Reviews
The contemporary critical reviews were uniformly positive. The New York Times critic summed up the majority view, "As a whole, Arsenic and Old Lace, the Warner picture which came to the Strand yesterday, is good macabre fun." Variety declared, "Capra's production, not elaborate, captures the color and spirit of the play, while the able writing team of Julius J. and Philip G. Epstein has turned in a very workable, tightly-compressed script. Capra's own intelligent direction rounds out."
Twenty-four years after the film was released, Charles Higham and Joel Greenberg wrote Hollywood in the Forties where they stated that "Frank Capra provided a rather overstated and strained version of Arsenic and Old Lace".
American Film Institute recognition
- 2000: AFI's 100 Years... 100 Laughs #30
Read more about this topic: Arsenic And Old Lace (film)
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“Why do I do this every Sunday? Even the book reviews seem to be the same as last week’s. Different books—same reviews.”
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