Bette Davis learns "All About Eve" in Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s classic film

 All About Eve (1950) is an American drama written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and starring Bette Davis, Anne Baxter, George Sanders, and Celeste Holm. Other cast members include Gary Merrill, Hugh Marlow, Thelma Ritter, and Marilyn Monroe.

Broadway star Margo Channing (Davis) has recently turned 40 and is wondering how long she can sustain her career. Then one evening after Margo’s latest performance, her best friend Karen Richards (Holm) brings a seemingly helpless superfan named Eve Harrington (Baxter). Eve followed Margo’s career when she was on tour in San Francisco and now in New York City.

Karen introduces Eve to Margo’s friends, including Karen’s husband playwright Lloyd Richards (Marlowe). Slowly, Eve becomes part of Margo’s inner circle making Margo’s personal assistant Birdie (Ritter) suspicious. So cunning is Eve, that she replaces Birdie as Margo’s new assistant.

Other complications arise from Margo’s relationship with the director of her current play Bill Sampson (Merrill), 8 years her junior. Margo is insecure in their relationship due to their age difference and unbeknownst to her, Eve attempts to replace Margo in Bill’s affections.

How does this all end? Will Margo overcome her insecurities about her age, career, and relationship with Bill or will Eve stand in her way?

Anne Baxter and Bette Davis square off

Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1929 – 1972) was an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. Mankiewicz won Academy Awards for directing and writing A Letter to Three Wives (1949), and All About Eve (1950). He is the only director to win back-to-back Academy Awards for writing and directing. Other films directed by Mankiewicz include Dragonwyck (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), Julius Caesar (1953), The Barefoot Contessa (1954), and Guys and Dolls (1955). He directed the 1963 crisis-plagued production of Cleopatra which negatively affected his career as a director.

Bette Davis (1908 – 1989) was an American actress whose stage and screen career spanned more than 50 years. Davis came to Hollywood in 1930 and within four years of her arrival, she was one of its biggest stars winning her first Best Actress Academy Award for her role in Dangerous (1935). Her starring role in Jezebel (1938) won her a second Best Actress Oscar. Davis would go on to star in many popular films during the 1940s including Dark Victory (1939), The Letter (1940), The Little Foxes (1941), and Now, Voyager (1942). In 1950 she starred as Margo Channing in All About Eve (1950), a role she is probably most identified with today. Other popular films include The Old Maid (1939), All This and Heaven Too (1940), Mr. Skeffington (1944), and The Corn is Green (1945).

Anne Baxter (1923 – 1985) won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role as Sophie MacDonald in The Razor’s Edge (1946). She was signed to a contract with Twentieth Century-Fox in 1940. In 1948, Baxter starred in four movies, with Yellow Sky being her most prominent role to date. She went on to have a prolific career in film, television, and theater. She is probably best known for her Oscar-nominated performance as Eve Harrington in All About Eve. Frank Lloyd Wright was Baxter’s grandfather.

George Sanders (1906 – 1972) was a British film and stage actor who also had a fine singing voice. Hollywood was looking for a villain to star opposite a young Tyrone Power in Lloyd’s of London (1936) and Sanders more than fit the bill. His performance in that film would forever stamp him as a sophisticated bad guy. Before his acting career, he worked in the textile industry, which must have helped him with his role in The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry. In the 1960s, Sanders played Mr. Freeze in the Batman (1966) television series.

Celeste Holm (1917 – 2012) was an American stage, film, and television actress. She won a Best Supporting Actress award for her role in Gentleman’s Agreement (1947) and was nominated for her roles in Come to the Stable (1949) and All About Eve (1950). She originated the role of Ado Annie in the landmark stage musical Oklahoma! (1943).

 

All About Eve trivia

• Claudette Colbert was the director’s first choice to play Margo Channing. In fact, Colbert was contracted to play the part but had to drop out due to a back injury she suffered during the filming of Three Came Home (1950).
• Bette Davis and Gary Merrill fell in love during filming and were married a few weeks after the production wrapped.
• The film holds the record for the most female Oscar-nominated performances: Anne Baxter and Bette Davis for Best Actress and Celeste Holm and Thelma Ritter for Best Supporting Actress.
• Davis said this film saved her career after a series of unsuccessful films. She said Mankiewicz “…resurrected me from the dead.”
• Producer Darryl F. Zanuck changed the working title Best Performance to All About Eve after reading one of Addison DeWitt’s lines in the opening narration of the script.
• Zanuck wanted Jeanne Crain to play Eve, but she became pregnant and Anne Baxter was offered the role.

 

Click HERE to watch the film at the Internet Archive.

Click HERE to join the online discussion on September 9, 2024, at 6:30 p.m. Central Time. Once you RSVP, you will receive an invitation and a link to join the discussion on Zoom.

 

Discussion questions

1. All About Eve’s reputation over the years has achieved legendary status. Do you think its reputation as a great film is well deserved?
2. The film is filled with wonderful performances by a great cast. Did one performance stand out to you or were all of equal weight in your estimation?
3. What do you think will become of Eve as she goes forward with her career? Will she always be under the thumb of Addison?
4. Do you think that Margo and Bill will have a successful marriage? Why or why not?
5. How well does the film hold up in the 21st century?
6. Was there anything in the film that surprised you?
7. If this movie were remade, who would you cast as Margo and Eve?

 

 

Michael Rennie is the visitor from space in “The Day the Earth Stood Still”

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) is an American science fiction film directed by Robert Wise and starring Michael Rennie, Patricia Neal, and Hugh Marlowe. The supporting cast includes Sam Jaffe, Frances Bavier, and Billy Gray. Lock Martin portrayed Gort, the robot.

A flying saucer lands in Washington, D.C. and is quickly surrounded by the United States Army. The alien says he comes “in peace and with good will.” But when he displays an object that looks like it a weapon, a nervous soldier shoots and injures the spaceman. Gort, a tall and imposing robot destroys the soldiers’ weapons causing the amassed crowd to run in fear.

Klaatu, the alien, is taken to Walter Reed Hospital and recovers quickly. He escapes from the hospital and finds himself at a boarding house where Helen Benson (Neal) and her son, Bobby (Gray) live. “Mr. Carpenter” befriends the Bensons and tries to learn more about the people on the planet he has come to warn.

Slowly, it becomes obvious that Mr. Carpenter is the man from space. Helen’s boyfriend Tom Stevens (Marlowe) discovers this and is willing to turn him in for the “prestige” he think it will bring.

Klaatu’s message for the world: stop fighting with one another and be careful in your development of nuclear weapons or we will destroy your planet!

 

Robert Wise (1914 - 2000) was an American director, producer, and editor. Wise began his movie career at RKO as a sound and music editor. For several years, he worked with senior editor William Hamilton. Wise’s first solo film editing credits were on Bachelor Mother (1939) and My Favorite Wife (1940). He was the film editor on Citizen Kane and was nominated for an Academy Award for Film Editing. Wise got his chance to direct at RKO from Val Lewton, the producer of horror classics like Cat People (1942). The Curse of the Cat People (1944) was the first film that Wise received director credit for. He eventually directed films noir, westerns, melodramas, and science fiction. Some popular films directed by Wise include The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Executive Suite (1954), I Want to Live! (1958), which earned Wise his first Oscar nomination for Best Director. He went on to win Best Director Oscars for West Side Story (1961) and The Sound of Music (1965).

Michael Rennie (1909 – 1971) was British stage, film, and television actor. Rennie was a popular leading man and character actor in Hollywood during the 1950s. Perhaps his most famous role is as space visitor Klaatu in the science fiction classic The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951). Rennie played St. Peter in The Robe (1953), the first movie filmed in Cinemascope. That same year he starred opposite Jeanne Crain in the mystery Dangerous Crossing. He continued to play lead and supporting roles throughout the 1950s and also acted in live television.

Patricia Neal (1926 - 2010) was an American film and stage actress. Neal gained fame on Broadway, winning the 1947 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her role in Another Part of the Forrest. Coincidentally, 1947 was the first year the Tony Awards were presented. Hollywood came calling and Neal signed a contract with Warner Bros. In 1949, she made three films including The Fountainhead co-starring Gary Cooper. In 1951 she starred in the science fiction classic The Day the Earth Stood Still. In the early 1950s, she left Hollywood to go back on the stage. She returned to the screen in 1957's A Face in the Crowd co-starring Andy Griffith. She co-starred with Audrey Hepburn and George Peppard in Breakfast at Tiffany's and she won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1963 for Hud. Neal continued to act in film, stage, and television until 2009.

Hugh Marlowe (1911 – 1982) Was an American stage, radio, film, and television actor. He is probably most famous for portraying playwright Lloyd Richards in All About Eve (1950). Other famous roles include The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), and Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956). Some of his other films include Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), Twelve O’Clock High (1949),  Night and the City (1950), Rawhide (1951), and Monkey Business (1952). Later in his career, he played family patriarch Jim Matthews on the NBC soap opera Another World from 1969 until his death in 1982.

 

The Day the Earth Stood Still trivia

• Lock Martin who played Gort the robot was nearly seven-feet tall.
• Patricia Neal had no idea the film would become a classic. Supposedly, she had a tough time keeping a straight face when she said, “Gort, Klaatu barado nikto.”
• Broadcast journalists from the 1950s were used in the film to make it seem more realistic.
• Spencer Tracy was interest in playing Klaatu, but the producer, Julian Blaustein thought the audience would have many expectations about the character with Tracy in the lead. Blaustein held out for Rennie, then unknown to most Americans.
• Frank Lloyd Wright influenced the design of the flying saucer.
• Sam Jaffe had an engineering degree which was a perfect background for his characterization in the film as Professor Jacob Barnhardt.

 

Click HERE to watch the film on YouTube.

 

Click HERE to join the discussion on June 3, 2024, at 6:30 p.m. Central Time. Once you RSVP, you’ll receive an invitation and a link to join the discussion on Zoom.

 

Discussion questions

1. Did you find this film was realistic?
2. This film was made in the early years of the Cold War. Do you think that influenced the plot?
3. This was one of the first science fiction films with an A budget and cast. Did the production impress you?
4. What did you think of the casting of Michael Rennie as Klaatu? Do you think the producer was right to cast him rather than a well-known actor like Spencer Tracy?
5. Did anything about the film surprise you?
6. Given the fact that it was made in the early ‘50s, does the film hold up in the 21^st century?
7. What did you make of Klaatu taking the name of Carpenter? 

Tyrone Power and Susan Hayward star in "Rawhide"

Rawhide (1951) is an American western film directed by Henry Hathaway and starring Tyrone Power and Susan Hayward. The supporting cast members include Hugh Marlowe, Dean Jagger, Edgar Buchanan, Jack Elam, and George Tobias.

Tom Owens (Power) is the sophisticated heir to the J. C. Owens of the Overland Mail Company. His father sends him west to the remote relay station Rawhide Pass to learn about the business from Sam Todd (Buchanan). Tom can’t wait to get back to civilization in one week’s time.

A young woman named Vinnie Holt (Hayward) arrives at the station with her young niece Callie. Callie is the daughter of Vinnie’s deceased sister. Vinnie was traveling east to take Callie to her paternal grandparents. Before Vinnie can catch the next train, The U.S. Calvary arrives to inform the stagecoach passing through Rawhide that four convicts escaped from Huntsville prison. With this news, the Calvary refuses to let Vinnie and Callie ride the stagecoach—it’s against the law to allow children to travel in a dangerous situation.

Tyrone Power and Hugh Marlowe

Now Vinnie and Callie are stuck at the Rawhide Pass with the escaped outlaws heading their way. When Rafe Zimmerman (Marlowe) arrives at the pass with his three fellow outlaws, no one is safe.

Henry Hathaway (1898 – 1985) was an American film director and producer. Hathaway started working in silent films in 1925 as an assistant to established directors like Victor Fleming and Josef von Sternberg. His first solo directorial effort was Heritage of the Desert (1932) starring Randolph Scott. Hathaway, along with Scott, would be known for western movies. Besides Scott, Hathaway directed Gary Cooper in several films, including The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935) which earned him his only Best Director Academy Award nomination. In 1940, Hathaway began working at Fox where he directed Tyrone Power in Johnny Apollo and Brigham Young (both 1940), Gene Tierney in China Girl (1942), Don Ameche and Dana Andrews in Wing and a Prayer (1944), and Call Northside 777 (1948) starring James Stewart and Richard Conte. After leaving Fox, he was one of three directors who worked on the western epic How the West Was Won (1962). He directed Steve McQueen in Nevada Smith (1966), directed John Wayne in True Grit (1968) which won Wayne his one and only Best Actor Academy Award.

Tyrone Power (1914 – 1958) was a major movie star as well as a star on stage and radio. He was one of the biggest box office draws of the 1930s and 1940s. Power was under exclusive contract to 20th Century-Fox where his image and film choices were carefully selected by studio head Zanuck. After the war, Power wanted to stretch his acting past romantic comedies and swashbuckler roles. Nightmare Alley was Power’s personal favorite of all his films. Some of Power's films include Marie Antoinette (1938), The Rains Came (1939), Jesse James (1939), The Mark of Zorro (1940), and  Blood and Sand (1941). Later in his career, he starred in Captain from Castile (1947), The Black Rose (1950), and Witness for the Prosecution (1957). Power’s favorite of all his films that he starred in was Nightmare Alley (1947) even though it was a commercial and a critical failure when first released. Its status as a classic film noir has been recently reevaluated.

Tyrone Power and Susan Hayward

Susan Hayward (1917 – 1975) was an Academy Award-winning actress for her role as Barbara Graham in I Want to Live! (1958). Hayward worked as a fashion model but traveled to Hollywood in 1937 to try out for the role of Scarlett O’Hara. She didn’t win that coveted role, but she secured a film contract. Hayward’s career took off in the late 1940s when she was nominated for Best Actress for Smash-Up, the Story of a Woman (1947). She received four more Best Actress nominations for My Foolish Heart (1949), With a Song in My Heart (1952), I’ll Cry Tomorrow (1955), and I Want to Live. Later in her career, Hayward replaced Judy Garland as Helen Lawson in Valley of the Dolls (1967).

Rawhide trivia

• This was Susan Hayward's first film for Fox after Walter Wanger sold her contract to the studio.
• Tyrone Power was 20 years older than his character.
• The film score was originally written for Brigham Young (1940) starring Power and Dean Jagger. It was also used for Yellow Sky (1948).
• Quentin Tarantino said this film was the inspiration for The Hateful Eight (2015).

To watch the film on YouTube, click on the link below.

To join the discussion on January 2, 2023, at 6:30 p.m.Central Time, click here. Once you RSVP, you will receive an invitation with a link to the discussion on Zoom. 

Discussion questions

1. Does this film remind you of any other westerns you've seen?
2. Did you think Tyrone Power was too old for the role of Tom Owens?
3. Were Power and Hayward a good "team?"
4. What about the supporting cast? Did anyone stand out to you?
5. Did anything about this film surprise you?

London’s post World War II underbelly is explored in “Night and the City”

Night and the City (1950) is a film noir directed by Jules Dassin, produced by Samuel G. Engel, and starring Richard Widmark, Gene Tierney, and Googie Withers. The film was shot on location in London and released by 20th Century-Fox.

Richard Widmark and Gene Tierney

The plot centers around Harry Fabian (Richard Widmark), an American con man working the angles in London. He is always coming up with a new scheme to make himself rich. These mad pursuits have put a strain on his relationship with Mary Bristol (Gene Tierney). Mary works as a singer at a nightclub owned by Phil Nosseross (Francis L. Sullivan) and his wife Helen (Googie Withers).

Harry thinks he’s found the thing that’s going to change his luck. He’s working on bringing back the sport of Greco-Roman wrestling with the help of the legendary Gregorius. This flies in the face of Gregorius’s son Kristo who controls all the wrestling (not the Greco-Roman kind) in London. To get the funding for this venture, Harry joins forces with Helen, Phil’s estranged wife who has plans of opening a club of her own. Harry manages to get money from Helen to pursue his wrestling scheme if he helps her get a liquor license for her new club. When Harry changes his wrestling plans and he needs more funds, he steals from Mary, causing more strife in their relationship.

The wrestling scheme goes south in a most tragic way and there’s a price on Harry’s head. Will he be able to escape from trouble like he’s done a million times before or will this be the final reckoning for Harry Fabian?

Widmark, Tierney, and Hugh Marlowe on location in London

Not appreciated on its initial release, Night and the City is considered a high point in the film noir movement.

Jules Dassin (1911 – 2008) was an American film director. He got work as an assistant director at RKO and then moved to M-G-M where he directed short subjects. Dassin directed the film noir classics Brute Force (1947), The Naked City (1948), and Thieves’ Highway (1949). He was blacklisted because of his once being a member of the Communist Party so he left the United States for Europe where remained for the rest of his life. He was married to Greek film actress Melina Mercouri.

Samuel G. Engel (1904 – 1984) was a screenwriter and producer who had a long association with 20th Century-Fox. He wrote and produced My Darling Clementine (1946), Sitting Pretty (1948), The Frogmen (1951), and Daddy Long Legs (1955).

Richard Widmark (1914- 2008) had a sensational movie debut playing the crazy villain Tommy Udo in director Henry Hathaway’s Kiss of Death (1947). His performance won him a Golden Globe Award for New Star Of The Year – Actor. He was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance as Udo. Widmark was under contract to Twentieth Century-Fox where he played mostly villains. Later in his career, he started playing more heroic roles in films like Slattery’s Hurricane and Down to the Sea in Ships (both 1949).

Gene Tierney (1920 – 1991) was an American actress. Tierney got her start on the stage where she played the ingenue lead in The Male Animal. She was spotted by 20th Century-Fox Studio head Darryl F. Zanuck and he offered her a movie contract. Zanuck said that Tierney was the most beautiful woman in the movies. Tierney proved that she could carry a film not completely based on her beauty in films like Laura (1944) and Leave Her To Heaven (1945) for which she was nominated for her first and only Best Actress Academy Award. In the late 1940s, she struggled with mental illness which negatively affected her career.

Googie Withers (1917 – 2011) was an English actress who appeared on the stage and in film. She starred in many popular films in the UK and was once voted the 8th most popular British star. She married actor John McCallum in 1948. Together they appeared in British films and stage plays. She moved to Australia, where McCallum was born, in 1959 and continued acting there and in the UK. She remained active in the theatre and film until 2002.

Other cast members you may recognize are Hugh Marlowe (1911 – 1982) who is probably most famous for portraying playwright Lloyd Richards in All About Eve (1950). Other famous roles include The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), and Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956). Mike Mazurki (1907 – 1990) was a former wrestler, like The Strangler in Night in the City, who became a character actor, often playing strong guys who weren’t too bright. If you watched Nightmare Alley (1947), you saw him play the strong man. He has supporting roles in Murder, My Sweet (1944), and Some Like It Hot (1959).

Below is the YouTube link to the movie. Please be sure to use this link; there are many versions of this film on YouTube that are of inferior quality.




Stephen Reginald is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Discussion of "Night and the City"
Time: Jun 9, 2020, 06:30 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us04web.zoom.us/j/72400741254?pwd=UEJOVnZ4N0V1Q0IvTG1sbzR2aUxxZz09

Meeting ID: 724 0074 1254
Password: 9MXHQv

Questions for discussion:
1. How was the city of London portrayed in the film? Did it seem like another character in the movie or was the setting inconsequential?
2. Richard Widmark had played quite a few bad guys by 1949 (the year the film was in production). Was this characterization different from the other bad guys he played? Was his character totally bad or irredeemable?
3. Gene Tierney’s role was rather small, consider her star stature. Do you think she was effective as Mary? What did you think of her scenes with Hugh Marlowe?
4. Did anything about the film surprise you? Do you think the director had a message or theme that he was trying to convey?
5. What about the ending? Inevitable? A surprise?