A roundup of Hollywood’s sharpest, silliest, and most side-splitting comedies from the 1930s to early 1960s that prove vintage humor can still be timeless.
Sections
4
Screwball Madness
Comedy of Manners
Physical & Farcical Fun
Quirky & Under-the-Radar
Screwball Madness
Rapid-fire dialogue, improbable situations, and battle-of-the-sexes chaos define these riotous screwball gems.
Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, and a leopard named Baby turn a quiet life into total pandemonium.
Bringing Up Baby (1938)
A divorced couple sabotage each other’s new romances with razor-sharp banter.
The Awful Truth (1937)
A socialite "rescues" a homeless man—who turns out to be smarter than everyone else.
My Man Godfrey (1936)
Comedy of Manners
These witty, urbane films skewer class, pretension, and social norms with style and sarcasm.
Society elites and a tabloid crew collide in a love quadrangle of epic proportions.
The Philadelphia Story (1940)
A woman and two men refuse to choose between love, friendship—and good fun.
Design for Living (1933)
A dull businessman is haunted by the wild, hilarious ghosts of a party-loving couple.
Topper (1937)
Physical & Farcical Fun
From slapstick to sight gags, these films master the art of physical comedy and absurd situations.
The Marx Brothers go full anarchic genius in their takedown of politics, war, and sanity itself.
Duck Soup (1933)
Opera, staterooms, and contract negotiations—Marx Brothers mayhem at its finest.
A Night at the Opera (1935)
Buster Keaton delivers jaw-dropping stunts and deadpan brilliance in this silent Civil War comedy.
The General (1926)
Quirky & Under-the-Radar
A bit offbeat and often underrated, these comedies charm with oddball humor and unexpected heart.
Ginger Rogers plays a woman pretending to be a 12-year-old—leading to wildly funny complications.
The Major and the Minor (1942)
A man discovers his sweet old aunts are serial killers—and that’s just the beginning.
Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)
A young woman gets married, gets pregnant, forgets who the husband is—and the town erupts.
