The same studio that brought forth
Father Was a Fullback
was responsible for
Mother is a Freshman
. Loretta Young stars as Abbigail Abbott, the widowed mother of coed Susan Abbott (Betty Lynn). In order to legally validate Susan's scholarship fund (a legacy of her late grandmother), Abigail enrolls in the university as a freshman. Here she is wooed by Professor Richard Michaels (Van Johnson)--much to Susan's dismay, since she'd set her cap for the professor herself. Rudy Vallee reprises the "stuffy middle-aged suitor" characterization he'd essayed in such previous comedies as
The Palm Beach Story
and
Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer
.
afforded audiences the opportunity of glimpsing 20th Century-Fox's familiar "college campus" sets in full Technicolor (these standing sets were also seen in black & white in such 1949 releases as
Mr. Belvedere Goes to College
It Happens Every Spring
).