TCM Schedule for Friday, December 18, 2015 -- What's On Tonight: Christmas Classics

[Staph]

TCM is celebrating birthday boy, great director and Oscar winner George Stevens, born on December 18, 1904, in Oakland, California. And in prime time, we have more films in celebration of the Christmas season. Enjoy!


6:00 AM -- The Nitwits (1935)
Two cigar-stand attendants get mixed up in a murder investigation.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Bert Wheeler, Robert Woolsey, Fred Keating
BW-82 mins, CC,

One of 21 movies made by popular comedy duo Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey between 1929 and 1937, before Woolsey died in 1938. It is also the last minor feature directed by film luminary George Stevens before he broke through with Alice Adams (1935).


7:30 AM -- Quality Street (1937)
A woman masquerades as her own niece to get back at a neglectful suitor.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Franchot Tone, Eric Blore
BW-83 mins, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Score -- Roy Webb

The original Broadway production, of the play by J. M. Barrie, starred legendary actress Maude Adams. It opened at the Knickerbocker Theatre in New York on November 11, 1901 and ran for 64 performances.


9:00 AM -- Alice Adams (1935)
A small-town girl with social ambitions falls in love with a local playboy.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Fred MacMurray, Fred Stone
BW-99 mins, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Katharine Hepburn, and Best Picture

There was a disagreement among Katharine Hepburn and George Stevens about the post-party scene. The script called for Hepburn to fall onto the bed and break into sobs, but Stevens wanted her to walk to the window and cry, with the rain falling outside. Hepburn could not produce the tears required, so she asked Stevens if she could do the scene as scripted. Stevens yelled furiously at Hepburn, which did the trick and the scene was filmed Stevens' way, and Hepburn's tears are real.


10:45 AM -- Annie Oakley (1935)
The famed female sharpshooter learns that you can't get a man with a gun when she falls for a rival marksman.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Preston Foster, Melvyn Douglas
BW-90 mins, CC,

Released less than 10 years after the death of the real Annie Oakley.


12:22 PM -- Glimpses Of Kentucky (1941)
This short film takes the viewer to the state of Kentucky.
C-8 mins,


12:30 PM -- Kentucky Kernels (1935)
Two musicians try to get an orphaned heiress through hillbilly country to claim her inheritance.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Bert Wheeler, Robert Woolsey, Mary Carlisle
BW-75 mins, CC,

Based on a story by Bert Kalmer and Harry Ruby.


2:00 PM -- Swing Time (1936)
To prove himself worthy of his fiancee, a dancer tries to make it big, only to fall for his dancing partner.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Victor Moore
BW-104 mins, CC,

Won an Oscar for Best Music, Original Song -- Jerome Kern (music) and Dorothy Fields (lyrics) for the song "The Way You Look Tonight"

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Dance Direction -- Hermes Pan for "Bojangles of Harlem"

During rehearsals for the "Bojangles of Harlem" sequence, Hermes Pan noticed that three light sources were creating a group of Fred Astaire shadows dancing in perfect sync, and got the idea for the special effects shots in the dance. Astaire was filmed in silhouette, then tripled. The dance proper was then filmed against a process screen and combined with the shadow footage optically by RKO effects chief Vernon Walker. The effect was by no means perfect, however, as there is some "bleeding" of the image - the process screen shows through Astaire's hair at several points.


3:50 PM -- How To Sub-Let (1939)
In this short film, Robert Benchley tries to demonstrate the proper method of sub-letting an apartment.
Dir: Roy Rowland
Cast: Hal K. Dawson, Robert Benchley, Marie Blake
BW-8 mins,


4:00 PM -- Vigil in the Night (1940)
A good nurse ruins her career by covering up for her sister's careless mistake.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Carole Lombard, Brian Aherne, Anne Shirley
BW-102 mins, CC,

The production of the movie was held up several weeks when Carole Lombard was admitted to the hospital after suffering a miscarriage. The press dubbed it an 'appendectomy' to cover up.


5:45 PM -- Penny Serenade (1941)
A woman on the verge of divorce recalls her heartbreaking attempts to adopt a child.
Dir: George Stevens
Cast: Irene Dunne, Cary Grant, Beulah Bondi
BW-120 mins, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Cary Grant

Irene Dunne often said that this was her favorite film because it reminded her of her own adopted daughter.


7:50 PM -- Borrah Minevitch And His Harmonica School (1942)
In this short musical, Borrah Minnevitch and His Rascals play popular songs on their harmonicas, such as "American Patrol" and "Always in My Heart." Vitaphone Release 1061A.
Dir: Jean Negulesco
BW-9 mins,



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: CHRISTMAS CLASSICS



8:00 PM -- I'll Be Seeing You (1944)
A soldier meets a woman on Christmas furlough from prison and they fall in love.
Dir: William Dieterle
Cast: Ginger Rogers, Joseph Cotten, Shirley Temple
BW-85 mins, CC,

The quote from Lincoln under his photograph in the YMCA room is from his Cooper Union Address: "Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it" (February 27, 1860).


9:30 PM -- Christmas in Connecticut (1945)
A homemaking specialist who can't boil water is forced to provide a family holiday for a war hero.
Dir: Peter Godfrey
Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Dennis Morgan, Sydney Greenstreet
BW-101 mins, CC,

When Felix (S.Z. Sakall) first meets Yardly (Sydney Greenstreet), he takes an immediate dislike to him and mumbles under his breath, "Fat man" and walks away. In The Maltese Falcon (1941) Greenstreet played the role of Kasper Gutman whose code name was "Fat Man".


11:30 PM -- Remember the Night (1940)
An assistant D.A. takes a shoplifter home with him for Christmas.
Dir: Mitchell Leisen
Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Fred MacMurray, Beulah Bondi
BW-94 mins, CC,

According to director Leisen, the role of Lee's mother was originally taken by Marjorie Main. When Main's performance proved to be far too broad and overdone, the scene was re-shot with Georgia Caine.


1:15 AM -- Holiday Affair (1949)
A young widow is torn between a boring businessman and a romantic ne'er-do-well.
Dir: Don Hartman
Cast: Robert Mitchum, Janet Leigh, Wendell Corey
BW-87 mins, CC,

Although this modest film was not a success at the time, annual showings on Turner Classic Movies in recent years have made this film something of a minor Holiday classic.


3:00 AM -- Bundle Of Joy (1956)
A shop girl is mistaken for the mother of a foundling.
Dir: Norman Taurog
Cast: Eddie Fisher, Debbie Reynolds, Adolphe Menjou
C-98 mins, CC,

Around 1956, singer Eddie Fisher and his agent Lew Wasserman were discussing roles for Fisher's acting debut. A project being discussed at the time was "What Makes Sammy Run?" by Budd Schulberg and Stuart Schulberg. Fisher wanted to play aggressive producer Sammy Glick, "the ultimate Jewish hustler. I knew a lot of real Sammy Glicks and I felt confident that was a character I could play." Lew Wasserman decided that the character was too much of a classic negative Jewish stereotype and that it would be bad for Fisher to play it. So Fisher went in the complete opposite direction (in retrospect, perhaps too far) with then-wife Debbie Reynolds in this squeaky clean comedy that Fisher hated, made to capitalize on the birth of their daughter, future Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977) "Princess Leia" Carrie Fisher.


4:45 AM -- Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938)
A small-town boy tries to juggle two girlfriends at once.
Dir: George B. Seitz
Cast: Lewis Stone, Mickey Rooney, Cecilia Parker
BW-91 mins, CC,

The fourth of sixteen Andy Hardy films starring Mickey Rooney, the first pairing of Mickey with Judy Garland.