Don't Change Your Husband

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Leila Porter comes to dislike her husband James, a glue king who is always eating onions and looking sloppy. But after she divorces him and marries two-timing playboy Schuyler Van Sutphen th... Read allLeila Porter comes to dislike her husband James, a glue king who is always eating onions and looking sloppy. But after she divorces him and marries two-timing playboy Schuyler Van Sutphen the now-reformed James looks pretty good.Leila Porter comes to dislike her husband James, a glue king who is always eating onions and looking sloppy. But after she divorces him and marries two-timing playboy Schuyler Van Sutphen the now-reformed James looks pretty good.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.5/10

1.3K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Photos12

+ 5

More like this

6.7

Why Change Your Wife?

7.0

Male and Female

6.6

Daddy-Long-Legs

6.9

Blind Husbands

6.9

When the Clouds Roll by

6.9

True Heart Susie

6.6

The Hoodlum

6.6

The President

6.6

The Affairs of Anatol

6.9

Bumping Into Broadway

6.9

From Hand to Mouth

7.3

Way Down East

Storyline

Edit

Did you know

Edit

Trivia
This is the first collaboration between Gloria Swanson and Cecil B. DeMille.

Quotes
First Title Card: This does not deal with the tread of victorious Armies, nor defeated Huns - but is just a little sidelight on the inner life of Mr. and Mrs. Porter - who found that they should not have looked for their marital troubles with a Telescope - but with a Microscope.

Connections
Featured in Boulevard! A Hollywood Story (2021)

User reviews23

Review

Featured review

6/10

The title gives it away

In his autobiography Cecil B. DeMille did not spend time on Don't Change Your Husband. Except to say that this was his first film with a new discovery Gloria Swanson. He then went on for a couple of pages talking about his friendship over the years with her.

Don't Change Your Husband was one of DeMille's silent comedies with a Victorian moral to every one. Here Swanson is a bored wife married to comfortable and stuffy DeMille regular Elliott Dexter. He barely notices the wife any more, keeping his head buried in the newspaper in the morning. He also has a nasty habit of eating raw onions and that will kill romance like nothing else will.

But he's provided for Swanson well including a nice set of jewelry and even though Dorothy Parker hadn't said it yet, diamonds are a girl's best friend.

One day a real Snidely Whiplash type villain Lew Cody starts putting the moves on Swanson. She divorces Dexter and marries Cody. But Cody just wants her jewels for business and to shower on another and badder girl Julia Faye.

DeMille was a child of the Victorian era and this film ends just about as the title suggests. The title itself really gives it all away.

Julia Faye who was one of DeMille's mistresses appeared in most of his feature films right up to the second Ten Commandments. Another was Jeanie MacPherson who was an actress as well as a screenwriter. She did the script for this and many other DeMille films. Lastly there was Gladys Rosson who was his private secretary and on every set right up to The Greatest Show On Earth. He had a regular harem going, but all these women even after the relationship was over were well taken care of work wise.

In fact Faye has one of the more meatier parts in her career as the other woman in Don't Change Your Husband. If this was sound one can only imagine the dialog between Swanson and Faye.

Don't Change Your Husband was the beginning of a fine collaboration between a great director and great star.