Frank R. Strayer's Blondie Meets the Boss (1939)

The second entry in the Blondie series, Blondie Meets the Boss (1939), is both funny and serious (as the best comedies usually are), dealing with issues of jobs and work, gender roles, infidelity and  relationships.  Dagwood inadvertently gets fired when he protests the cancellation of his vacation and Blondie goes to the boss, Mr. Dithers, to get Dagwood's job back.  Dagwood is at home wearing an apron and doing the dishes and feeling that his manhood is threatened when a sleazy neighbor invites him on a fishing trip, with hints of meeting some floozies.  Blondie's sister and her boyfriend come over on their way to a jitterbug competition and Dagwood has them babysit while he goes off fishing and gets his picture taken with a floozy, accidentally bringing home the camera after staying out all night.

Meanwhile Blondie has become a valued member of Mr. Dithers's staff and continues working at the office, on her lunch hour getting the film developed from the camera Dagwood brought home and seeing a picture of him with another woman (he was just trying to keep her from falling out of a boat).  Dagwood is off to the café where the jitterbug competition is being held and is followed there by Blondie, who hits him over the head with her pocketbook and Dagwood staggers out to the dance floor where his sister-in-law grabs him for a partner in the dance competition after her boyfriend gives her the air, claiming that being a babysitter has insulted his masculinity.  Dagwood staggers around the floor as Skenny Ennis sings "You Had it Coming to You" and the crowd goes wild, as director Frank R. Strayer stages an amusing parody of dance competitions of the time.  The owner of the nightclub is trying to flimflam Mr. Dithers and when Blondie accidentally saves Dithers from the deal she gets Dagwood's job and vacation back for him.  The packing that Baby Dumpling and Blondie did in order to leave Dagwood is now used for the vacation.

The film effectively captures the uncertain mood of the time, with unemployment high  and war possibly on the way, a war that will separate husbands and wives, as husbands go in the army and women go to work.  Director Strayer and cinematographers Henry Freulich effectively use chiaroscuro to portray the affection that the Bumsteads -- husband, wife, baby, dog -- feel for their home, a center of some security in a seemingly chaotic world.