TCM Schedule for Thursday, January 9, 2014 -- Star of the Month - Joan Crawford

[Staph]

In the daylight hours, TCM is celebrating Anita Louise, born Anita Louise Fremault on January 9, 1915, in New York City. She started on Broadway as a six-year-old in Peter Ibbetson, and moved on to motion pictures at age 9. Unlike many child stars, she made the successful transition to adult roles, though her beauty often prevented her from getting the great dramatic parts.

And in primetime and through out the day tomorrow, we've got the films of Star of the Month Joan Crawford. Enjoy!

(Does anyone want to volunteer to do Saturday this week? Thanks!)


6:15 AM -- The Florodora Girl (1930)
A turn-of-the-century chorus girl searches for romance.
Dir: Harry Beaumont
Cast: Marion Davies, Lawrence Gray, Walter Catlett
BW-79 mins, TV-G,

This was the first film which opened the famous Pantages Theater at Hollywood and Vine.


7:45 AM -- Everything's Rosie (1931)
A carnival con artist tries to mend his ways when his adopted daughter gets engaged.
Dir: Clyde Bruckman
Cast: Robert Woolsey, Anita Louise, John Darrow
BW-67 mins, TV-G, CC,

Robert Woolsey's only film appearance without his partner, Bert Wheeler. The great comedy team of "Wheeler & Woolsey" are little known in the 21st century, despite their great popularity in the 1930s. One of the reasons likely is the fact that their films were not packaged and sold to television in the 1950s, unlike The Three Stooges and "Laurel & Hardy", who then went on to entertain new generations of fans. Bobby Clark wrote much of the dialogue, and it was very risqué and was considered borderline in the more liberal 1930s (at least prior to the enforcement of the 1934 Production Code). Their shorts were geared towards adults, and even in the 1930s, they were considered vulgar, and thus would have been inappropriate on television in the 1950s as the comedy shorts of the Stooges and Laurel & Hardy were programmed for children.


9:00 AM -- Millie (1931)
A prostitute turns to murder to protect her teenage daughters honor.
Dir: John Francis Dillon
Cast: Helen Twelvetrees, Lilyan Tashman, Robert Ames
BW-85 mins, TV-G,

Charles R. Rogers produced this as an independent film, but sold the distribution rights to RKO after he was made chief executive of RKO-Pathé in January 1931.


10:30 AM -- The Firebird (1934)
A young girl's secret romance is exposed when her lover is murdered.
Dir: William Dieterle
Cast: Verree Teasdale, Ricardo Cortez, Lionel Atwill
BW-74 mins, TV-PG,

In 1936 Igor Stravinsky sued Warner Bros. over the 'misuse' of his themes from the ballet "The Firebird". In 1938 a French court awarded him one franc in damages, instead of the 300,000 francs he was claiming.


11:45 AM -- That Certain Woman (1937)
A gangster's widow fights for love despite society's disapproval.
Dir: Edmund Goulding
Cast: Bette Davis, Henry Fonda, Anita Louise
BW-94 mins, TV-G, CC,

Written by director Edmund Goulding.


1:30 PM -- Green Light (1937)
An idealistic doctor sacrifices his career to protect an elderly surgeon.
Dir: Frank Borzage
Cast: Errol Flynn, Anita Louise, Margaret Lindsay
BW-85 mins, TV-G, CC,

After his first two starring films, "Captain Blood" and "The Charge of the Light Brigade," Errol Flynn asked Warners to find him a non-swashbuckling role. "Green Light" was the result. However, he was back with sword in hand for his next, "The Prince and the Pauper."


3:00 PM -- The Sisters (1938)
Three western girls make unhappy marriages at the turn of the century.
Dir: Anatole Litvak
Cast: Errol Flynn, Bette Davis, Anita Louise
BW-99 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Originally the film credits were to read "Errol Flynn in The Sisters", but Bette Davis demanded equal billing alongside Errol Flynn. She also pointed out that the original credits had an unwelcome sexual connotation.


4:45 PM -- The Gorilla (1939)
Three screwball detectives try to protect a lawyer from a murderous gorilla.
Dir: Allan Dwan
Cast: Jimmy Ritz, Harry Ritz, Al Ritz
BW-66 mins, TV-G,

This was the last The Ritz Brothers film directed by Allan Dwan, and their last for 20th Century-Fox (they would move on to Universal).


6:00 PM -- These Glamour Girls (1939)
A drunken college boy invites a taxi dancer to spend the weekend at his snobbish school.
Dir: S. Sylvan Simon
Cast: Lew Ayres, Lana Turner, Tom Brown
BW-79 mins, TV-G,

Based on a story from Cosmopolitan Magazine, by Jane Hall. Somehow, I suspect that Cosmo has changed quite a bit since the 1930s.


7:30 PM -- Now Playing January (2014)
BW-26 mins, TV-PG, CC,



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: STAR OF THE MONTH: JOAN CRAWFORD



8:00 PM -- Grand Hotel (1932)
Guests at a posh Berlin hotel struggle through scandal and heartache.
Dir: Edmund Goulding
Cast: Greta Garbo, John Barrymore, Joan Crawford
BW-113 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Won the Oscar for Best Picture

Joan Crawford was irked by Greta Garbo's insistence on top billing and decided to take her revenge. Knowing that Garbo loathed tardiness and Marlene Dietrich in equal measures, Crawford played Dietrich records between shots and made sure to arrive late on set.


10:00 PM -- Rain (1932)
A missionary tries to reform a streetwalker trapped on a Pacific island.
Dir: Lewis Milestone
Cast: Frederic Howard, Ben Hendricks, William Gargan
BW-94 mins, TV-G,

Costumer Milo Anderson bought Crawford's checkered dress at a department store, and later recalled that the dress required extensive alteration, being far too large for Crawford everywhere except in the shoulders. Still new to the business, Anderson did not realize that multiple copies would be needed of a costume worn so extensively throughout the film. When it came time for a second copy, Anderson discovered that the dress had sold out and was now not available anywhere. Nor could the checkered fabric be located. Since the dress had already been seen in numerous scenes, the only solution was to have the design laboriously painted onto cloth and then have the dress duplicated. The dress had originally been store-bought to save money--and ultimately, with all the work, it added considerably to the film's budget.


11:45 PM -- Dancing Lady (1933)
A musical star is torn between a millionaire playboy and her stage manager.
Dir: Robert Z. Leonard
Cast: Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Franchot Tone
BW-92 mins, TV-G, CC,

Fillm debut of Fred Astaire. NOTE: (1) Though he was reported to have appeared years earlier in the silent film Fanchon, the Cricket (1915), he and his sister Adele Astaire only visited the set; they did not appear on camera. (2) This was the first time Fred Astaire wore his signature top hat and tails.

Joan Crawford was Fred Astaire's very first on-screen dance partner.


1:30 AM -- Forsaking All Others (1934)
A woman pursues the wrong man for almost twenty years.
Dir: W. S. Van Dyke
Cast: Robert Montgomery, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable
BW-83 mins, TV-PG, CC,

The screenplay was written for Loretta Young, George Brent and Joel McCrea, but later was given to Gable, Crawford, and Montgomery.


3:00 AM -- This Modern Age (1931)
A child of divorce raises eyebrows when she goes to Paris to live with her estranged mother.
Dir: Nicholas Grindé
Cast: Joan Crawford, Pauline Frederick, Neil Hamilton
BW-68 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Marjorie Rambeau fell ill during production and was replaced by Pauline Frederick.


4:30 AM -- Today We Live (1933)
An aristocratic English girl's tangled love life creates havoc during World War I.
Dir: Howard Hawks
Cast: Joan Crawford, Gary Cooper, Robert Young
BW-113 mins, TV-G, CC,

Variety reported in its review that director Howard Hawks used footage from the movie Hell's Angels (1930) for the big bomber expedition sequence, the main dogfight, and the head-on collision of two airplanes.

[Auggie]

1. Anita Louise is gorgeous!

Good actress too. It's a shame she didn't get in bigger films.

[CBHagman]

2. I'll do Saturday this week.

Just getting in under the wire here...

[Staph]

3. Thanks, CB!

I'll take it next week.