Each month, I scour the Turner Classic Movies schedule for upcoming films that I can't miss. The highlights are posted here for your reading and viewing pleasure! (All listed times are Eastern Standard, check your local listings or TCM.com for actual air times in your area. Each day's schedule begins at 6:00 a.m.; if a film airs between midnight and 6 a.m. it is listed on the previous day's programming schedule.)
It is August, a.k.a. "Summer Under the Stars" time on TCM, and each day of the month is devoted to one actor or actress. For my movie picks this month, I'm feeling the girl-power and featuring four classic Hollywood era actresses whom I always enjoy watching.
8/2: Lucille Ball
8 PM - The Dark Corner (1946)
10 PM - Yours, Mine, and Ours (1968)
Lucille Ball had an interesting career which took on many personas, from glamor-puss ingenue to everyone's favorite wife & mother to worldwide comedy icon. For her line-up today, I've picked out two films, made before and after she achieved stardom as a TV comedienne. In Dark Corner, an atmospheric noir directed by Henry Hathaway, Ball is given top billing as a secretary who sets out to clear her private eye boss (Mark Stevens) when he's framed for murder. At the time, Ball was an MGM contract player and unhappy with the roles assigned to her. She reportedly hated her experience on this film and clashed with Hathaway (though it doesn't show on screen). No surprise then that soon after she would search out opportunities on other platforms and she found success on radio with My Favorite Husband (1947-51) and then on television in her groundbreaking sitcom I Love Lucy (1951-57). The show made her a hugely popular star, and it still endures today -- I recently stumbled upon an episode airing on a major network in primetime!
Yours, Mine, and Ours finds Ball at a very different point in her career, in between her second and third successful sitcoms, and one of the biggest stars in America who developed her own projects. This family comedy about a widow and mother of 8 (Ball) who marries a widower (Henry Fonda) with 10 children of his own was United Artists' top grossing film for the year. I always enjoy this film and can't help but get sucked in whenever it comes on. I especially love the scene in which Fonda's children trick Ball into getting drunk at their first dinner together; it goes from hilarious to really heartbreaking as Ball's character knows she's not in control of her behavior, but cannot figure out why, and shows the range and ability of Ball the actress.
BONUS: See Ball and Fonda in their first on screen pairing in 1942's The Big Street at 1 PM.
8/10: Hedy Lamarr
10 AM - H.M. Pulham, Esq. (1941)
12:15 PM - Crossroads (1942)
Lamarr was one of the most beautiful, magnetic, and glamorous actresses ever to grace film screens, but she was often accused of having wooden acting style. She also had notoriously poor instincts for choosing projects, reportedly refusing roles inCasablanca, Gaslight, and Laura, and often ending up in less interesting pictures as an exotic "woman of mystery." These roles probably weren't well-written to begin with and typically only required her to, well, be glamorous...or in her words, "stand still and look stupid." However, the two films I've selected today earned Hedy some of her best notices and gave her more of an acting challenge than usual. In Crossroads, she shines as the resourceful young bride of William Powell's French diplomat afflicted with amnesia (or is he?) and blackmailed by criminals. And in H.M. Pulham, Esq., Lamarr is convincing as an independent and ambitious career-woman (though perhaps not quite as believable as a former Iowa farm girl), who reconnects in middle age with a former boyfriend (Robert Young). Both roles proved that Lamarr could deliver if given good material; and history has proved that she wasn't just a pretty face, as a frequency-hopping invention developed by Lamarr and composer George Antheil was a pre-cursor to the wireless technology we use today.
8/12: Janet Gaynor
2 PM - A Star is Born (1937)
4:15 PM - State Fair (1933)
8 PM - Lucky Star (1929)
10 PM - Street Angel (1928)
I've come to regard Janet Gaynor's presence in a film as a signal of quality. Her film career spanned only a little over a decade, but in that time she worked with some of the best directors of the silent and sound eras, was one half of an indelible screen couple, created an iconic role in a classic Hollywood story, and won the first Best Actress Academy Award. I'm sure that I would enjoy all the movies scheduled today, but here are four I don't want to miss.
Lucky Star and Street Angel both star Gaynor and Charles Farrell and were directed by Frank Borzage. Gaynor and Farrell made 12 movies together, but I think the silent films made with Borzage are a step above the rest. In Street Angel, Gaynor is a poor girl hiding from the police with a traveling circus who falls for an artist (Farrell). This was among the performances for which she was awarded the Oscar, along with Sunrise and 7th Heaven (back then they didn't have to pick just one role). In Lucky Star, made the following year, Gaynor is the sweetheart of wounded WWI vet Farrell, but the two are kept a part by her controlling mother. The plots in which love conquers all are not groundbreaking, but the films have an ethereal, romantic beauty. Lucky Star was filmed as both a talkie and a silent, but only the silent version has survived; so ironically, what was Gaynor and Farrell's first talkie is now their final silent film.
Gaynor also found success when not teamed with Farrell. State Fair is a delightful story of a family -- father, mother, son, and daughter -- who each have their own adventure at the Iowa State Fair. The film was nominated for Best Picture and remade twice; however, this version is not available on DVD, so this is your rare chance to catch it! A Star is Born has also been remade twice (so far), but the 1937 original is my favorite version of this iconic Hollywood story of an up and coming actress (Gaynor) married to a director (Fredric March) whose career is in decline. Off screen, the two stars' situations were somewhat reversed. While March's greatest successes were yet to come, Gaynor would soon retire from acting.
8/19: Ruby Keeler
8 PM - 42nd Street (1933)
11:30 PM - Dames (1934)
4 AM - The Phynx (1970)
Ruby Keeler said of herself, "I was all personality and no talent." Now she wasn't the greatest actress or singer, or even dancer; however, her sincerity and spirit certainly struck a chord with 1930s audiences -- who flocked to the musical extravaganzas starring Keeler as a working class kid trying to catch a break. Her film debut was in 42nd Street, the definitive backstage musical featuring virtuosic production numbers designed by Busby Berkeley. Much like her character, a chorus girl who must replace the show's leading lady, Keeler went out there a youngster, and came back a star (to paraphrase the film's most famous line). She was teamed again with her 42nd Street co-star Dick Powell in the equally entertaining and eye-popping Dames, another story of some plucky hoofers putting on a Broadway show featuring more number by Berkeley.
The last movie of the night is a weird little film about a rock band of super secret agents sent to rescue numerous American celebrities kidnapped by the leader of communist Albania. Among the bizarre collection of of hostages are Keeler, Dorothy Lamour, Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O'Sullivan, Xavier Cugat, James Brown, Louis Hayward, Patsy Kelly, Pat O'Brien, the Bowery Boys, Butterfly McQueen, and Colonel Sanders. The film was deemed too awful for a theatrical release, which may have been a blessing as it was the final picture for many of the Golden Age stars, including Keeler. However, classic film film fans may enjoy this oddity.
