The Hucksters

The Hucksters is a 1947 MGM film directed by Jack Conway and starring Clark Gable that marked the debut of Deborah Kerr in an American film. The supporting cast includes Sydney Greenstreet, Adolphe Menjou, Keenan Wynn, Edward Arnold and Ava Gardner. The movie is based on the novel The Hucksters by Frederic Wakeman, Sr., a skewering of the post-World War II radio advertising industry with a racy backdrop for its day involving Gable and his alternating pursuit of Kerr and Gardner.

Plot

Victor Norman (Clark Gable) is a radio advertising executive just back from World War II and looking for a job in his old field. He literally throws a few loose dollars out the hotel window, telling the hotel valet that being down to his last even $50 "will help me seem sincere about not needing a job." On his way to his interview, he stops and spends thirty-five of them on a "sincere" hand-painted necktie.

His appointment is at the Kimberly Advertising Agency, with Mr. Kimberly himself (Adolphe Menjou). As the two size each other up, they are interrupted by a phone call from Evan Llewellyn Evans (Sydney Greenstreet), the tyrannical, high-volume chief of the Beautee Soap company, the agency's biggest account. The call throws the staff into turmoil and derails Vic's interview, so he offers to perform an unpleasant task for Kimberly: recruit Mrs. Kay Dorrance (Deborah Kerr), widow of a WWII U.S. general and of noble British birth, for a Beautee soap campaign featuring New York socialites.