When Chicago Had One Too Many Firemen
King vs. Humberstone --- and Zanuck's The Referee
 |
| Where Battle Lines Were Drawn: The Main Title Credits for In Old Chicago |
 |
| From the 2/38 Issue of International Photographer |
posted by John McElwee at 11:00 AM
4 Comments:
The burning of Chicago in this movie is one of the great special effects sequences in film history. If they remade it today it would crammed with phony GI and impossible angles and would look like a video game. And people would crow about how far FX have come!
Thanks very much for the interesting information, John. I had always thought of Chicago as a Henry King project, not cognizant of Humberstone's vital contribution to the fire sequences.
Lots of ego and prima donna behaviour on King's part. I always think of him as an easy going sort (at least, as opposed to a high strung tempermental type like a Mike Curtiz over at Warners).
I guess the perception that Fox's main director's credit for a major production like this would be tarnished brought out the old director's claws, at Humberstone's expense, even though latter retained his name in the credits.
I've always been a little confused about In Old Chicago's release date. It qualified for the 1937 Oscars (including Alice Brady's win), yet is often referred to as a 1938 film, such as your reference in your article.
I assume it was released at the tail end of '37 (in time for Academy consideration) but was primarily viewed by the public in the early months of the following year.
I come at it from the opposite side: I always associate In Old Chicago with Humberstone! I'd almost forgotten about who the "book" director was until you reminded me, John. For every "important" director ruling the roost (Henry King, Cecil B. DeMille, Frank Capra) there were equally efficient directors working twice as fast with a fraction of the prominence (H. Bruce Humberstone, William Beaudine, Joseph H. Lewis).
Dan Mercer compares "In Old Chicago" with "San Francisco":
"In Old Chicago" was ostensibly made from "We the O'Learys," a story written by Niven Busch, but is it possible that what really happened was that a minion of Darryl F. Zanuck filched a carbon of "San Francisco" from an M-G-M waste paper basket?
The essential elements are all the same: the glamorous rogue with a heart of gold, his sterling friend, the attractive chanteuse, the rough neighborhood where the story takes place (the "Tenderloin" in the one, the "Patch" in the other), the vigorous political contest, and a multitude of period tunes, all leading to the cataclysmic disaster.
Where they differ, however, is all to the credit of M-G-M: Clark Gable, the king at his peak, opposed by a callow Tyrone Power, the superb Spencer Tracy against the inconsequential Don Ameche, Jeannette MacDonald, with her talent and class, over the appealing but limited Alice Faye, and a toss-up between two square-jawed stalwarts, Jack Holt and Brian Donlevy. The music of "San Francisco" offers not only the catchy title tune but the sublime trio from Gounod's "Faust," perhaps the most thrilling one ever composed for an opera. As for the disaster itself, what would you prefer, an earthquake and a massive fire, or a massive fire started by a cow?
And if there is any doubt as to the outcome, "San Francisco" has the topper in Ted Healey. He is not everyone's taste, to be sure, but to see him in this production, treating it as though it was his own star vehicle, is a hoot. Gable might be romancing MacDonald, but in the background we can see Healey doing some bit of business, knowing that it's his show and all eyes are upon him. At the end, he even provides a credible death scene, though some would have preferred seeing it a couple of reels earlier.
By the way, it might have been a slander to ascribe the cause of the Great Chicago Fire to the unfortunate Daisy the Cow. A survey of reports from the period indicate that there were a rash of fires throughout the Midwest at the same time, some of which were apparently caused by unusual meteorological phenomena. Had this aspect been played up rather than the legend about a cow, "In Old Chicago" might at least have shared with "San Francisco" a certain grandeur and mystery as to the cause of the disaster.
Post a Comment
<< Home