Caught in the Draft

Don Bolton (Hope) is a vain movie star who fears being drafted into military service. He suffers an aversion to loud noise, even the sound of a fake gunshot on the set. Thus, Don doubts he would last a day in training. One day, Col. Peter Fairbanks (Clarence Kolb) visits the studio as a consultant for a war film. He brings his beautiful daughter Tony (Dorothy Lamour) along. Don plots to marry the colonel's daughter to avoid the draft. After proposing to her, however, he immediately learns that draft eligibility ends at age 31. So Don, who is 32, retracts his proposal. Tony, disgusted with him, calls him a coward.

A few weeks later, Don realizes he's in love with Tony after all. He wants to impress her, so he stages a fake enlistment. But everything backfires, and before he knows it, Don's in the Army. along with his assistant Bert (Eddie Bracken) and his manager Steve (Lynne Overman). At training camp, Col. Fairbanks is CO. He tells Don if he ever gets promoted to corporal, he can marry Tony. But Army life proves to be more than Don and his associates can handle. As a result, they suffer through frequent KP duty.

Later, when Don and his companions are sent to a distant post, a camp war game is organized. During the "fighting," Bert alters the signposts in the field in order to help his team. But the result proves disastrous; the men on the opposing team now follow a route into a live artillery range. Don overcomes his fear of noise to rescue the men. He also saves Tony, who is observing the games while riding horseback. After this success, Don is promoted to corporal and is now free to marry Tony.[2]

• Bob Hope – Don Bolton
• Dorothy Lamour – Antoinette 'Tony' Fairbanks
• Lynne Overman – Steve Riggs
• Eddie Bracken – Bert Sparks
• Clarence Kolb – Col. Peter Fairbanks
• Paul Hurst – Sgt. Burns
• Ferike Boros – Yetta
• Phyllis Ruth – Margie
• Irving Bacon – Cogswell
• Arthur Loft – Movie director
• Edgar Dearing – Recruiting sergeant

The film was a big hit and became Paramount's second most successful release of 1941 after Louisiana Purchase, also starring Bob Hope.

• Caught in the Draft at IMDb