Republic Tries a Whodunit

Ellery Queen Solves The Spanish Cape Mystery (1935)

Republic does  Ellery Queen, and it's darn good. Everyone thinks of that outfit in galloping or cliffhanger terms, but there were stabs at a mainstream, many turning up on Netflix and not a few of interest for those who've pigeonholed the Yates factory too long. Besides, it not as though we can see Ellery Queen elsewhere, the Columbia series with Ralph Bellamy long out of circulation. Donald Cook plays the detective as indolent observer of seaside murders, bodies piled like cordwood before he takes active interest. Cook requires getting used to, our dominant image of him the priggish brother to James Cagney in Public Enemy. Republic's 1935 release schedule saw as many modern dress actioners as westerns, their ID with the genre not yet firmly established. Helen Twelvetrees had landed there on a slope from stardom, is top-billed in The Spanish Cape Mystery. There are exteriors as the title implies, shot at Laguna according to then-trades. Cook as Ellery goes on vacation with elderly and irascible judge Berton Churchill, a head-scratcher as to what these two would have in common over a month spent at a rental cottage. Still, it's a novel set-up, and Churchill for-once sympathetic is refreshing. I was pleased with myself for guessing the killer about halfway in, though most could probably have figured it in a first ten minutes. Excellent quality on Netflix.

Paramount Punts One For 1949

Bride Of Vengeance Plays Loose With The Code and Is Fun Besides

Adjudged by most to be a stinker since 1949, Bride Of Vengeance surprised me by having much to enjoy, a game cast seemingly wise to fact they're immersed in disaster and figuring to get what fun they can out of it. Bride Of Vengeance greased skids for Mitch Leisen at Paramount, him blamed for inaction at ticket windows ("slim" in Chicago, "drab" in L.A., and so on, said Variety). But whose screwy idea was it to do a picture about the Borgias? At least Paramount wasn't alone, as 20th sent Henry King with Tyrone Power and Orson Welles to Euro-location for Prince Of Foxes the same year, Welles to essay another of the lethal family. Bride Of Vengeance was lots more economical, done seemingly whole on Para stages, and with a cast less starry than Prince's: Paulette Goddard, John Lund, MacDonald Carey. Accounts claim Goddard was so bad that Mitch gave up on her and let the actress flounder as best she could --- now me, being easy to please, found Paulette no worse here than on any other occasion, though she does seem to lack awareness that Bride Of Vengeance plays best when sent up slightly, which is where co-star John Lund excels.

Lund was supposed to freshen a postwar garden of lead men, Paramount launching him in dual role as Olivia DeHavilland's love mate, and later son, in To Each His Own, a Leisen homer that put him near rank of DeMille and Billy Wilder on the Marathon lot. Lund would have less luck than a Lancaster, or Kirk Douglas, or whatever of newcomers made the postwar grade and kept working to old age. His best known appearance was opposite Dietrich and Jean Arthur in Billy Wilder's A Foreign Affair, among that director's less noted features. If Mitchell Leisen was higher regarded, auteurists might study his four with John Lund in a way the later Douglas Sirk films featuring Rock Hudson were parsed. As it is, Lund was quick forgot after he quit the business in 1963, and didn't come back. Mentioning Lund is worthwhile for his being so good in Bride Of Vengeance, the one of three leads who best got humor inherent in poison pellets and tons of costume.

I'd Bet Foreign Receipts for BOV Were Lots Better Than US Ones

Leisen focused, as with Frenchman's Creek, Kitty, most of his, on dressing both sets and people. His was practiced eye for what we'd look at for a feature's whole, detractors saying he let visuals matter more than story. On Bride Of Vengeance, it was for dialogue director Phyllis Seaton to unbend narrative kinks as they arose. If this seems to sell Leisen short, there's evidence of numerous of his films that were solid as to narrative and performances --- Hold Back The Dawn, aforementioned Kitty, Remember The Night, To Each His Own --- and this director was champion to composers who did some of their best work under his supervision, Hugo Friedhofer and Victor Young come particularly to mind. Leisen had nearly twenty years at Paramount, as staff and for a most part outstanding, director, which was longer there than colleagues would last, save DeMille.

Bride Of Vengeance came with economy driving at Paramount. A postwar slump was biting deep and there'd be a $1.5 million cap on budgets. You can see Bride corners being cut, though Leisen maintains high gloss even to stage walls closing in. Sets are dark and appropriately gloomy as befitting subject matter, Bride Of Vengeance a subject that fortunately didn't need opening up to tall roofs or vast exteriors. Considering it's about a family of slayers, Bride lets membership off the hook in ways that made me wonder who was awake at PCA offices. There's also strong suggestion of incest between brother/sister MacDonald Carey and Paulette Goddard, the two introduced with recap of those they've liquidated offscreen. I figured Carey at least for a grisly finish, but he retires almost cheerily from final reel defeat with every indication he'll be back to try another day, this but moments after back-spearing disloyal lieutenant Ray Burr. And what of battlefield aftermath with legs blown off and blood dripping from sleeves where arms have been dismembered? Looked to me like recap of DeMille's arena in Sign Of The Cross, on which Leisen had assisted. Was he recalling how much fun such explicit carnage could be?

Variety was kind in wake of a trade screening, with forecast of sprightly biz for Bride Of Vengeance. An Easter 1949 opening at the Paramount Theatre in New York had the old confidence brought to bear on earlier shows with lots more potential than Bride Of Vengeance. Stage/screen combos hewed to axiom that what the movie lacked could be made up with live acts to swell receipts. Paramount wanted at least a Broadway opening to brag about, even if credit for success went largely to be-bopping Charlie Barnet "And His Famous Orchestra." Swing was on ways out by '49, but Barnet stayed hot with hits like Cherokee, Caravan, and other of jive faves among the juve set. There were comics Jerry Colonna and Jack Carter ("who do not interfere with one another," said Variety's review), "crack tapster" Bunny Briggs, plus trilling Margaret Phelan, whose "standard" Man Can Be A Wonderful Thing I could not locate on web search. Anyone familiar with this tune, or Phelan? Trade applauded was brevity of the stage program --- 45 minutes --- which made for total of under three hours, maybe less, in event short subjects were jettisoned.

The Paramount's loaded bill did well, but Bride Of Vengeance tanked elsewhere, and there'd be collateral damage not only to Mitchell Leisen, but star Paulette Goddard, whose last picture for the studio this would be. Bride's ill repute kept it out of NBC's shopping cart when the network did a 60's deal for primetime run of much of the post-'49 Paramount library (Bride Of Vengeance coming just under the wire between MCA ownership and titles that would stay with Para). Television release came in 4/67 with Bride Of Vengeance among 56 features, most off-network, in a "Portfolio One" group for syndication. Paramount passed on home video, understandable considering Bride's runt of litter status. My peruse of catalogues couldn't even locate 16mm rental for the thing, Bride Of Vengeance being one hard picture to see for a lot of years. Now there is availability on Amazon Instant (free to Prime membership), along with many Paramount post-'49's previously out of circulation. There is a CD of Hugo Friedhofer's fine score for Bride Of Vengeance. It's on a combo disc with Captain Carey USA, another rich vein of Friedhofer sound. So long as Olive, Legend, Criterion, et al, are licensing Paramount titles for Blu-Ray release, I wish they'd consider Bride Of Vengeance. It deserves wider play.

From Funnypapers To Film ...

Mutt and Jeff Are Playing With Fire in 1926 Cartoon

By what accounts I consulted, there were 300 Mutt and Jeff cartoons, of which eleven survive. Pretty pathetic, and the more distressing in light of fact M&J were a very big noise in their day, even in silent cartoons where they toplined on and off from the mid-teens to late twenties. Pioneer participant of the series Dick Huemer compared them with Peanuts of later vintage, and yes, the pair seem eternal for short/fat, tall/thin guys still referred to generically as "Mutt and Jeff." Such basic concept made creator Bud Fisher rich beyond Midas, a millionaire off his strip when a million could be made and kept. Once Mutt and Jeff came to movies, they'd not be idle. One company would do shorts a while and fold up, another in wings to take over, Fisher the broker who'd hire artists, then leave them to toil while he cashed checks.

Playing With Fire might be a cleanest sample of the Mutt/Jeff lot. Done at tail-end 1926, it fairly cries for sound still a couple years off for cartoons, and in fact, might have been kitted out with a track for later distribution, as were several other Mutt/Jeffs (animator Huemer, who worked on these, would call sound "the great savior of the animated cartoon"). Playing With Fire happily turned up at Ebay on clean-as-whistle 35mm nitrate, was grabbed by a collector, who displayed his bounty at You Tube, the treasure lovingly taken from its can and placed on a Steenbeck editor for playback. Digitally cleaned rendition is part of Thunderbean's lately released Blu-Ray, Technicolor Dreams and Black & White Nightmares, Playing With Fire a highlight for crystal clarity seldom had from 20's animation tending to survive, if at all, on raggedy terms. Great to see lost films recovered from online auction, spiffed up digitally, then made available for home playback via Blu-Ray. Thunderbean and its collector contacts are once again to be applauded for rescue of rarities and sharing them with fans. Archives could take a lesson from such fast tracking of treasures to outlying enthusiasts who can enjoy them most.

A Once Rarest Of Karloffs Back Among Us

A Horror Star's Homecoming Yields The Ghoul (1933)

Boris Karloff UK-bound to go his Yank chillers one better, this a back-from-dead venture where he's an Egyptologist in possession of a charm said to be bridge between here and beyond. A practical problem is bedridden Boris checking out at a start, an arid Act Two denied him, then fitful resurrect as titular "Ghoul," sans dialogue. What talk there is (lots) comes courtesy a Dickensian lot led by Ernest Thesiger, Cedric Hardwicke, and Ralph Richardson, with Anthony Bushell and Dorothy Hyson as bickering romancers. The Ghoul was ambitious, its aim clearly set upon US markets, but this was early among Gaumont pics distributed stateside and had to compete besides with slicker Karloffs done by Universal. There was boomer fever to see The Ghoul thanks to mouth-watering stills Forrest Ackerman used to publish; you'd think from these it was an acme of all things horrific, but where were prints? For years, we figured The Ghoul among lost ones, and it might as well have stayed so for all of a muddy and subtitled bootleg that saw circulation on 16mm and later video. Fascinating how monster mavens will grip onto lost or elusive titles as "unfinished business" toward seeing a genre's all, particularly where an icon like Karloff was involved. We are blessed of late with revival of The Ghoul, plus The Old Dark House, two that beckoned over years of non-or-not good enough access, then turned up to triumph in quality none of us would have dreamed possible. I will sometimes repeat-watch Dark House to see again if my own eyes are deceiving me ... could anything as long gone look so fine as this? I'm sorry for dedicated fans who did not live to see these flags upraised after decades spent down or at half-mast. 

A Jukebox Musical Pours It On

Robt. Lowery Gets a Telling From Future Granny Irene Ryan in Monogram Laff-and-Tune Fest Hot Rhythm

Funny Folk and Music Enliven Hot Rhythm (1944)

A Monogram masterpiece! Lowly jingle writer Robert Lowery tries boosting crush Dona Drake to singer status, is stymied in part by dizzy Irene Ryan, who unexpectedly gets the canary spot on records/radio. All this and slapstick too ... Tim Ryan the blustery boss falling over trash cans and wife Irene (they were a performing team), then in walks Harry Langdon to tie up link with comedy's Greatest Era. Future Granny Clampett Irene was a 40's extreme on Gracie Allen; she brays, tumbles, is punishingly dense. Wish there were a hundred Irene Ryan pics I could watch. Dona Drake had been Rita Rio of an all-girl band and appearance in Soundies, those little films you'd look at as a hosting juke box played. Bob Lowery had flaked out of 20th Fox's youth program ... how many Richard Greenes did they need? ... but would secure legacy playing Batman for Columbia in a 1949 serial. Monogram built a single lush set for Hot Rhythm and confined most action to it, the affect serving OK so long as bands rotate nimbly and pace doesn't flag. Doubt if anyone at Metro lost sleep over Mono songbooks, but for second feature placement, they stood good and pleased customers with modest expectation. Langdon alone is basis for watching, of course, but band boxes budget-wrapped like Hot Rhythm are joyous for plenty beyond Harry in twilight, and Netflix has a brace of them in good quality.

Robinson's Roaring Back!

Eddie Doing What He Does Best in Illegal (1955)



A rare-by-1955 animal for Warners --- a totally in-house production just as in yore, with star alumnus Edward G. Robinson doing dynamo duty as if Little Caesar had just happened. Do I recommend Illegal? Crawl if you must to see it. Or more conveniently, watch the HD stream at Warner Instant or a DVD (combo-available with RKO's The Big Steal). Having checked out WB's '55 output, I find much was independent-produced and merely distributed by the Brothers: Land Of The Pharaohs, Mister Roberts, New York Confidential, Blood Alley, The Court Martial Of Billy Mitchell, others. The company was otherwise plunged deep into TV and churning series with vigor unknown since B's from the 30's. Illegal has that sort of energy, being straight-ahead retell of The Mouthpiece, a 1932 monument pillaged for story bumps and characterization since it was new in '32. Variety was catty in reviewing Illegal, "old-fashioned" the term they'd bandy (also "rather dated and well-used"). Weren't they aware it was a remake?

Illegal was like a testimonial for Eddie before his backlog avalanched to television, that to come within a year. Far be it to imagine anyone at Warners trafficking in sentiment, but could Robinson have been handed this for freeze-out he'd known since apply of HUAC screws? He'd been maligned as a Red, kept out of class pics, a hardship then, but palatable in hindsight for fun and unpretentious work he'd do instead: A Bullet For Joey, Vice Squad, Black Tuesday, etc. Chances are Warner's largesse was more profit motivated: their previous year reissue of Little Caesar (with Public Enemy) had been a hit, so why not Eddie in something new? Illegal EGR is forceful after fashion of toughies bearing Warner shield when he was one of their top hands. After this and Hell On Frisco Bay, the actor would slow to character work more age-appropriate. Illegal is valedictory for days when the little giant would slug guys to make a point (his attorney for the offense delivers as many knuckle sandwiches as speeches in Illegal's courtroom). Here is one that makes lawyering almost look like fun (I said almost). What Eddie does with rules of evidence and procedure is sheer joy to watch.

Everyone knew he was an art collector, so an inside joke has mouthpiece Robinson dropping in on crime boss Albert Dekker's H.Q. where he observes masterpieces hung on walls. Eddie I.D.'s each admiringly, gag being they were all loaned from the actor's personal collection, value of six canvasses totaling $213,500 (now it would be millions). Also ensconced in Dekker's pad is Jayne Mansfield --- a (calendar) art object in her own right. This was touted at the time as Jayne's screen debut, done concurrently Pete Kelly's Blues actually US-released first. Anyway, she was a big noise around the Burbank lot, being tested even for Rebel Without A Cause placement with James Dean. In fact, Illegal played many a house as support feature to Rebel, as well as tandem dates with blood relation I Died A Thousand Times, it too being remade from an old Warners property (High Sierra).

Illegal had its Broadway premiere in old-time vaudeville company at the Palace Theatre (one-time temple of variety), where a whopping eight acts preceded the feature. There was the Gaudsmith Brothers in "comedy antics with their uncooperative dogs," a harmonica virtuoso, "the Negro terp (dance) team" Billy and Ann, plus hoop juggling "which by now can be regarded as a classic exhibition of the art" (Variety). A first three days clocked $19K for the Palace, so who said vaudeville was dead? Edward G. Robinson would memoir-declare that his self-esteem fell by the hour during this "B picture phase of my career," trouble with his wife (she wanted a divorce) and son (he was getting one) an ongoing stress. But Illegal wasn't necessarily a "B," negative cost being $634K, about the same as being spent on the Randolph Scott westerns at WB. Illegal drew $535K in domestic rentals, $642K foreign. There was nice profit, $248K, a clear sign that Robinson in the right vehicle was still bankable. His fans would soon get the dollop when everything Eddie earlier did cascaded onto late shows via sale of the pre-49 Warner library to AAP.

When Pirates Couldn't Take A Censor's Stronghold

Chicago In Context: These Were The Big Shows Playing
Through Yule '44 and Into a New Year

Frenchman's Creek In Your 1944 Christmas Stocking --- Part Two

It's Christmas 1944, and you're going to the show. Each of companies is out with shiniest baubles. Warners had To Have and Have Not plus Hollywood Canteen in fresh release, while Metro premiered National Velvet at Radio City and kept Meet Me In St. Louis in best venues from a Thanksgiving open. Small markets wouldn't see these until calendar turn to 1945. Entertainment in those days took slower to canvas the country. Paramount wrapped Frenchman's Creek at Broadway's Rivoli after thirteen socko weeks, and just before Christmas, the very time venues in other cities would bring it in as their Yule attraction. Motion Picture Daily (10/13/44) announced "the largest simultaneous booking for a Paramount film in months," with 300 prints for Christmas/New Year dates. Awareness of Frenchman's Creek was fever pitching by this time, its New York reception trumpeted in trades and elsewhere. Movies, like stage plays, benefited from length of Broadway runs, that being barometer of success for both. Frenchman's Creek had come a long way from a property that couldn't be filmed, at least with any fidelity to the Daphne DeMaurier novel from which it derived. Censors had earlier kyboshed efforts by Selznick and MGM to adapt FC, and like Forever Amber to come, the code/Code seemed unbreakable. Paramount would have to denude the book's central theme, which was adultery between heroine "Dona" and her pirate swain. Simply put, the affair could not take place, despite yearnings spoke by the onscreen would-be lovers.

A Pirate Ship Built Twice: At Top Full-Scale,
and Below a Para-Built Miniature

This was the sort of maddening hypocrisy that sunk many a bid for adult content. Rule One and Only: Play by PCA rules or your picture won't be shown, at least not in theatres subscribed to the Code, which all better houses abided by lest a watchdog Legion Of Decency and/or local acolytes be aroused. Radar was up re Frenchman's Creek from announcement it would be filmed. Many knew the DeMaurier blueprint (Dona not only sleeps with her seagoing lover, but bears children by him). To remove all of this would gut DeMaurier's narrative, Paramount figuring to compensate with costumes and Technicolor, letting customer's imagination fill in the rest. Knowing all of studio tricks, the PCA insisted on dialogue that would make plain that nothing illicit had happened between the principals. There would be longing looks, much dialogue professing passion, and even a kiss or two, all leading to Joan Fontaine's inevitable choice to stay home and mind kiddies/husband, her grand adventure a mere mischief that puts her nowhere near the pirate's bed. That last isn't quite accurate --- she does clock time between Arturo DeCordova's sheets, but chastely --- him only entering the morning after to deliver breakfast. Hep viewers knew this was limit of license in a 40's show; they'd get fun from reading between lines (or dissolves), but knew all a while that movies would never lay sex on the line.

Arturo DeCordova speaks the cleansing line to Joan Fontaine: "Of course, if you choose to stay in England, there is nothing that has happened between us that would make you marriage a pretense." Would this have reassured viewers who suspected something more had gone on? Director Mitchell Leisen thought to the end that he had slipped one over on censors. He incorrectly recalled Joan Fontaine's "morning-after" scene to biographer David Chierichetti: "It's quite obvious that she's naked in the bed when she throws her shawl around her shoulders before he (DeCordova) comes in." Wishful thinking on Leisen's part this was, as frame captures at left show Fontaine well-clothed when she awakens and then talks to DeCordova, who knocks before entering. Anecdotal history on Frenchman's Creek is rich: There is Chierichetti's book, which is one of the best career studies of a Classic Era director I've read (full of interviews with those who worked with Leisen); also we have associate producer David Lewis' viewpoint as expressed in The Creative Producer: A Memoir Of The Studio System, also a must. Joan Fontaine had sour memories of Frenchman's Creek, which she claims to have been forced upon her by Selznick on threat of suspension. The latter was also gun held by Paramount to Leisen's head, Frenchman's Creek by the director's estimate "as dull as dishwater and ... a lousy picture."

Movie Magic! Everything Above Players is Matte-Painted

A First Floor Is Built, The Rest a Hanging Miniature

They all agree the production was an ordeal ... 104 days and much of that on shore location where toilets weren't handy. Fontaine alienated co-workers by observing that success of the finished product was burden upon her shoulders alone, which sat not well with Brit co-players who saw her as stuck up to begin with. Leisen was a stylist whose emphasis was on the look of his film, sets and costuming a specialty. Billy Wilder would knock him for that, so much so that many now think of Leisen only in terms of insult his Paramount nemesis laid down (Wilder felt his script for 1941's Hold Back The Dawn was ruined by Leisen's timid handling). Maybe Leisen wasn't the ideal director for a show about pirates, as these are a limpid lot, and his non-flair with action begs for intervention from a Michael Curtiz or Raoul Walsh. Where Leisen prevails is recreation of the period, Frenchman's Creek a sumptuous pageant and likely the most gorgeous Technicolor ever to grace a 40's screen, this apparent even in debased circumstance of Universal's DVD. He'd work closely with matte/miniature departments at Paramount to enhance what was already lavish, sleight-of-hand in Frenchman's Creek a fine demonstration of what behind-scenes paint and model artists could do. In this sense, Leisen was following in tradition his mentor, C.B. DeMille, had estalished at Paramount.

The process of star creation, and how it sometimes failed, can be seen up close in Frenchman's Creek, its launch of Arturo DeCordova being a craft that sank within the year Paramount spent trying to sell him as a "future Valentino." It seemed a sensible enough idea. The war had made outreach to Latin neighbors both practical and profitable. DeCordova had been a major star in Mexico and would be again after his US tide went out. There was precedent too for stars aborn in pirate garb ... consider Errol Flynn. Nothing was specifically wrong with DeCordova. He just couldn't reach off the screen and grab his audience the way Flynn, or indeed Valentino, had. Whatever investment Para was willing to make in him, they couldn't force DeCordova upon a public that didn't want him. This was hard truth Hollywood learned with every personality coming in with fanfare, then going out to obscurity. Frenchman's Creek was a great success that should have made "A Great New Romantic Star" of Arturo DeCordova, but he'd be what patronage would forget first, a rock in shoes of Paramount staffers who imagined they could make an attraction of anybody.

Further down cast listing was Harald Ramond, another who might have made the grade but for ugly scandal that rendered him persona non grata just as Frenchman's Creek was widening out for 1944's holiday season. Ramond had emigrated to the US after a "series of adventures" in Europe, one of which was imprisonment in a German concentration camp (so said studio bio). He had signed with independent producer Charles R. Rogers, who'd loan him to Paramount for big break that was Frenchman's Creek. Ramond had in meantime become involved with Lupe "Spitfire" Valez, who was impregnated by him. She chose to end her life ("sleeping powders," said press) rather than face disgrace of unwed motherhood. Word got out that Ramond had refused to marry Lupe when she came to him in trouble, this despite his insistence to the contrary ("The last time I talked to Lupe I told her that I would marry her any way she wanted"). Wherever truth lay, this was no base for a young man in 1944 to build a Hollywood career upon, so Harald Ramond moved back to Euro pastures, where he'd have twenty years more work in features and television (as Harald Maresch).

And so we're left with what Universal gives us of Frenchman's Creek. Maybe there's a 35mm nitrate print surviving somewhere, but I've doubt of ever seeing it, short of seven hour's flight to a UCLA or some such screening. I know my own affection for this show is perverse. Ladies in forty-pound costumes, men bewigged with poodle dogs travelling in wake. Joan Fontaine's fop of a husband says "Fiddle-Dee-Dee" repeatedly. The pirates don dresses and captured corsets and kiss each other. To quote Paul Cavanagh's deathless putdown from The Mississippi Gambler, "they handle a sword as though it were a parasol." But then there is Basil Rathbone, a lion among lambs. And what fun to see he and Nigel Bruce sharing scenes in this folderol, and right in midst of Holmes-ing it at Universal (breaks on Frenchman's location found the two recording SH radio broadcasts). Wrath-bone shuns the wig when it's time to get dangerous, like when he does rape attempt on Joan. That's the wildest scene in Frenchman's Creek and worth an hour and half's wait. As with The Mark Of Zorro, once Basil's dispatched, the show is essentially over. Everything after that (another thirty minutes of Frenchman) is badly anti-climactic. Still, Frenchman's Creek is loads of fun and priceless mirror to what flipped audiences in late '44 and right thru '45, a monster hit of its day that I'm glad to see available to us now.

Hitting Technicolor High Seas

Piracy Pays for Paramount and Frenchman's Creek (1944) --- Part One

This Paramount budget monstrosity (a whopping $4.8 million cost, said Variety) is just out via Universal's Vault Series, so that now Frenchman's Creek can at least be less forgotten than it's been since 1944. I was always intrigued by stills that promised the moon in terms of costuming and production, plus there was Basil Rathbone in wicked dudgeon, crawling up a staircase to continue assault upon Joan Fontaine even after she's sunk a dagger in him. Frenchman's was adapted from Daphne DeMaurier, she of Rebecca fame, which had been luck for Fontaine and producing boss David Selznick. He loaned her to Paramount for FC in fact, then rained memos upon makers about stuff they did wrong in rushes (lots, by DOS reckoning). Para boss Buddy DeSylva finally told Dave to buzz off or take his girl back, which finally shut the kibitzing up. Selznick truly had juice in that town, getting prominent titles credit for whatever talent he lent. "Miss Fontaine's service by arrangement with David Selznick" is high on Frenchman's masthead, while also-borrowed Basil Rathbone (from Metro) and Nigel Bruce (Universal) get no such designation. The credit require must have been written into every loan contract Selznick signed.

I wish Frenchman's Creek looked better on DVD, but there's the rub re shows most don't know from Adam's tomcat. Well, it's taken me fifty years to see it, so I'll not judge. 16mm prints were nowhere, let alone with decent color (they'd be pink where present on dealer lists). Fact is, Frenchman's Creek should bask in glory of Blu-Ray, or at least HD stream, for it's second to none of 40's Technicolor, a most dazzling of showcases for all-the-more perfected hues we had by wartime. Critics and public welcomed this return to puffed sleeve romance in a midst of world-spread fighting, Frenchman's Creek purest escapism in most needed sense. Paramount knew they had a honey and spent freely, maybe too much so, extravagance here being grim preview of tab movies would run when WWII was done and costs took to skies (as Fox would learn to near-ruin with similar Forever Amber in 1947). Variety kept tally through a year's countdown to Frenchman's release (it was completed in fall '43 --- didn't open till 9/44). Trade insiders could chuckle over loss to come from spending $3.6 million ... then new estimate $3.8 ... topped by one columnist who said it had run to shocker four million (studio leaks were rife then as gov't ones are now). This was GWTW territory!

No little sweating went on behind Para doors. There'd been a June '44 preview for execs that shook some, consensus being that Frenchman's Creek "lacks strong marquee voltage in its top names, and (the) situation presents major merchandising problem to company officials," as reported by Variety. Burning question was whether to exhibit Creek as a "special," that is roadshow, or at least for advanced admission, or let it go out as a regular release. To shoot for enhanced coin would antagonize showmen and worse, strong circuits, both having declared war on the roadshow concept, which was their idea of Paramount pocket-picking. The company's argument? They'd need (way) upwards of five million just to begin breaking even, selling of Frenchman's Creek "admittedly a tough task for the sales and theatre department" (Para owned or controlled over a thousand venues where their pics were shown). Word was that Frenchman's Creek was the most expensive feature in Paramount's history, and the company didn't deny it. What they needed now was an opening as historical as dollars spent.

Roadshow was out --- too much heat from exhibs. They were still aflame over For Whom The Bell Tolls and The Song Of Bernadette, which some had refused to play until terms came down. Trouble with roadshow was upped tickets which management had to explain to regular customers with expectation of regular pricing, ill will ignited when cashiers demanded more. "A virtual ban on roadshowing" was threatened by theatres, but here came two for '44-45 that would aim for bleachers --- Since You Went Away and Wilson, their respective producers Selznick and Zanuck convinced that "prestige of the pictures will be enhanced by upped prices." Whatever Frenchman's Creek had, it wasn't prestige. This was a bodice ripper pure and simple, with pirates and stolen kisses in lieu of critic lure. The trick would be to drumbeat those elements via "pre-release" dates that would show best how to move Frenchman's Creek through a wider market.

Broadway's Rivoli Dresses Up For Frenchman's Creek

A premiere was set, delayed, then had at Broadway's Rivoli (9/19), a 2000+ seat leviathan relieved of another Para biggie, The Story Of Dr. Wassell, that stayed a whopping twelve weeks, not unusual in a war-boom era of extended runs. Much was spent on the Rivoli's front, plus tie-ins up/down Broadway. Top seating, after 5 PM, was $1.50. Paramount's intent was to play for months toward December at the Rivoli, plus "a few selected test runs in various parts of the country to determine sales policy," which was figured to be demand of 50% from theatres booking Frenchman's Creek. Those were steep terms, but preferable to roadshow or upped tickets, and besides, Frenchman's Creek was shaping up a hit, as indicated by lines formed outside the Rivoli and a $9,000 opener day for that venue, followed by two weeks that set all-time house records. Paramount had a souvenir book, sold for a quarter to Rivoli patrons; this was having roadshow cake and eating it too, even if Frenchman's Creek wasn't played on those terms. The "test dates" to follow were in usual keys --- Boston, Detroit, Kansas City, five others --- and there was nationwide magazine coverage with color stills taken of the cast, and action from the film. People would be reading about Frenchman's Creek for months before they could see it, but this was normal strategy for shows big enough to linger in memory as eventual "must-sees."

It was frankly a woman's picture, which in 1944, with most men gone to fight, was a good thing. This was a time for lines, endless ones, to see Greer Garson, Bette Davis ... and Joan Fontaine, who'd shown what profit could derive from distaff travails of Jane Eyre, Suspicion, The Constant Nymph, an unbroke line of success. So what if her leading man was virtual unknown (in the US) Arturo DeCordova? (more of him in Part Two) What mattered was the fair sex taking an interest and projecting themselves upon Fontaine's latest leap to romantic heights. There was a "huge" and historical national tie-up with the Dorothy Gray cosmetics firm, "a natural for the women trade," said Showman's Trade Review. This would canvas department stores and drug chains throughout the country (imagine Dana Andrews' Fred Derry peddling Dorothy Gray cosmetics in his reduced Best Years Of Our Lives drug-clerking circumstances). A lipstick-rouge combination, "Frenchman's Red," was introduced at fashion shows to which local membership of "Social Registers" was invited, and lavish costumes from Frenchman's Creek were shown in stores which offered 40's approximation of 17th century style. The promotion would be "carried through during the entire life of the picture, wherever it is shown, starting with the metropolitan centers and filtering through to the smallest communities." Frenchman's Creek and its spun-off products could thus maintain a high public profile for at least a year.

Part Two of Frenchman's Creek is HERE.