TCM Schedule for Thursday, November 12 -- Star of the Month -- Grace Kelly

[Staph]

It's the second week for star of the month, Grace Kelly, and it's a good night for movie lovers. We have the first two of Kelly's three performances directed by Alfred Hitchcock, along with her Oscar-winning turn in A Country Girl. Enjoy!


4:30am -- Hard To Get (1938)
An unemployed architect falls in love with an heiress.
Cast: Dick Powell, Olivia de Havilland, Charles Winninger, Allen Jenkins
Dir: Ray Enright
BW-82 mins, TV-G

In a small role, watch out for Penny Singleton, who was about to break out as a live action version of the cartoon character Blondie Bumstead. For us baby boomers, Penny's voice is familiar as Jane Jetson.


6:00am -- Somewhere I'll Find You (1942)
Brothers feud over a girl they both fall for while covering World War II.
Cast: Clark Gable, Lana Turner, Robert Sterling, Patricia Dane
Dir: Wesley Ruggles
BW-108 mins, TV-G

Filming was halted on January 16, 1942 due to the death of Clark Gable's wife, Carole Lombard, and resumed on February 23.


8:00am -- Of Human Bondage (1946)
A medical student risks his future when he falls for a low-class waitress.
Cast: Paul Henreid, Eleanor Parker, Alexis Smith, Edmund Gwenn
Dir: Edmund Goulding
BW-106 mins, TV-PG

In an exchange which had Warner Bros. loaning to RKO the services of Joan Leslie for The Sky's the Limit (1943) and John Garfield for The Fallen Sparrow (1943), Warners acquired the production rights to W. Somerset Maugham's classic novel, which RKO already had adapted to the screen in 1934, featuring memorable performances by Bette Davis and Leslie Howard.


10:00am -- The Time Of Your Life (1948)
A philosophical drunk encourages his friends to live their dreams to the hilt.
Cast: James Cagney, William Bendix, Wayne Morris, Jeanne Cagney
Dir: H. C. Potter
BW-105 mins, TV-PG

The original Broadway production of "The Time of Your Life " by William Saroyan opened on October 25, 1939 at the Booth Theater, ran for 185 performances, won the Pulitzer Prize in Drama in 1940 and closed on April 6, 1940. The role of Harry was played by then-unknown Gene Kelly.


12:00pm -- None but the Lonely Heart (1944)
A young ne'er-do-well tries to get his life on track to help his ailing mother.
Cast: Cary Grant, Miss Ethel Barrymore, Ethel Barrymore, Barry Fitzgerald
Dir: Clifford Odets
BW-113 mins, TV-PG

Won an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Ethel Barrymore

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Cary Grant, Best Film Editing -- Roland Gross, and Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- C. Bakaleinikoff and Hanns Eisler

According to a 1947 "New York Times" article, Lela E. Rogers, the mother of Ginger Rogers, denounced the script at a committee hearing of HUAC (House Committee on Un-American Activities) as a "perfect example of the propaganda that Communists like to inject" and accused Clifford Odets of being a Communist. Rogers cited the line spoken by "Ernie" to his mother, "You're not going to get me to work here and squeeze pennies out of little people who are poorer than I am," as an example of Communist propaganda. Hanns Eisler, who was nominated for an Academy Award for composing the film's score, was also interrogated by HUAC and was designated as an unfriendly witness for his refusal to cooperate.


2:00pm -- A Life Of Her Own (1950)
An innocent small-town girl climbs to the top of the modeling business man by man.
Cast: Lana Turner, Ray Milland, Tom Ewell, Louis Calhern
Dir: George Cukor
BW-109 mins, TV-PG

The haunting theme music here by Bronislau Kaper was reused two years later in MGM's Invitation (1952), and under the title Invitation became an enduring jazz standard, especially associated with tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson.


4:00pm -- Song Of Love (1947)
True story of Clara Schumann's battle to save husband Robert's health and resist the romantic overtures of Johannes Brahms.
Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Paul Henreid, Robert Walker, Henry Daniell
Dir: Clarence Brown
BW-118 mins, TV-G

Footage from this film was adapted into the short film The Schumann Story (1950).


6:00pm -- Old Acquaintance (1943)
Two writers, friends since childhood, fight over their books and lives.
Cast: Bette Davis, Miriam Hopkins, Gig Young, John Loder
Dir: Vincent Sherman
BW-110 mins, TV-PG

This is the film with the often shown, camp classic scene of Bette Davis calmly grabbing Miriam Hopkins by the shoulders, vigorously shaking her, throwing her down into a chair, and then calmly saying with a clipped, sarcastic edge: "Sorry". Bette Davis later admitted she immensely enjoyed playing that scene.


What's On Tonight: STAR OF THE MONTH: GRACE KELLY


8:00pm -- Dial M For Murder (1954)
A straying husband frames his wife for the murder of the man he'd hired to kill her.
Cast: Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, Robert Cummings, John Williams
Dir: Alfred Hitchcock
C-106 mins, TV-PG

Alfred Hitchcock arranged to have Grace Kelly dressed in bright colors at the start of the film and made them progressively darker as time goes on.


10:00pm -- Rear Window (1954)
A photographer with a broken leg uncovers a murder while spying on the neighbors in a nearby apartment building.
Cast: James Stewart, Grace Kelly, Wendell Corey, Thelma Ritter
Dir: Alfred Hitchcock
C-114 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- Robert Burks, Best Director -- Alfred Hitchcock, Best Sound, Recording -- Loren L. Ryder (Paramount), and Best Writing, Screenplay -- John Michael Hayes

The original story by Cornell Woolrich had no love story and no additional neighbors for L.B. Jeffries to spy on, and was created by Alfred Hitchcock and John Michael Hayes. Hayes was encouraged by Hitchcock to spend time with Grace Kelly before writing the Lisa character and Hayes admitted that elements of Lisa were inspired by the actress.


12:00am -- The Country Girl (1954)
While trying to help her husband make a comeback, an alcoholic singer's wife fights her love for another man.
Cast: Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, William Holden, Anthony Ross
Dir: George Seaton
BW-104 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Grace Kelly, and Best Writing, Screenplay -- George Seaton

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Bing Crosby, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White -- Hal Pereira, Roland Anderson, Sam Comer and Grace Gregory, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- John F. Warren, Best Director -- George Seaton, and Best Picture

The original Broadway production of "The Country Girl" by Clifford Odets opened at the Lyceum Theater on November 10, 1950 and ran for 236 performances. Uta Hagen won the 1951 Tony Award for Actress in a Drama for the role of Georgie Elgin, the same role that won Grace Kelly her only Academy Award for Best Actress.


2:00am -- The Entertainer (1960)
A third-rate vaudevillian uses liquor and young women to escape the pressures of changing times.
Cast: Laurence Olivier, Brenda De Banzie, Joan Plowright, Roger Livesey
Dir: Tony Richardson
BW-104 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Laurence Olivier

John Osborne wrote his play "The Entertainer" specifically at the request of Laurence Olivier, who wanted the Angry Young Man of the British theater to create a vehicle for him, one of the figures of the British Establishment that Osborne was rebelling against. Olivier hoped that appearing in the Osborne play would make him relevant to a new generation of theater goers. It proved to be one of Olivier's greatest stage successes (The Colonial Theatre in Boston has a plaque on the outside wall commemorating Olivier's appearance there during the US tour of the play), while the film adapted from the play won him the sixth of his ten acting Academy Award nominations. His performance as Archie Rice, as well as his marriage to his young co-star Joan Plowright, one of the leading actresses of the new wave of British thespians, did keep Olivier contemporary with the new leaders of the British theater. Conversely, Olivier's generational contemporaries, including the actors John Gielgud and Ralph Richardson and the playwright Terence Rattigan, would become to seem stout and old-fashioned as they failed to keep up with the theatrical evolution. (Gielgud would counter with the role of Julian in Edward Albee's obscure "Tiny Alice" on Broadway in 1962, but outside of the classical repertoire, he and Richardson did not recover their cachet as actors in contemporary plays until the mid-1970s, in Harold Pinter's "No Man's Land".) Olivier would help shepherd the new generation of actors, directors and playwrights as the head of the National Theatre in the 1960s and early '70s.


4:00am -- Fat City (1972)
A washed-up boxer tries to show a young hopeful the ropes.
Cast: Stacy Keach , Jeff Bridges, Susan Tyrrell, Candy Clark
Dir: John Huston
C-97 mins, TV-14

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Susan Tyrrell

John Huston initially wanted Marlon Brando to play the role of Tully. When Brando informed Huston repeatedly that he needed some more time to think about it, Huston finally came to the conclusion that the star wasn't really interested and looked out for another actor until he finally cast the then relatively unknown Stacy Keach.

[Staph]

1. None But the Lonely Heart

An uncharacteristically depressed and perennially glum Cary Grant faced turning 40 in the mid-Forties. Not an ideal situation for a romantic idol, Grant was additionally enveloped by marital unhappiness and would soon display immense dislike for his next smash, Arsenic and Old Lace (1944), held up for several years and now breaking box office records. The star despised director Frank Capra's handling of the material and cast, forcing him to indulge in an overabundance of mugging. It would remain the actor's least favorite film. The publication of Richard Llewellyn's down beat novel, None But the Lonely Heart, about a cockney London loser, temporarily changed the actor's sour outlook, even more so when he discovered that RKO had purchased the screen rights expressly to placate their suave debonair star.

The studio knew they had a probable financial disaster, but eventually figured that the combination of Grant, Ethel Barrymore and screenwriter Clifford Odets would help write the project off as a "prestige picture," buttressed by its possible success in the major cities. The popularity of author Llewellyn, whose previous work, How Green Was My Valley (1941), scored big for Fox, would be another promotional plus. Grant, who hadn't even read the book when it was gift wrapped to him by RKO, clearly identified with the poverty stricken lead. It would be the closest any screen portrayal came to the real Archibald Leach as opposed to the Hollywood-created Cary Grant, irony compounded when many reviewers commented on the star being miscast.

Odets was stunned when he was first told of the upcoming picture: "...It was about a 19 year old boy with pimples whose two desires are to have a girl friend and to get a new suit of clothes. 'Are you sure it's right for Cary Grant?' I said. It seemed they were, so I had to change the concept of the book considerably." So impressed was Grant with the final adaptation that he victoriously lobbied for the writer to be the movie's director as well. That said, neither Odet's bitter yet perceptive script nor his sensitive direction would receive a nomination at Oscar® time. Likewise, None But the Lonely Heart would also be ignored in the Best Picture category.

Barrymore, on the other hand, who wrapped up her chores as the lead character's dying mother during a two week hiatus from her stage triumph, The Corn is Green, was rewarded by a much-deserved Best Supporting Actress statuette. Winning his second and final Best Actor nomination, Grant, who claimed he never took the awards seriously, didn't even bother showing up for the ceremony (losing to Bing Crosby for Going My Way). Nevertheless the star's closest friends revealed that he was always tremendously disappointed by the loss and considered None But the Lonely Heart his finest performance and a personal favorite among his films. To this day, many movie fans agree with Grant, feeling that he was shortchanged by the Academy. As for RKO, they were correct: in the big cities, None But the Lonely Heart won critical raves and did fair business before ultimately drowning in the "Red Sea" of the company's year end accounting books.

Producer: David Hempstead
Director: Clifford Odets
Screenplay: Clifford Odets, based on the novel by Richard Llewellyn
Production Design: Mordecai Gorelik
Cinematography: George Barnes
Costume Design: Renie
Film Editing: Roland Gross
Original Music: C. Bakaleinikoff, Hanns Eisler
Cast: Cary Grant (Ernie Mott), Ethel Barrymore (Ma Mott), Barry Fitzgerald (Twite), June Duprez (Ada), Jane Wyatt (Aggie Hunter), George Coulouris (Jim Mordinoy).
BW-114m. Closed captioning.

by Mel Neuhaus