To Heir Is Human (1944)

• 54%
• 1944
• Harold Godsoe
• Una Merkel
• Harry Langdon
• Christine McIntyre

This Columbia short has Una Merkel and Harry Langdon billed above the title, in that order, with Harold Godsoe(who was an assistant director at Columbia and has no other director's credit on an American-made film) as the ONLY credited director on the film credits. Harry Edwards appears nowhere on this film's credits as the director. The first-billed Una Merkel has a job delivering telephone books, and is booted into, by Dr. I. M. Calm, the empty office across the hall of a Missing Persons Bureau. One A. Raven Sparrow (Lew Kelly, in his usual what-if-Boris Karloff went-really-looney tunes act) enters and offers her a thousand dollars to find a missing heir to a fortune, Harry Fenner (Harry Langdon.) Since this short runs less than twenty minutes, she is fortunate to find him washing the office windows. They make their way to the estate and find that "Uncle" Sparrow, his niece Velma (Christine McIntyre) and handyman-goon Bobo (Eddie Gribbon), who may or may not be related to anybody, are plotting to kill Harry in order to acquire his fortune. The whole thing perks up more than somewhat when Christine McIntyre shows up.