Jealousy (1929), which was reconfigured in 1946 under the title Deception.
The Production Code Administration rejected the initial draft that Warner Bros. submitted for The Letter because, as in Maugham’s play, it contained unpunished adultery and murder. Thus, the studio was forced to replace the original ending — in which Leslie extols her love for the dead man to both her husband and the audience — with one in which the adulteress-cum-murderess gets punished for her deeds.
The pre-Production Code 1929 version of the film maintained the original ending. Also, in that film Hammond has a mistress (played by Lady Tsen Mei, 1888–1985), not a wife. And finally, the lady in question was able to keep both her East Asian ethnicity and her job (a brothel madam).
Cecil Kellaway (1893–1973) is listed in the credits for The Letter, even though his character can be glimpsed only in a long shot during a party scene. His scenes were most likely cut from the final release print.
Both George Amy and Warren Low are credited as editors of The Letter. However, only Low was nominated for an Academy Award in that category. (Amy was possibly an assistant editor.)
The Bette Davis DVD Collection
LEMONY SNICKET’S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS
VOCES INOCENTES / INNOCENT VOICES
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