TCM Schedule for Friday, November 27, 2015 -- What's On Tonight: Fantasy Adventures

[Staph]

TCM is devoting the daylight hours to my favorite Archibald Leach . . . er, ah, Cary Grant. And in prime time, we're off to fantasy land. Enjoy!


6:00 AM -- Topper (1937)
A fun-loving couple returns from the dead to help a henpecked husband.
Dir: Norman Z. McLeod
Cast: Constance Bennett, Cary Grant, Roland Young
BW-98 mins, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Roland Young, and Best Sound, Recording --
Elmer Raguse (Hal Roach SSD)

The easiest part of the shoot for Cary Grant and Constance Bennett was the many special effects scenes, which only required them to record their lines while special effects artists made the various items they moved, from fountain pens to a pair of frilly lace panties, appear to move on their own.


8:00 AM -- Bringing Up Baby (1938)
A madcap heiress upsets the staid existence of a straitlaced scientist.
Dir: Howard Hawks
Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Charlie Ruggles
BW-102 mins, CC,

David's response to Aunt Elizabeth asking him why he is wearing a woman's dressing gown ("Because I just went gay all of a sudden!&quot is considered by many film historians to be the first use of the word "gay" in its roughly modern sense (as opposed to its archaic meaning of "happy, carefree&quot in an American studio film. Among homosexuals, the word first came into its current use during the 1920s or possibly even earlier, though it was not widely known by heterosexuals as a slang term for homosexuals until the late 1960s. The line was not in the original shooting script for the film; it was an ad lib from Cary Grant himself. The censors were likely unfamiliar with the term and assumed it to mean "gaga" or "senile" in the context.


10:00 AM -- My Favorite Wife (1940)
A shipwrecked woman is rescued just in time for her husband's re-marriage.
Dir: Garson Kanin
Cast: Irene Dunne, Cary Grant, Randolph Scott
BW-88 mins, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Writing, Original Story -- Leo McCarey, Bella Spewack and Sam Spewack, Best Art Direction, Black-and-White -- Van Nest Polglase and Mark-Lee Kirk, and Best Music, Original Score -- Roy Webb

Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem, "Enoch Arden," about a fisherman presumed lost at sea who returns to find his wife remarried, was the basis of five prior films: Enoch Arden (1914), Die Toten kehren wieder - Enoch Arden (1919), and D.W. Griffith's Enoch Arden: Part I (1911), Enoch Arden: Part II (1911), and Enoch Arden (1915). Those films adhered to Tennyson's poem. But in My Favorite Wife, Something's Got to Give (1962), and Move Over, Darling (1963), only the basic idea of a spouse who returns is kept, with the spouse presumed lost now being the wife. However, in all of these films, the surname of the couple in question remains "Arden."


11:30 AM -- Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948)
A New York businessman's dream of a country home is shattered when he buys a tumbledown rural shack.
Dir: H. C. Potter
Cast: Cary Grant, Myrna Loy, Melvyn Douglas
BW-94 mins, CC,

Although this film was from the novel of the same name, much of the story is autobiographical. Author Eric Hodgins and his wife built the actual house in the rural Litchfield County, Connecticut town of New Milford. Located in the bucolic Merryall section of town, the house recently sold for $1.2 million.


1:30 PM -- Room for One More (1952)
A family with three children takes in troubled orphans.
Dir: Norman Taurog
Cast: Cary Grant, Betsy Drake, Lurene Tuttle
BW-95 mins, CC,

During the Pledge of Allegiance the words under God were missing. This is because the words were not added to the Pledge of Allegiance until 1954 and the movie was made in 1952.


3:30 PM -- Charade (1963)
A beautiful widow tries to find her husband's lost fortune while eluding the killers who want it themselves.
Dir: Stanley Donen
Cast: Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, Walter Matthau
C-113 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Original Song -- Henry Mancini (music) and Johnny Mercer (lyrics) for the song "Charade"

Cary Grant initially turned down the movie because he felt he would be too much of a predator pursuing the much-younger Audrey Hepburn. In a last-ditch attempt to sign Grant, Peter Stone worked all night on the script and presented it to Grant to look over just once more. Grant gleefully accepted the role, prompting producers to demand to know what Stone had done. Stone had simply moved all of the romantically aggressive lines from Grant's character to Audrey Hepburn's, making her the predator.


5:30 PM -- North By Northwest (1959)
An advertising man is mistaken for a spy, triggering a deadly cross-country chase.
Dir: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason
C-136 mins, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay - Written Directly for the Screen -- Ernest Lehman, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color -- William A. Horning, Robert F. Boyle, Merrill Pye, Henry Grace and Frank R. McKelvy, and Best Film Editing -- George Tomasini

Ernest Lehman became the film's scriptwriter following a lunchtime meeting with Alfred Hitchcock, arranged by their mutual friend, composer Bernard Herrmann. Hitchcock originally wanted him to work on his new project The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959) (which was eventually made instead by Michael Anderson), but Lehman refused. Hitchcock was so keen to work with him that he suggested they work together on a different film using Mary Deare's budget (without MGM's approval) even though he had only three ideas to set Lehman on his way: mistaken identity, the United Nations building, and a chase scene across the faces of Mt. Rushmore.



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: FANTASY ADVENTURES



8:00 PM -- Jason And The Argonauts (1963)
The legendary hero enlists the help of the gods to steal the golden fleece.
Dir: Don Chaffey
Cast: Todd Armstrong, Nancy Kovack, Gary Raymond
C-104 mins, CC,

While filming footage of the Argo off the coast of Italy, shooting was interrupted when a replica of the Golden Hind sailed into view. The British television series Sir Francis Drake (1961) happened to be filming in the same location. Producer Charles H. Schneer shouted, "Get that ship out of here. You're in the wrong century!" at the British crew, dispelling any tensions that arose from both shots being lost.


10:00 PM -- The Land That Time Forgot (1974)
A World War I U-boat takes a wrong turn and discovers a lost world of dinosaurs and cavemen.
Dir: Kevin Connor
Cast: Doug McClure, John McEnery, Susan Penhaligon
C-91 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

The real U-33 of World War One served in the Mediterranean and survived the war.


11:45 PM -- Lost Horizon (1937)
Four fugitives from a Chinese revolution discover a lost world of peace and harmony.
Dir: Frank Capra
Cast: Ronald Colman, Jane Wyatt, Edward Everett Horton
BW-133 mins, CC,

Won Oscars for Best Art Direction -- Stephen Goosson, and Best Film Editing -- Gene Havlick and Gene Milford

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- H.B. Warner, Best Sound, Recording -- John P. Livadary (Columbia SSD), Best Assistant Director -- Charles C. Coleman, Best Music, Score -- Morris Stoloff (head of department) with score by Dimitri Tiomkin, and Best Picture

Jane Wyatt stated that the deletion of the High Lama's speech about peace, during Robert's first meeting with Father Pero, was done at the request of the US government because of the film's release in the looming shadows of World War II. Wyatt stated the government wanted no views of world peace so that young men would be in the "bang, bang, bang" mode. During the FDR administration, Wyatt was requested by the Presdient to host a performance of the Bolshoi Ballet during the war. This resulted in her being blackballed during the McCarthy era castigation of American citizens, who were supposedly Communists and not "true" citizens.


2:15 AM -- The Thief of Bagdad (1940)
A young thief faces amazing monsters to return Bagdad's deposed king to the throne.
Dir: Ludwig Berger
Cast: Conrad Veidt, Sabu, June Duprez
C-106 mins, CC,

Won Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- Georges Périnal, Best Art Direction, Color -- Vincent Korda, and Best Effects, Special Effects -- Lawrence W. Butler (photographic) and Jack Whitney (sound)

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Original Score -- Miklós Rózsa

Filming began in Britain, but because of the Blitz, the production relocated to Hollywood. There was such a long break in production, Sabu's early scenes had to be re-shot because he had grown several inches. When filming began in the US, the stricter censorship codes of the Hays Office there were applied. One of the most obvious differences between the scenes shot in the UK and those filmed in the USA is that the tops of the actresses' costumes were buttoned up all the way to satisfy the Hays Office. That kind of clue makes it easier to identify the US-shot scenes than trying to spot differences in the sets.


4:15 AM -- The Boy and the Pirates (1960)
Magic transports a boy to the days of cutthroats and buccaneers.
Dir: Bert I. Gordon
Cast: Charles Herbert, Susan Gordon, Murvyn Vye
C-84 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Timothy Carey was fired from this movie because he threw Charles Herbert across the deck of the pirate ship.

[longship]

1. Some really great films.

Including two of the greatest mysteries ever filmed, both starring Cary Grant, Charade and North by Northwest. The former has a rather astounding supporting performance by Walter Matthau, the latter has one of the most astounding support casts ever assembled and a musical score that blows ones mind. I cannot decide which Hitchcock is the greatest, but surely NbNW is near the top, along with Vertigo, Psycho, Rear Window, and Strangers on a Train, among others. And Charade is the best pseudo-Hitchcock ever made. Good for Stanley Donen. It is a gem.

[bbmykel]

2. Couldn't agree more!

Just finished 'Charade' for the umpteenth time and it was still great.

'NBNW' on now and looks great on bigscreen TV.

I'm now even more thankful today than yesterday!