TCM Schedule for Thursday, February 28 -- The 60s

[Staph]

Today features movies about weddings, from the classic Spencer Tracy version of Father of the Bride (1950) to Katharine Hepburn's return from box office poison The Philadelphia Story (1940) (and its pale musical remake High Society (1956) with Grace Kelly, Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra replacing Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant and Jimmy Stewart) to Fiddler on the Roof (1971) and its weddings of the three daughters of Tevye (the first wedding and the song Sunrise, Sunset always make me cry!). Tonight's 31 Days of Oscar returns to the 1960s with a couple of wonderful historical pictures, A Man for All Seasons (1966) and Doctor Zhivago (1965). Enjoy!


5:00am -- The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)
A circus ringmaster and an egotistical trapeze artist vie for the love of a pretty acrobat.
Cast: Betty Hutton, Charlton Heston, James Stewart.
Dir: Cecil B. DeMille.
C-152 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Writing, Motion Picture Story -- Fredric M. Frank, Theodore St. John and Frank Cavett, and Best Picture

Nominated for Oscars for Best Costume Design, Color -- Edith Head, Dorothy Jeakins and Miles White, Best Director -- Cecil B. DeMille, and Best Film Editing -- Anne Bauchens

Among the spectators at the circus are Bob Hope, Diana Lynn, Bing Crosby, Mona Freeman, William Boyd (Hopalong Cassidy), and Merrill Reese (an unknown nine-year-old who later became the radio voice of the Philadelphia Eagles).


7:45am -- The Member of the Wedding (1952)
When her brother marries, a 12-year-old girl faces the awkward pains of adolescence.
Cast: Julie Harris, Ethel Waters, Brandon de Wilde.
Dir: Fred Zinnemann.
BW-89 mins, TV-G

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Julie Harris

Julie Harris, Ethel Waters, and Brandon De Wilde all repeated their roles from the original Broadway production. Julie Harris was 27, when she played 12 year-old Frankie Addams.


9:15am -- Father Of The Bride (1950)
A doting father faces mountains of bills and endless trials when his daughter marries.
Cast: Spencer Tracy, Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Bennett.
Dir: Vincente Minnelli.
BW-93 mins, TV-G

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Spencer Tracy, Best Writing, Screenplay -- Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, and Best Picture

MGM gave Elizabeth Taylor a wedding gift of a one-off wedding dress designed by Edith Head (a move also designed to promote the film).


11:00am -- The Philadelphia Story (1940)
Tabloid reporters crash a society marriage.
Cast: Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, James Stewart.
Dir: George Cukor.
BW-112 mins, TV-G

Won Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- James Stewart, and Best Writing, Screenplay -- Donald Ogden Stewart

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Katharine Hepburn, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Ruth Hussey, Best Director -- George Cukor, and Best Picture

The film was shot in eight weeks, and required no retakes. During the scene where James Stewart hiccups when drunk, you can see Cary Grant looking down and grinning. Since the hiccup wasn't scripted, Grant was on the verge of breaking out laughing and had to compose himself quickly. James Stewart thought of hiccuping in the drunk scene himself, without telling Cary Grant. When he began hiccuping, Grant turned to Stewart saying, "Excuse me." The scene required only one take.


1:00pm -- High Society (1956)
In this musical version of The Philadelphia Story, tabloid reporters invade a society wedding.
Cast: Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra.
Dir: Charles Walters.
C-107 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for Oscars for Best Music, Original Song -- Cole Porter for the song "True Love", and Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture -- Johnny Green and Saul Chaplin

Grace Kelly, recently engaged to Prince Rainier of Monaco, wore her actual engagement ring for as character's engagement ring.


3:00pm -- Royal Wedding (1951)
A brother-and-sister musical team find romance when they tour to London for Elizabeth II's wedding.
Cast: Fred Astaire, Jane Powell, Peter Lawford.
Dir: Stanley Donen.
C-93 mins, TV-G

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Original Song -- Burton Lane (music) and Alan Jay Lerner (lyrics) for the song "Too Late Now"

"You're All the World to Me" is one of the most famous and frequently-shown dance routines of Fred Astaire. His character is so in love that he dances up one wall, across the ceiling and back down the opposite wall. It was accomplished by putting a whole room, attached camera and harnessed cameraman inside a 20 ft. diameter rotating "squirrel cage."


4:45pm -- Fiddler on the Roof (1971)
In Russia before the revolution, a Jewish milkman tries to marry off his daughters who have plans of their own.
Cast: Topol, Norma Crane, Leonard Frey.
Dir: Norman Jewison.
C-181 mins, TV-G

Won Oscars for Best Cinematography -- Oswald Morris, Best Music, Scoring Adaptation and Original Song Score -- John Williams (the first win for the future Star Wars composer), and Best Sound -- Gordon K. McCallum and David Hildyard

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Topol, Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Leonard Frey, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration -- Robert F. Boyle, Michael Stringer and Peter Lamont, Best Director -- Norman Jewison, and Best Picture

Topol was only in his mid-thirties when he performed the role of an older Tevye. To make Topol look older, the makeup team clipped 15 white hairs from director Norman Jewison's beard and applied them to Topol's eye brows (seven on the left, eight on the right).


What's On Tonight: 31 DAYS OF OSCAR: 60S


8:00pm -- A Man for All Seasons (1966)
A devout scholar gets caught in the middle of Henry VIII's plans to break with the Catholic Church.
Cast: Paul Scofield, Robert Shaw, Wendy Hiller.
Dir: Fred Zinnemann.
C-120 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Paul Scofield (Paul Scofield was not present at the awards ceremony. His co-star Wendy Hiller accepted the award on his behalf.), Best Cinematography, Color -- Ted Moore, Best Costume Design, Color -- Elizabeth Haffenden and Joan Bridge, Best Director -- Fred Zinnemann, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Robert Bolt, and Best Picture

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Robert Shaw, and Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Wendy Hiller

The producers originally wanted Laurence Olivier as Thomas More and Alec Guinness as Wolsey, but director Fred Zinnemann insisted on Paul Scofield and Orson Welles in the roles.


10:15pm -- Doctor Zhivago (1965)
Illicit lovers fight to stay together during the turbulent years of the Russian Revolution.
Cast: Omar Sharif, Julie Christie, Rod Steiger.
Dir: David Lean.
C-200 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color -- John Box, Terence Marsh and Dario Simoni, Best Cinematography, Color -- Freddie Young, Best Costume Design, Color -- Phyllis Dalton, Best Music, Score - Substantially Original -- Maurice Jarre, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Robert Bolt

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Tom Courtenay, Best Director -- David Lean, Best Film Editing -- Norman Savage, Best Sound -- A.W. Watkins (M-G-M British SSD) and Franklin Milton (M-G-M SSD), and Best Picture

The film was shot in Spain during the regime of Gen. Francisco Franco. While the scene with the crowd chanting the Marxist theme was being filmed (at 3:00 in the morning), police showed up at the set thinking that a real revolution was taking place and insisted on staying until the scene was finished. Apparently, people who lived near where filming was taking place had awoken to the sound of revolutionary singing and had mistakenly believed that Franco had been overthrown. (By the way, Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead!)


2:00am -- Seance on a Wet Afternoon (1964)
A medium kidnaps a child so she can help the police solve the crime.
Cast: Kim Stanley, Richard Attenborough, Nanette Newman.
Dir: Bryan Forbes.
BW-116 mins

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Kim Stanley

During filming, Richard Attenborough developed kidney stones and was unable to work for an entire day. Since filming was on such a tight schedule, director Bryan Forbes got into costume and played his role for some shots.


4:00am -- Summer And Smoke (1961)
A small-town spinster's repressed love for the local rebel spells danger.
Cast: Geraldine Page, Laurence Harvey, Una Merkel.
Dir: Peter Glenville.
C-118 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Geraldine Page, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Una Merkel, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color -- Hal Pereira, Walter H. Tyler, Sam Comer and Arthur Krams, and Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Elmer Bernstein

Based on the play by Tennesse Williams. Williams died at the age of 71 after he choked on an eyedrop bottle cap in his room at the Hotel Elysee in New York. He would routinely place the cap in his mouth, lean back, and place his eyedrops in each eye. His brother Dakin and some friends believed he was murdered. The police report, however, suggested his use of drugs and alcohol contributed to his death. Many prescription drugs were found in the room. Williams' lack of gag response may have been due to drugs and alcohol effects.

[Staph]

1. Father of the Bride (1950)

For those who always thought, like Spencer Tracy's character in Father of the Bride (1950), that marriage was a simple affair, MGM's hit 1950 comedy is the perfect cure—as comical as it is all too true. The only thing simple about this story of a father reluctantly giving his daughter away was the production process, one of the smoothest in MGM history thanks to director Vincente Minnelli and a strong, very professional cast. Getting it into production, however, was another story entirely.

Studio head Dore Schary thought Edward Streeter's best-selling comic novel was a natural for the husband-and-wife team of Francis Goodrich and Albert Hackett, who had worked magic on such simple, all-American stories as It's a Wonderful Life and Easter Parade. But they took one look at the episodic novel and swore it was unadaptable. Schary was used to such reluctance on their part, and patiently led them through the first few weeks of the writing. Every time they swore they had failed, he showed them what worked in their scenes, until they came up with a screenplay that pleased everyone.

Goodrich and Hackett had shaped the father's role for Spencer Tracy, the only actor Minnelli thought capable of capturing the story's humor along with the heartache of a man giving up his beloved daughter. Then Jack Benny approached Schary at a party, and the studio head foolishly said he could do it. Minnelli had to test him for the part, but though he worked tirelessly to reduce Benny's trademarked double takes to a minimum, it was clear that the brilliant comic just didn't have the dramatic chops for the role.

Unfortunately, when Tracy heard that another actor had tested, he turned the picture down. Minnelli got Katharine Hepburn to arrange a dinner party where he convinced Tracy that they couldn't make the film without him. That was just the reassurance Tracy needed to change his mind.

The 17-year-old Elizabeth Taylor, MGM's top young actress at the time, was the only choice to play Tracy's daughter. And just to add to the film's publicity, when they announced her casting, Taylor announced her engagement to William Pawley. As she told the press, the thought of planning her own wedding and playing a young bride at the same time was "positively drooly."

When Taylor got married just a few weeks before the film's June 1950 release, it created a PR bonanza that helped make it one of the year's top-grossing pictures. Only it wasn't William Pawley who met her at the end of the aisle. By the time Taylor got around to making Father of the Bride, Pawley had tired of living around her schedule, and the engagement had ended. Instead, Taylor fell for hotel heir Nicky Hilton, who became her first husband on May 6, 1950.

The first rushes for Father of the Bride were so strong that MGM immediately registered the title Now I'm a Grandfather and negotiated sequel rights with Streeter. The sequel was made a year later, under the title Father's Little Dividend, and defied conventional wisdom by doing almost as well at the box office as the original. By the time of the second film, in which a happily married Taylor has her first child, Taylor's first marriage was over, a fact not trumpeted in the film's publicity.

Trivia: No company has been more involved in placing their product in Hollywood films than Coca-Cola. It started with Dinner at 8, which was promoted at hundreds of Coca-Cola outlets with posters that featured Jean Harlow and other cast members drinking the product during breaks in filming. In Father of the Bride, Spencer Tracy (who was used in print ads for Coca-Cola), offers guests at the engagement party Cokes to drink.

Director: Vincente Minnelli
Producer: Pandro Berman
Screenplay: Edward Streeter (novel), Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett
Cinematography: John Alton
Art Direction: Cedric Gibbons, Leonid Vasian
Music: Adolph Deutsch
Cast: Spencer Tracy (Stanley Banks), Joan Bennett (Ellie Banks), Elizabeth Taylor (Kay Banks), Don Taylor (Buckley Dunstan), Billie Burke (Doris Dunstan), Leo G. Carroll (Mr. Massoula)
BW-93m. Closed captioning. Descriptive Video.

by Frank Miller