It's a mass state of confusion for barrister Laurence Olivier when he is manipulated to share his hotel suite with the stranded Merle Oberon whom he later believes to be the wife in question when he takes on the divorce case by Ralph Richardson. Oberon, actually single and the only heir to her grandfather's estate, knows the truth but having fallen in love with him, keeps it secret while the real wife (Binnie Barnes) continues her own charade. It's a sex comedy without sex, and very funny and romantic.A year before their classic pairing as Heathcliff and Cathy in "Wuthering Heighrs", Olivier and Oberon play totally different emotions, giving a British taste of screwball comedy. They share complete chemistry as they romp around innocently in pajamas, moving bedroom furniture yo his living room. Gorgeous in Technicolor, this takes two people known more for drama and gives them something fun to play with. The innuendo is there, but it remains classy the entire time.

A year before they made the memorable "Wuthering Heights," Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier starred together in this comedy revolving around appropriate behavior, correspondents and carrying out a falsehood to its utmost degree.Did you notice that as the film went on, Oberon looked a lot older than the dashing Laurence, the attorney in the film who worked on divorce cases?The first scene is a lengthy one and to be perfectly honest, I could not wait for it to end. Due to a terrible foggy night in London, patrons at a ball are unable to secure lodging at a hotel and Oberon pushes her way into sharing Olivier's room. He is a bit stuffy and she is overly forward as we see the trials and tribulations of sharing a room only for one evening.When someone else who did the same thing is sued for divorce, Olivier thinks that the wife is Oberon and the rest of the film is devoted to his dilemma. As it becomes more apparent regarding what is going on, everyone laughs and Olivier is humiliated when the truth finally comes out.This is really an inane farce, over-stated, but the question of womanhood is well touched by Olivier at film's end.

Laurence Olivier, Merle Oberon, Ralph Richardson, and Binnie Barnes star in "The Divorce of Lady X," a 1938 comedy based on a play. Olivier plays a young barrister, Everard Logan who allows Oberon to spend the night in his hotel room, when the London fog is too dense for guests at a costume ball to go home. The next day, a friend of his, Lord Mere (Richardson), announces that his wife (Barnes) spent the night with another man at the same hotel, and he wants to divorce her. Believing the woman to be Oberon, Olivier panics. Oberon, who is single and the granddaughter of a judge, pretends that she's the lady in question, Lady Mere, when she's really Leslie Steele.We've seen this plot or variations thereof dozens of time. With this cast, it's delightful. I mean, Richardson and Olivier? Olivier and Oberon, that great team in Wuthering Heights? Pretty special. Olivier is devastatingly handsome and does a great job with the comedy as he portrays the uptight, nervous barrister. Oberon gives her role the right light touch. She looks extremely young here, fuller in the face, with Jean Harlow eyebrows and a very different hairdo for her. She wears some beautiful street clothes, though her first gown looks like a birthday cake, and in one gown she tries on, with that hair-do, she's ready to play Snow White. Binnie Barnes is delightful as the real Lady Mere.The color in this is a mess, and as others have mentioned, it could really use a restoration. Definitely worth seeing.

I loved the dialogue above all - the sharp and witty banter between British 'icons' Olivier and Oberon, and even the playful back and forth between Morton Selten as Lord Steele and H.B. Hallam as his long-suffering butler, Jeffries. Binnie Barnes was also superb as Lady Mere; her accent might have slipped, but she definitely had the right attitude for her character! The use of colour was also a plus, particularly with the wonderful outfits. I think Merle Oberon would have done better without the continuous close-ups - though she did have a certain magnetism, she doesn't quite hold up to such inspection - and Olivier was definitely better suited to the stage: indeed, that is probably where he thought he was, judging by the delivery of some of his character's lines. The improbability of the story aside, 'The Divorce of Lady X' is a wry 'snapshot' of its era: gender, class, morality - even weather (it's very hard to believe that London had smog so bad that people were unable to travel, but it did happen).