East Side, West Side (1949)

My Review

“East Side, West Side” is a drama film where Barbara Stanwyck plays a woman whose husband has had numerous affairs, with one of his ex-girl friends coming to town to cause trouble. Weak direction by Mervyn Leroy (“Gold Diggers of 1933” 1933) and a mediocre script by Isobel Lennart turned what was intended to be a top feature film for MGM into a second-rate melodrama.

The cast includes Barbara Stanwyck, Van Heflin, Cyd Charisse, Gale Sondergaard, William Conrad, William Frawley, Ava Gardner, Raymond Greenleaf, Beverly Michaels, Tom Powers, and Nancy Davis as Helen Lee. In 1952, Davis married Ronald Reagan, and would go on to be First Lady of the U. S. (1981-1989). “East Side, West Side” made a modest profit at the box office for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.