For our December 2023 Special Subject, we're having ourselves a Monty Woolley Christmas! We look at three Christmas-adjacent movies from the 1940s featuring the anti-Santa in roles big and small: The Man Who Came to Dinner, in which he stars as waspish radio personality Sheridan Whiteside, who takes over the home of a bourgeois Middle American couple; Life Begins at Eight-Thirty, in which he plays a great actor who's been broken by alcoholism; and The Bishop's Wife, in which he adds some New York Bohemian intellectual colour to the holiday classic. We discuss the cultural and political implications of The Man Who Came to Dinner and the uncanniness of Cary Grant and debate the appeal of alcoholism. Then in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we briefly discuss Ernst Lubitsch's Cluny Brown (fully discussed in our Jennifer Jones series) and a new release, a Christmas movie even darker than our Monty Woolleys, William Oldroyd's Eileen, starring Thomasin McKenzie and Anne Hathaway (a rare spoiler-free exchange of impressions from us). And as a bonus, we become possessed by the spirit of Monty Woolley and rant about how much we hate contemporary movie trailers. (No analysis, just invective.)
Happy Holidays!
Time Codes:
0h 00m 45s: Extremely brief Introduction to Monty Woolley
0h 04m 38s: THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER (1942) [William Keighley]
0h 31m 24s: LIFE BEGINS AT EIGHT-THIRTY (1942) [Irving Pichel]
0h 42m 47s: THE BISHOP’S WIFE (1947) [Henry Koster]
0h 54m 37s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Ernst Lubitsch’s Cluny Brown (1946) and William Oldroyd’s Eileen (2023)
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* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring
* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s
* Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)
* Read Elise’s piece on Gangs of New York – “Making America Strange Again”
* Check out Dave’s Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist’s 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!
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January Special Subject – Ginger Rogers & Fred Astaire – Part 2 + FEAR & MOVIEGOING IN TORONTO
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Paramount – 1942: SULLIVAN’S TRAVELS & THE ROAD TO MOROCCO + FEAR & MOVIEGOING IN TORONTO – Delphine Seyrig series at TIFF: Be Pretty and Shut Up (1981), Ind
Acteurist oeuvre-view – Jean Arthur – Part 12: THE IMPATIENT YEARS (1944); A FOREIGN AFFAIR (1948) and SHANE (1953) + Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto: WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S ROMEO + JULIET (1996)
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Universal – 1941: THE FLAME OF NEW ORLEANS & UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Christmas 2022 Special Subject – REMEMBER THE NIGHT (1940) and I’LL BE SEEING YOU (1944)
Acteurist oeuvre-view – Jean Arthur – Part 11: THE MORE THE MERRIER (1943) and A LADY TAKES A CHANCE (1943)
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – RKO – 1941: CITIZEN KANE & DEVIL AND DANIEL WEBSTER + 2022 Sight and Sound Poll
Acteurist oeuvre-view – Jean Arthur – Part 10: THE DEVIL AND MISS JONES (1941) and THE TALK OF THE TOWN (1942)
Special Subject – Noirvember Sirk – LURED (1947); SLEEP, MY LOVE (1948); SHOCKPROOF (1949) and THUNDER ON THE HILL (1951)
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – 20th Century Fox – 1941: I WAKE UP SCREAMING & CONFIRM OR DENY + FEAR & MOVIEGOING IN TORONTO – Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), The Palm Beach Story (1942) and Me
Acteurist oeuvre-view – Jean Arthur – Part 9: TOO MANY HUSBANDS (1940) and ARIZONA (1940)
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Warner Brothers – 1941: THE STRAWBERRY BLONDE (dir. Raoul Walsh) and MANPOWER (dir. Raoul Walsh)
Halloween 2022 Special Subject – The Haunted Mizoguchi – UGETSU (1953) and SANSHO THE BAILIFF (1954)
Acteurist oeuvre-view – Jean Arthur – Part 8: ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS (1939) and MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON (1939) + Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto – L’amour par terre (1984)
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – MGM – 1941: A WOMAN’S FACE and THE TRIAL OF MARY DUGAN + FEAR & MOVIEGOING IN TORONTO: BUCK AND THE PREACHER (1972)
Acteurist oeuvre-view – Jean Arthur – Part 7: EASY LIVING (1937) and YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU (1938) + Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto – DRACULA (1931) & BRAM STOKER’S DRACULA (1992)
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Paramount – 1941: THE LADY EVE & REACHING FOR THE SUN + FEAR & MOVIEGOING IN TORONTO: THE HUDUSCKER PROXY (1994) & FEMME FATALE (2002)
Acteurist oeuvre-view – Jean Arthur – Part 6: MORE THAN A SECRETARY (1936) and HISTORY IS MADE AT NIGHT (1937)
September Special Subject – German Sirk Sampler – Part 2 – THE FINAL CHORD (1936) & CHEATED BY THE WIND (1937) + Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto: MARNIE (1964)
Hollywood Studios Year-by-Year – Universal – 1940: THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES and THE INVISIBLE MAN RETURNS
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