SOURCE: Krutch, Joseph Wood. “What Nothing Succeeds Like.” The Nation 149, no. 18 (October 28, 1939): 474-75.

In the following review, Krutch objects to what he sees as a lack of warmth and merriment in The Man Who Came to Dinner although he recognizes that it is funny and skillfully crafted.

Not even the obvious virtues of farce as the Messrs. Kaufman and Hart have learned to write it seem quite adequate to explain the boundless enthusiasm with which their successive works are received. A very large and very mixed audience has taken them to its heart in some special way and greets them with a warmth seldom exhibited upon any other occasion, grave or gay. The glow begins at the first hint that a new piece is to be expected, and as the great night approaches, the elect assemble in the best of their good clothes ready to greet one another...