Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master (Screen Classics) (104 page)

1927

The Rough Riders
(Paramount) Released March 15 in New York City, October 21 nationwide. Length: In premiere version, thirteen reels; cut to ten reels (app. 100 minutes) for nationwide release. Preservation status: Fragments at the Library of Congress and the Museum of Modern Art. Cast: Noah Beery, Charles Farrell, George Bancroft, Charles Emmett Mack, Mary Astor, Frank Hopper. Production: Adolph Zukor and Jesse L. Lasky, presenters; B. P. Schulberg, associate producer; Robert N. Lee and Keene Thompson, screenwriters, and George Marion Jr., titles writer (from an adaptation by John Fish Goodrich of an original story by the technical adviser Hermann Hagedorn); James Wong Howe, cinematographer; Henry Hathaway, assistant director. (The writer-director John Milius did his version of the story for television in 1997.)

Hula
(Paramount) Released August 27. Length: 64 minutes. Preservation status: 35 mm preserved. Cast: Clara Bow, Clive Brook, Agostino Borgato, Arnold Kent, Albert Gran, Patty DuPont. Production: B. P. Schulberg, associate producer; Ethel Doherty, screenwriter, and George Marion Jr., titles writer (from Doris Anderson’s adaptation of Armine von Tempski’s novel); William Marshall, cinematographer; Henry Hathaway, assistant director.

The Way of All Flesh
(Paramount) Released October 1. Length: 90 minutes. Preservation status: Lost. Cast: Emil Jannings, Belle Bennett, Phyllis Haver. Production: Adolph Zukor and Jesse L. Lasky, presenters; Jules Furthman, screenwriter, and Julian Johnson, titles writer (from Lajos Biro’s adaptation of a story by Perley Poore Sheehan); Victor Milner, cinematographer; Henry Hathaway, assistant director. (Remade in 1940, directed by Louis King.)

Academy Award: Jannings, best actor, winner, for this film and
The Last Command.

1928

The Awakening
(Samuel Goldwyn, released through United Artists) Released November 17. Length: 90 minutes. Preservation status: Lost. Cast: Vilma Banky, Walter Byron, Louis Wolheim. Production: Samuel Goldwyn, producer; Carey Wilson, screenwriter, and Katherine Hilliker and H. H. Caldwell, title writers (from an original story by Frances Marion); George Barnes, cinematographer (assistant, Gregg Toland); William Cameron Menzies, art director.

Academy Award nomination: Menzies (submitted, not an official nomination).

1929

Abie’s Irish Rose
(Paramount) Released January 5. Silent with sound sequences. Length: 129 minutes. Preservation status: 35 mm preserved except for some musical sequences. Cast: Charles “Buddy” Rogers, Nancy Carroll, Jean Hersholt, J. Farrell MacDonald. Production: Adolph Zukor and Jesse L. Lasky, presenters; B. P. Schulberg, associate producer; Jules Furthman, screenwriter, and Herman J. Mankiewicz, Julian Johnson, and Anne Nichols, title writers (from Nichols’s play); Harold Rosson, cinematographer. (Remade in 1946, directed by Edward Sutherland.)

Wolf Song
(Paramount) Released March 30. Silent with sound sequences. Length: 75 minutes. Preservation status: 35 mm preserved except for some musical sequences. Cast: Gary Cooper, Lupe Velez, Louis Wolheim, Russell “Russ” Columbo. Production: Adolph Zukor and Jesse L. Lasky, presenters; Fleming, producer; John Farrow and Keene Thompson, screenwriters, and Julian Johnson, title writer (from Harvey Fergusson’s novel); Allen Siegler, cinematographer.

The Virginian
(Paramount) Released November 9. Length: 90 minutes. Cast: Gary Cooper, Walter Huston, Mary Brian, Richard Arlen, Eugene Pallette, Willie Fung. Production: Adolph Zukor and Jesse L. Lasky, presenters; Louis D. Lighton, producer; Howard Estabrook, screenwriter, and Edward E. Paramore, dialogue writer (from Grover Jones and Keene Thompson’s adaptation of Owen Wister’s novel and the theatrical adaptation by Wister and Kirk La Shelle); J. Roy Hunt and Edward Cronjager, cinematographers; Henry Hathaway, assistant director. (Previously made in 1914 with Dustin Farnum and in 1923 with Kenneth Harlan; remade in 1946 with Joel McCrea; later the basis of a 1960s TV series with James Drury and a 2000 TV movie directed by and starring Bill Pullman.)

1930

Common Clay
(Fox) Released August 13. Length: 89 minutes. Cast: Constance Bennett, Lew Ayres, Tully Marshall, Matty Kemp, Beryl Mercer. Production: William Fox, presenter; Jules Furthman, screenwriter (from the play by Cleves Kinkead); Glen MacWilliams, cinematographer. (Previously made in 1919.)

Renegades
(Fox) Released October 26. Length: 84 minutes. Cast: Warner Baxter, Myrna Loy, Noah Beery, Bela Lugosi, Victor Jory, Noah Beery Jr. Production: William Fox, presenter; Jules Furthman, screenwriter (from the novel
Le renégat
by André Armandy); L. William O’Connell, cinematographer.

1931

Around the World in Eighty Minutes
(United Artists) Released December 12. Length: 80 minutes. Cast: Douglas Fairbanks, Fleming, Sessue Hayakawa, Duke Kahanamoku, Mickey Mouse. Production: Fairbanks, producer; Robert E. Sherwood, screenwriter; Harry Sharp and Chuck Lewis, cinematographers.

1932

The Wet Parade
(MGM) Released March 26. Length: 122 minutes. Principal shooting took place January 18–February 23, but Fleming began developing the project on September 21, 1931, and did retakes from February 24 to March 8. Cast: Dorothy Jordan, Lewis Stone, Robert Young, Walter Huston, Jimmy Durante, Wallace Ford, Myrna Loy, Joan Marsh, Clarence Muse, Clara Blandick. Production: Hunt Stromberg, producer; John Lee Mahin, screenwriter (from the novel by Upton Sinclair); George Barnes, cinematographer.

Red Dust
(MGM) Released October 22. Length: 84 minutes. Production dates: August 10–October 8; retakes on October 11. Cast: Clark Gable, Jean Harlow, Gene Raymond, Mary Astor, Donald Crisp, Tully Marshall, Willie Fung. Production: Hunt Stromberg, producer; John Lee Mahin, screenwriter (from the play by Wilson Collison); Harold Rosson, cinematographer. (Remade as
Congo Maisie
in 1940, directed by H. C. Potter, and as
Mogambo
in 1953, directed by John Ford, also with Clark Gable, also written by John Lee Mahin.)

1933

The White Sister
(MGM) Released April 14. Length: 110 minutes. Fleming originally signed a contract for this picture on July 29, 1932, but it was waived so he could work on
Red Dust.
Production dates: December 1932–March 1, 1933, retakes on March 2. Cast: Helen Hayes, Clark Gable, Lewis Stone, May Robson, Edward Arnold. Production: Hunt Stromberg, producer; Donald Ogden Stewart, screenwriter (from the novel by F. Marion Crawford); William Daniels, cinematographer. (Previously made in 1915 with Viola Allen and in 1923 with Lillian Gish.)

Bombshell
(MGM) Released October 13. Length: 96 minutes. Fleming went on contract May 6. Production dates: August 7–September 15, 1933, with retakes on September 20 and 21. Cast: Jean Harlow, Lee Tracy, Frank Morgan, Franchot Tone, Pat O’Brien, Ted Healy, Louise Beavers, Isabel Jewell, C. Aubrey Smith. Production: Fleming, producer; Hunt Stromberg, associate producer; John Lee Mahin and Jules Furthman, screenwriters (from a play
by
Caroline Francke and Mack Crane); Harold Rosson and Chester Lyons, cinematographers.

1934

Treasure Island
(MGM) Released August 17. Length: 105 minutes. Fleming went on payroll on February 8. Production began March 20 and ended May 29, with retakes on June 8, 9, 25, and 27. Cast: Wallace Beery, Nigel Bruce, Jackie Cooper, Lionel Barrymore, Otto Kruger, Lewis Stone, Charles “Chic” Sale, Charles Bennett, Douglas Dumbrille. Production: Hunt Stromberg, producer; John Lee Mahin, screenwriter (from the novel by Robert Louis Stevenson); Ray June, Clyde DeVinna, and Harold Rosson, cinematographers. (
Treasure Island
has been filmed numerous times, most famously by Byron Haskin for Walt Disney in 1950, with Robert Newton and Bobby Driscoll; in 2002, Disney also produced and distributed the futuristic comic cartoon feature
Treasure Planet,
which in many ways pays homage to Fleming’s version.)

1935

Reckless
(MGM) Released April 19. Length: 99 minutes. Production dates: November 27, 1934–February 25, retakes on March 8, 9, and 11. Cast: Jean Harlow, William Powell, Franchot Tone, May Robson, Ted Healy, Nat Pendleton, Rosalind Russell, Mickey Rooney. Production: David O. Selznick, producer; P. J. Wolfson, screenwriter (from a story by Selznick under the pseudonym Oliver Jeffries); George Folsey, cinematographer.

The Farmer Takes a Wife
(Fox) Released August 2. Length: 91 minutes. Fleming moved to the Fox lot on February 26 and returned to MGM for the reshoots on
Reckless,
before this film’s principal photography took place from early April to mid-May. Cast: Janet Gaynor, Henry Fonda, Charles Bickford, Slim Summerville, Andy Devine, Jane Withers, Margaret Hamilton, Siegfried “Sig” Rumann, John Qualen. Production: Winfield Sheehan, producer; Edwin Burke, screenwriter (from Frank B. Elser and Marc Connelly’s stage adaptation of Walter D. Edmonds’s novel
Rome Haul
). (Remade as a Betty Grable musical in 1953, directed by Henry Levin.)

1937

Captains Courageous
(MGM) Released June 25. Length: 116 minutes. Production dates: second-unit photography began in October 1935, principal photography began September 22, 1936, and Fleming didn’t finish doing retakes
until
March 18, 1937. Cast: Freddie Bartholomew, Spencer Tracy, Lionel Barrymore, Melvyn Douglas, Mickey Rooney, John Carradine, Leo G. Carroll, Jack LaRue. Production: Louis D. Lighton, producer; John Lee Mahin, Marc Connelly, and Dale Van Every, screenwriters (from the novel by Rudyard Kipling); Harold Rosson, cinematographer. (Remade for TV both in 1977, with Karl Malden, Jonathan Kahn, and Ricardo Montalban, and in 1996, with Robert Urich, Kenny Vadas, and Colin Cunningham, in the roles originally played by Barrymore, Bartholomew, and Tracy, respectively.)

Academy Award nominations: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, outstanding production; Tracy, best actor (winner); Elmo Veron, film editing; Mahin, Connelly, Van Every, screenplay.

1938

Test Pilot
(MGM) Released April 22. Length: 118 minutes. Production dates: December 1, 1937–February 18, 1938, with retakes March 30–early April. Cast: Clark Gable, Myrna Loy, Spencer Tracy, Lionel Barrymore, Louis Jean Heydt, Gloria Holden, Virginia Grey, Samuel S. Hinds, Martin Spellman. Production: Louis D. Lighton, producer; Vincent Lawrence and Waldemar Young, screenwriters (from an original story by Frank “Spig” Wead); Ray June, cinematographer.

Academy Award nominations: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, outstanding production; Tom Held, film editing; Wead, original story.

1939

The Wizard of Oz
(MGM) Released August 25. Length: 101 minutes. Production dates: September 30, 1938 (recording); October 13, 1938 (filming, under Richard Thorpe, whose footage was scrapped)–March 16, 1939 (under King Vidor, who shot the Kansas scenes; Jack Conway and W. S. Van Dyke are often cited as contributors according to an erroneous column item). Fleming began shooting November 4, 1938, and continued until February 17, 1939. Cast: Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley, Billie Burke, Margaret Hamilton, Charley Grapewin, Clara Blandick. Production: Mervyn LeRoy, producer; Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, screenwriters (from the novel by L. Frank Baum); Harold Rosson, cinematographer.

Academy Award nominations: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, outstanding production; Cedric Gibbons, William Horning, art direction; Rosson (submitted, not
an
official nomination), color cinematography; Herbert Stothart, original score (winner); song, “Over the Rainbow,” Harold Arlen, E. Y. Harburg (winners); special effects, A. Arnold Gillespie, Douglas Shearer. Special award to Judy Garland “for outstanding performance as a screen juvenile during the past year.”

Gone With the Wind
(Selznick International, released by MGM) Released December 15. Length: 222 minutes. Production dates: December 10, 1938–February 15, 1939. Fleming directed from March 2 to April 27, and from May 5 to July 1, with reshoots during the first two weeks of October. Cast: Clark Gable, Vivien Leigh, Olivia de Havilland, Leslie Howard, Thomas Mitchell, Hattie McDaniel, Butterfly McQueen, Victor Jory, Evelyn Keyes, Ann Rutherford, Laura Hope Crews, Harry Davenport, Rand Brooks, Cammie King, Mickey Kuhn, Ward Bond. Production: David O. Selznick, producer; Sidney Howard, screenwriter (from the novel by Margaret Mitchell); Ernest Haller, cinematographer.

Academy Award nominations: Selznick International, outstanding production (winner); Gable, actor; Leigh, actress (winner); de Havilland, supporting actress; McDaniel, supporting actress (winner); Lyle Wheeler, art direction (winner); Haller, Ray Rennahan, cinematography (color) (winners); Fleming, direction (winner); Hal C. Kern, James E. Newcom, film editing (winner); Max Steiner, original score; Samuel Goldwyn Studio, sound recording; John R. Cosgrove, Fred Albin, Arthur Johns, special effects; Howard, screenplay (winner). Special award to William Cameron Menzies for outstanding achievement in the use of color; scientific/technical award for several technical advances.

1941

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
(MGM) Released August 12. Length: 127 minutes. Production dates: February 4–April 18. Cast: Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman, Lana Turner, Donald Crisp, Ian Hunter, Barton MacLane, and C. Aubrey Smith. Production: Victor Saville, producer; John Lee Mahin, screenwriter (from the novella by Robert Louis Stevenson); Joseph Ruttenberg, cinematographer. (This was a remake of the 1932 Paramount film directed by Rouben Mamoulian, with Fredric March.)

Academy Award nominations: Ruttenberg, black-and-white cinematography; Harold F. Kress, film editing; Franz Waxman, musical score of a dramatic picture.

1942

Tortilla Flat
(MGM) Released May 21. Length: 105 minutes. Production dates: November 23, 1941–February 12, 1942; retakes February 23–24. Cast: Spencer Tracy, Hedy Lamarr, John Garfield, Frank Morgan, Akim Tamiroff, Sheldon Leonard, John Qualen, Donald Meek, Connie Gilchrist, Allen Jenkins, Henry O’Neill. Production: Sam Zimbalist, producer; John Lee Mahin and Benjamin Glazer, screenwriters (from the novel by John Steinbeck); Karl Freund, cinematographer.