Starring Ray Milland, Paulette Goddard, Roland Young, Albert Dekker, Margaret Hayes, Cecil
Kellaway
Directed by Sidney Lanfield

Print: black/white
Runtime: 77 min.
Genre: comedy
Print Quality: B

Long underappreciated by film buffs, The Lady Has Plans is a screwball comedy disguised
as an espionage melodrama. The title character is not star Paulette Goddard, as one might
assume, but Nazi agent Rita Lenox (Margaret Hayes), who sneaks into Lisbon with a secret
message written on her bare back in invisible ink. Through a case of mistaken identity,
perky Sidney Royce (Paulette Goddard), the assistant to globetrotting radio correspondent
Kenneth Harper (Ray Milland) is presumed to be Rita Lenox. At the behest of British
Intelligence chieftan Ronald Dean (Roland Young), who hopes to extract the vital information
supposedly scribbled on Sidney's back, our nonplussed heroine is treated like royalty in a
posh Lisbon hotel. Meanwhile, Rita, having summed up the situation, simultaneously poses
as Sidney. Once he's figured out what's what, Harper manages to waylay Rita and intercept
the message, but neither he nor Sidney are out of the woods yet-not if German spy chief
Baron Von Kemp (Albert Dekker) has anything to say about it.