TCM Schedule for Thursday, February 4, 2015 -- What's On Tonight: 31 Days of Oscar: Day 4

[Staph]

It's day four of 31 Days of Oscar. Enjoy!


6:30 AM -- Topper Returns (1941)
A beautiful ghost enlists a henpecked husband to track down her killer.
Dir: Roy Del Ruth
Cast: Joan Blondell, Roland Young, Carole Landis
BW-88 mins, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Sound, Recording -- Elmer Raguse (Hal Roach SSD), and Best Effects, Special Effects -- Roy Seawright (photographic) and Elmer Raguse (sound)

In the film, Eddie (played by Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson) says that he's going back to "Mr. Benny", an in-joke reference to the fact that Anderson played Rochester, the valet, on Jack Benny's radio program and later TV show.

The link to the next film -- H. B. Warner


8:00 AM -- The Green Goddess (1930)
A fanatical Indian potentate holds British settlers hostage.
Dir: Alfred Green
Cast: George Arliss, H. B. Warner, Alice Joyce
C-73 mins, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- George Arliss

Filmed in 1929 and completed before Disraeli (1929), but was held out of release until later at the request of George Arliss because he felt the other film was a better vehicle for his talkie debut.

The link to the next film -- Ralph Forbes


9:19 AM -- Romance Of Radium (1937)
This short film tells the story of the discovery of radium and how it is used in medicine.
Dir: Jacques Tourneur
Cast: Emmett Vogan, André Cheron, Margaret Bert
BW-10 mins,


9:30 AM -- Stage Door (1937)
Women at a theatrical boarding house try to make their big break happen.
Dir: Gregory LaCava
Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Adolphe Menjou
BW-92 mins, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Andrea Leeds, Best Director -- Gregory La Cava, Best Writing, Screenplay -- Morrie Ryskind and Anthony Veiller, and Best Picture

The famous line delivered by Katharine Hepburn ("The calla lilies are in bloom again...&quot is actually dialog taken from the play "The Lake", which Hepburn infamously played on Broadway (Dorothy Parker famously said that Hepburn "ran the gamut of emotions - from A to B.&quot .

The link to the next film -- Gail Patrick


11:15 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."

The link to the next film -- Randolph Scott


12:45 PM -- Captain Kidd (1945)
An infamous pirate tries to double cross the King of England.
Dir: Rowland V. Lee
Cast: Charles Laughton, Randolph Scott, Barbara Britton
BW-81 mins, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Werner Janssen

The film is loosely based on the real-life captain Kidd.Born in Scotland in 1645, he began his career as a privateer. By 1690, he became a wealthy shipowner in New York. In 1696, during a trip to East Africa, Captain Kidd turned to piracy. He captured or looted many ships. Trusting that his privateer commission would protect him he returned to Long Island in 1699. He was ordered to England where he was arrested and tried for piracy and murder. He was executed in 1701. Stories about Kidd's buried treasure were legendary but the only booty ever found was on Gardiners Island, near Long Island.

The link to the next film -- John Qualen


2:15 PM -- A Patch Of Blue (1965)
A blind white girl falls in love with a black man.
Dir: Guy Green
Cast: Sidney Poitier, Shelley Winters, Elizabeth Hartman
BW-105 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Shelley Winters

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Elizabeth Hartman, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Robert Burks, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White -- George W. Davis, Urie McCleary, Henry Grace and Charles S. Thompson, and Best Music, Score - Substantially Original -- Jerry Goldsmith

Scenes of Sidney Poitier and Elizabeth Hartman kissing were excised from the film when it was shown in theaters in the American South, where many states still had laws against what they called "race-mixing".

The link to the next film -- Elizabeth Hartman


4:15 PM -- You're a Big Boy Now (1966)
A young man moves to New York City and falls for a cold-hearted beauty,
Dir: Francis Ford Coppola
Cast: Peter Kastner, Elizabeth Hartman, Geraldine Page
C-98 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Geraldine Page

Coppola was desperate to film on location at the New York Public Library but the library refused because of the scene involving classic pornography locked up in a steel vault. However, Mayor John V. Lindsay was eager to promote the city and prevailed on the Library to change it's mind. This is why Lindsay gets a special thanks credit. The vault scene was eventually filmed on a sound stage.

The link to the next film -- Julie Harris


6:00 PM -- East of Eden (1955)
Two brothers compete for their father's approval and a woman's love.
Dir: Elia Kazan
Cast: Julie Harris, James Dean, Raymond Massey
C-118 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Jo Van Fleet

Nominated for Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- James Dean (This was the first posthumous acting nomination in Academy Awards history.), Best Director -- Elia Kazan, and Best Writing, Screenplay -- Paul Osborn

During the production of the film, Elia Kazan used to write letters to his friend John Steinbeck, with whom he had worked closely on the original screenplay for Viva Zapata! (1952), to keep him abreast of the film's progress. Steinbeck thought James Dean was a perfect Cal, and tremendously enjoyed the final film.

The link to the next film -- Jo Van Fleet



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: 31 DAYS OF OSCAR: DAY 4



8:00 PM -- Cool Hand Luke (1967)
A free-spirited convict refuses to conform to chain-gang life.
Dir: Stuart Rosenberg
Cast: Paul Newman, George Kennedy, J. D. Cannon
C-127 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- George Kennedy

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Paul Newman, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Donn Pearce and Frank Pierson, and Best Music, Original Music Score -- Lalo Schifrin

The movie's line "What we've got here is failure to communicate." was voted as the #11 movie quote by the American Film Institute. When Frank Pierson wrote that dialog to be delivered by a an uneducated, redneck prison guard, he worried that people wouldn't find it authentic. So he wrote a biography of the guard, explaining that in order to advance to a higher grade in the system, he had been required to take criminology courses, thus exposing him to the kind of academic vocabulary that would justify him using the 'communicate' phrase. But as it turned out, no one questioned the line or needed to read the fictional account.

The link to the next film -- George Kennedy


10:15 PM -- The Dirty Dozen (1967)
A renegade officer trains a group of misfits for a crucial mission behind enemy lines.
Dir: Robert Aldrich
Cast: Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson
C-150 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Won an Oscar for Best Effects, Sound Effects -- John Poyner

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- John Cassavetes, Best Sound, and Best Film Editing -- Michael Luciano

Production on the film ran for so long that Jim Brown was in danger of missing training camp for the up-coming 1967-68 football season. As training camp and the NFL season approached, the NFL threatened to fine and suspend Brown if he did not leave filming and report to camp immediately. Not one to take threats, Brown simply held a press conference to announce his retirement from football. At the time of his retirement, Brown was considered to be one of the best in the game and even today is considered to be one of the NFL's all-time greats.

The link to the next film -- Ernest Borgnine


1:00 AM -- The Wild Bunch (1969)
A group of aging cowboys look for one last score in a corrupt border town.
Dir: Sam Peckinpah
Cast: William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan
C-145 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Nominated for Oscars for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Material Not Previously Published or Produced -- Walon Green (screenplay/story), Roy N. Sickner (story) and Sam Peckinpah (screenplay), and Best Music, Original Score for a Motion Picture (not a Musical) -- Jerry Fielding

During a screening in New York, Sam Peckinpah invited Jay Cocks, of Time magazine, who brought his friend Martin Scorsese. They sat in an empty Warner Bros. screening room with only two other critics, Judith Crist and Rex Reed. That final scene knocked them out of their seats. Recalled Scorsese, "We were mesmerized by it; it was obviously a masterpiece. It was real filmmaking, using film in such a way that no other form could do it; it couldn't be done any other way. To see that in an American filmmaker was so exciting." Cocks remembered that he and Scorsese "literally turned to each other at the end and were stunned. We were looking at each other, shaking our heads, like we had just come out of a shared fever dream."

The link to the next film -- Warren Oates


3:30 AM -- The Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond (1960)
A small-time thief kills his way to the top of the New York rackets.
Dir: Budd Boetticher
Cast: Ray Danton, Karen Steele, Elaine Stewart
BW-101 mins, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Costume Design, Black-and-White -- Howard Shoup

In an interview about the making of this film, cinematographer Lucien Ballard recalled, "We wanted to go for an authentic atmosphere for the 1920s where the film was showing. So after seeing some of the rushes, the producer went to Boetticher [director Budd Boetticher] and said, 'I thought you said Ballard was a great cameraman - this looks like it was shot in 1920!' And Budd said, 'It's SUPPOSED to look like it was shot in 1920!'

The link to the next film -- Ray Danton


5:15 AM -- A Majority of One (1961)
A Jewish widow falls in love with a Japanese businessman.
Dir: Mervyn LeRoy
Cast: Rosalind Russell, Alec Guinness, Ray Danton
C-149 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Cinematography, Color -- Harry Stradling Sr.

When Mrs. Jacobi visits the home of Mr. Asano, the servant who answers the door and assists later is George Takei, "Mr. Sulu" of Star Trek.

The link to the next film -- Rosalind Russell