TCM Schedule for Thursday, September 17 -- Bob's Picks

[Staph]

This morning has more of the films of star of the month Claude Rains. This afternoon features a series of ranch movies, starring Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Robert Taylor, Marlene Dietrich, and Buddy Ebsen. And this evening we have another round of Robert Osborne's favorites, tonight featuring women acting outside the norms of society. Enjoy!


7:00am -- Hearts Divided (1936)
Napoleon's younger brother falls for a girl from Baltimore.
Cast: Marion Davies, Dick Powell, Charles Ruggles, Claude Rains
Dir: Frank Borzage
BW-76 mins, TV-G

The play opened on Broadway, New York City, New York, USA on 7 September 1908 and had only 24 performances. It was based on the actual marriage of Napoleon's brother to Elizabeth Patterson, but it eventually was annulled by order of Napoleon.


8:21am -- Short Film: Canoeman's Holiday (1956)
A canoe trip down the St. Croix River, which forms the southern end of the boundary between New Brunswick and Maine.
Narrator: Harry Wisner.
Dir: Douglas Sinclair
BW-8 mins

Featuring the owners of the Loon Bay Lodge in St. Stephen, New Brunswick, Canada.


8:30am -- Stolen Holiday (1937)
A Paris fashion model marries a fortune hunter to protect him from the law.
Cast: Kay Francis, Claude Rains, Ian Hunter, Alison Skipworth
Dir: Michael Curtiz
BW-80 mins, TV-G

The movie is loosely based on the French bond scandal involving Serge Alexandre Stavisky. After the fraud was discovered he either committed suicide or was murdered by the French police.


10:00am -- Lady With Red Hair (1940)
An actress hopes to regain her lost son by making it to the top.
Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Claude Rains, Richard Ainley, Laura Hope Crews
Dir: Kurt Bernhardt
BW-78 mins, TV-G

Louis Payne, the husband of Mrs. Leslie Carter in real life, coached Richard Ainley, who was playing him in the movie.


11:30am -- Canadian Pacific (1949)
A railroad surveyor faces an Indian rebellion.
Cast: Randolph Scott, Jane Wyatt, J. Carroll Naish, Victor Jory
Dir: Edwin L. Marin
C-95 mins, TV-G

Filmed at Banff National Park, National Park, Lake Louise, Morley Indian Reserve, and Yoho National Park.


1:15pm -- The Sea Of Grass (1947)
Husband-and-wife ranchers take opposite sides in a range war.
Cast: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Robert Walker, Melvyn Douglas
Dir: Elia Kazan
BW-124 mins, TV-PG

In his autobiography, Elia Kazan said of this film: "It's the only picture I've ever made that I'm ashamed of. Don't see it." (I don't think it's that bad, but I'm a serious Tracy/Hepburn fan.)


3:30pm -- Saddle The Wind (1958)
A rancher with a questionable past tries to stop his outlaw brother.
Cast: Robert Taylor, Julie London, John Cassavetes, Donald Crisp
Dir: Robert Parrish
C-84 mins, TV-PG

Written by Rod Serling!


5:00pm -- Rancho Notorious (1952)
A cowboy infiltrates a bandit hideout in search of his girlfriend's killer.
Cast: Marlene Dietrich, Arthur Kennedy, Mel Ferrer, Gloria Henry
Dir: Fritz Lang
C-89 mins, TV-G

Director Fritz Lang had originally planned to call this film "Chuck-a-Luck". However, the studio insisted that its name be changed to "Rancho Notorious" and when Lang asked why, he was told that it was because Americans wouldn't understand what "Chuck-a-Luck" (a gambling game commonly played in saloons in the Southwest) meant. Lang replied, "Well, it's a good thing that they all know what 'Rancho Notorious' means!"


6:30pm -- Mail Order Bride (1964)
An aging cowhand tries to help a young rancher settle down by buying him a wife.
Cast: Buddy Ebsen, Keir Dullea, Lois Nettleton, Warren Oates
Dir: Burt Kennedy
C-83 mins, TV-PG

In the 1930s, Disney animators filmed Buddy Ebsen dancing in front of a grid to "choreograph" Mickey Mouse's dance steps for the Silly Symphony cartoons.


What's On Tonight: TCM PRIME TIME FEATURE: BOB'S PICKS


8:00pm -- The Wicked Lady (1945)
A married woman finds new thrills as a masked robber on the highways.
Cast: Margaret Lockwood, James Mason, Patricia Roc, Griffith Jones
Dir: Leslie Arliss
BW-104 mins, TV-PG

This was the very first British film to be cut by Hollywood censors due to leading lady Margaret Lockwood's revealing cleavage.


10:00pm -- Johnny Guitar (1954)
A lady saloon owner battles a female rancher out to frame her for murder.
Cast: Joan Crawford, Sterling Hayden, Mercedes McCambridge, Scott Brady
Dir: Nicholas Ray
C-110 mins, TV-PG

Joan Crawford and Mercedes McCambridge fought both on and off camera. One night, in a drunken rage, Crawford scattered the costumes worn by McCambridge along an Arizona highway. Cast and crew had to collect the outfits.


12:00am -- Jubilee Trail (1954)
A pregnant widow ventures West in search of a new life.
Cast: Vera Ralston, Joan Leslie, Forrest Tucker, John Russell
Dir: Joseph Inman Kane
C-103 mins, TV-G

Interviewed by Johnny Carson on "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" (1962), Maureen Stapleton was asked what she did to make herself feel better when she knew she'd given a bad performance. "I look through the TV Guide and try to find a Vera Hruba Ralston picture to watch," said Stapleton, "because I know, no matter how bad a performance I may have given, I could NEVER be as bad as she was!".


2:00am -- Hollywood Canteen (1944)
A serviceman and a starlet find love at the star-staffed serviceman's center.
Cast: Andrews Sisters, Jack Benny, Joe E. Brown, Eddie Cantor
Dir: Delmer Daves
BW-124 mins, TV-G

Nominated for Oscars for Best Music, Original Song -- M.K. Jerome (music) and Ted Koehler (lyrics) for the song "Sweet Dreams Sweetheart", Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture -- Ray Heindorf, and Best Sound, Recording -- Nathan Levinson (Warner Bros. SSD)

Originally conceived by Warner Bros. as a multi-studio (like the actual Hollywood Canteen) WWII effort with rival studios (Fox, Paramount, MGM, etc.) contributing cameo appearances by its stars. But when other studios balked at having performers appear (even though profits were reportedly earmarked for war effort), Warner turned it into a single-studio affair.


4:15am -- Around The World (1943)
Kay Kyser and his Kollege of Musical Knowledge entertain the troops overseas.
Cast: Kay Kyser, Mischa Auer, Joan Davis, Marcy McGuire
Dir: Allan Dwan
BW-79 mins, TV-G

Joan Davis encounters a sulphur-crested cockatoo in the streets of Cairo. Cockatoos are native to Australia and some islands to its north, and are not found in Africa.

[Staph]

1. Stolen Holiday

In the 1937 drama Stolen Holiday Claude Rains plays Stefan Orloff, a dashing Russian swindler who persuades beautiful French model Nicole Picot (Kay Francis) to help him with a business scheme. In return, Orloff helps establish Nicole as one of the most successful fashion designers in Paris. Nicole resists marrying Orloff, finding true love instead with British diplomat Anthony Wayne (Ian Hunter). However, when Orloff’s shady dealings begin to catch up with him, Nicole’s loyalty to Orloff is put to the test.

Warner Bros. made a point to put a disclaimer at the beginning of the film saying that the characters and events in Stolen Holiday were fictitious. However, the story was clearly based on a real-life French financial scandal known as the Stavisky Affair in the early 1930s. Serge Stavisky was a Russian con artist living in France who sold worthless bonds and operated throughout the highest levels of French society and government. Stavisky was married to the beautiful former Chanel model Arlette Simon, who was the basis for the Kay Francis character in Stolen Holiday. In 1934 Stavisky went on the run when his scam was discovered, and the ensuing scandal had major political ramifications and resulted in several deaths.

Stolen Holiday was mainly a star vehicle for actress Kay Francis, who was at the height of her popularity at Warner Bros. when the film was made. Francis’s statuesque figure and striking dark beauty perfectly suited her to the role of the elegant Nicole Picot. Playing a model and designer also gave Francis the opportunity to show off many exquisite fashions designed for her by Orry-Kelly. Stolen Holiday was Francis’s fourth and final film under the direction of Michael Curtiz. The film was also one of several in which she co-starred with actor Ian Hunter, but it marked the only time she co-starred with Claude Rains.

Stolen Holiday is also notable because it was the first time that Claude Rains and Michael Curtiz ever worked together. It was the beginning of a long and successful series of collaborations between the two that ultimately produced eleven films in total including the 1942 classic Casablanca.

Part drama, part romance and part haute couture fashion show, Stolen Holiday has something to please everyone. “It is the production values, the unusually good dialog and the superiority of the cast,” said the Variety review, “which combine to raise the picture to where it is more than ordinarily entertaining...The star and (Ian) Hunter are opposite each other for the third time. A good combination. Rains gives the swindler-romancer a high polish. Comedy is derived largely from Alison Skipworth, who is excellent as Miss Francis’ friend and advisor.” The New York Times said, “If the picture is at all distinguished, it is because Claude Rains does a superb job with the character whom the film’s producers would have you believe is not patterned after the late M. Serge Alexandre Stavinsky; and...Kay Francis parades the most striking wardrobe that Hollywood’s couturiers can conceive in the Paris manner.”

Director: Michael Curtiz
Screenplay: Casey Robinson
Cinematography: Sid Hickox
Art Direction: Anton Grot
Music: Werner R. Heymann (stock music, uncredited)
Film Editing: Terry Morse
Cast: Kay Francis (Nicole 'Nicky' Picot), Claude Rains (Stefan Orloff), Ian Hunter (Anthony 'Tony' Wayne), Alison Skipworth (Suzanne, Nicole's Assistant and Friend), Alexander D'Arcy (Leon Anatole, Orloff's Assistant), Betty Lawford (Helen Tuttle), Walter Kingsford (Francis Chalon, Publisher).
BW-80m. Closed Captioning.

by Andrea Passafiume