TCM Schedule for Thursday, August 20 -- Summer Under the Stars--Miriam Hopkins

[Staph]

Today's star of the day is Miriam Hopkins, one of the big stars of the 1930s. Born to wealth in Savannah, Georgia, she was one of the contenders for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With The Wind (1939). Enjoy!


6:00am -- The Chase (1966)
A convict's escape ignites passions in his hometown.
Cast: Marlon Brando, Jane Fonda, Robert Redford, E. G. Marshall
Dir: Arthur Penn
C-133 mins, TV-14

Producer Sam Spiegel had acquired the property that became The Chase (1966) in the 1950s and originally wanted Marlon Brando to play the role of Jason 'Jake' Rogers and Marilyn Monroe to play his lover, Anna Reeves. By the time production began in 1965, Brando was too old to play the role of the son, and took the part of Sheriff Calder instead. Brando was paid $750,000 and his production company Pennebaker was paid a fee of $130,000. (Brando's sister Jocelyn Brando also was cast in the small role of Mrs. Briggs).


8:15am -- The Richest Girl in the World (1934)
To put off fortune-hunters, an heiress trades places with her secretary.
Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Joel McCrea, Fay Wray, Henry Stephenson
Dir: William A. Seiter
BW-76 mins, TV-G

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Writing, Original Story -- Norman Krasna

The heiress that Miriam Hopkins plays is meant to be Barbara Hutton, heir to the Woolworth fortune -- the Paris Hilton of her day.


9:45am -- Wise Girl (1937)
A rich girl plays poor to win over a Greenwich Village artist.
Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Ray Milland, Walter Abel, Henry Stephenson
Dir: Leigh Jason
BW-70 mins, TV-G

Watch for Margaret Dumont, in one of her non-Marx Brothers roles.


11:00am -- Woman Chases Man (1937)
A millionaire hires a lady architect to con the money for a housing project out of his wealthy son.
Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Joel McCrea, Charles Winninger, Erik Rhodes
Dir: John Blystone
BW-69 mins, TV-G

Broderick Crawford's film debut.


12:15pm -- The Old Maid (1939)
An unmarried mother gives her illegitimate child to her cousin.
Cast: Bette Davis, Miriam Hopkins, George Brent, Jane Bryan
Dir: Edmund Goulding
BW-95 mins, TV-PG

To get the effects of aging, Bette Davis didn't wear any eye makeup or lipstick, and makeup artist Perc Westmore used a pale, ashen base on her face.


2:00pm -- Old Acquaintance (1943)
Two writers, friends since childhood, fight over their books and lives.
Cast: Bette Davis, Miriam Hopkins, Gig Young, John Loder
Dir: Vincent Sherman
BW-110 mins, TV-PG

This is the film with the often shown, camp classic scene of Bette Davis calmly grabbing Miriam Hopkins by the shoulders, vigorously shaking her, throwing her down into a chair, and then calmly saying with a clipped, sarcastic edge: "Sorry". Bette Davis later admitted she immensely enjoyed playing that scene.


4:00pm -- Virginia City (1940)
A rebel spy poses as a wild West dance hall girl.
Cast: Errol Flynn, Miriam Hopkins, Randolph Scott, Humphrey Bogart
Dir: Michael Curtiz
BW-121 mins, TV-G

Miriam Hopkins replaced Olivia de Havilland.


6:00pm -- The Heiress (1949)
A plain young woman's money makes her prey to fortune hunters.
Cast: Olivia de Havilland, Montgomery Clift, Ralph Richardson, Miriam Hopkins
Dir: William Wyler
BW-115 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Olivia de Havilland, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White -- John Meehan, Harry Horner and Emile Kuri, Best Costume Design, Black-and-White -- Edith Head and Gile Steele, and Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Aaron Copland

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Ralph Richardson, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Leo Tover, Best Director -- William Wyler, and Best Picture

To help Olivia de Havilland achieve the physically and emotionally weary and worn effect that he wanted, director William Wyler packed books into the suitcases that the actress lugged up the staircase in the scene where her character realizes that she has been jilted by her lover.


What's On Tonight: SUMMER UNDER THE STARS: MIRIAM HOPKINS


8:00pm -- The Smiling Lieutenant (1931)
A misfired flirtation lands a young lieutenant married to a princess instead of the one he loves.
Cast: Maurice Chevalier, Claudette Colbert, Miriam Hopkins, Charlie Ruggles
Dir: Ernst Lubitsch
BW-89 mins, TV-G

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Picture

The operetta by Felix Dormann and Leopold Jacobson opened in Leipzig, Germany, on 31 May 1907. An English version, entitled "A Waltz Dream", with music by Oscar Straus and English book by Joseph W. Herbert, opened in New York City, New York, USA, on 27 January 1908 and ran for 111 performances. It is not known if any of Straus' music from that production was used in this film. The songs, however, had a new lyricist and new titles.


9:45pm -- Trouble In Paradise (1932)
A love triangle ignites trouble between two jewel theives and their intended victim.
Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Kay Francis, Herbert Marshall, Charlie Ruggles
Dir: Ernst Lubitsch
BW-82 mins, TV-G

This movie was popular both with critics and with audiences, but was made before the enforcement of the production code. After 1935, it was withdrawn from circulation and was not seen again until 1968. The film was never available on videocassette and only became available on DVD in 2003.


11:15pm -- Design For Living (1933)
An independent woman can't chose between the two men she loves.
Cast: Fredric March, Gary Cooper, Miriam Hopkins, Edward Everett Horton
Dir: Ernst Lubitsch
BW-91 mins, TV-G

Writer Ben Hecht and producer-director Ernst Lubitsch retained only one line from the original play by Noel Coward: "For the good of our immortal souls!"


1:00am -- Barbary Coast (1935)
A vice king's girlfriend falls for a young miner.
Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Edward G. Robinson, Joel McCrea, Walter Brennan
Dir: Howard Hawks
BW-90 mins, TV-G

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Cinematography -- Ray June

Rereleased in the US as Port of Wickedness.


2:45am -- These Three (1936)
Scandal destroys the lives of two small-town schoolteachers.
Cast: Miriam Hopkins, Merle Oberon, Joel McCrea, Catherine Doucet
Dir: William Wyler
BW-93 mins, TV-14

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Bonita Granville

Based on The Children's Hour, by Lillian Hellman, but changed to a heterosexual triangle. Because of the lesbian theme of the original play, the Hays office refused to allow the original title to be used, nor any mention of it onscreen or in publicity materials. Hence, Lillian Hellman is credited only for original story and screenplay.


4:30am -- 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

Based on the life of the late 19th century actress Mrs. Leslie Carter. Louis Payne, the husband of Mrs. Leslie Carter in real life, coached Richard Ainley, who was playing him in the movie.

[Staph]

1. Miriam Hopkins Profile

* Films in Bold Type Air on 8/20

Miriam Hopkins (1902-1972), a versatile actress who could play both floozies and grand ladies, was also known for her fiery temperament.

An established Broadway actress when she was signed for films by Paramount in 1930, Hopkins quickly became a top movie star thanks to her appearances in two films by sophisticated-comedy master Ernst Lubitsch. The Smiling Lieutenant (1931) is a period musical in which Claudette Colbert famously advises Hopkins to "Jazz Up Your Lingerie"; Trouble in Paradise (1932), is a delightful comedy in which Hopkins and Herbert Marshall play jewel thieves with Kay Francis as their prey.

Hopkins' other film mentor, Rouben Mamoulian, directed her as Becky Sharp (1935) in a version of Thackeray's Vanity Fair that became the first movie to be made in three-strip Technicolor. Hopkins' other career high points include These Three (1936), a film version of Lillian Hellman's The Children's Hour; The Old Maid (1939) and Old Acquaintance (1943), two classy soap operas costarring Hopkins' rival Bette Davis; and Lady With Red Hair (1940), in which Hopkins played the noted actress Mrs. Leslie Carter.

Later in her career Hopkins returned to Broadway, then turned to summer stock and character roles in such films as The Children's Hour (1961), now playing an older character; and The Chase (1966). She was especially good in her first major supporting role in films, that of the solicitous, romantic aunt in a fine reunion film with Wyler, The Heiress (1949). She also did occasional TV work, perhaps most memorably in an outlandish yet highly effective and even moving Norma Desmond-type turn as an overage flapper still living in her youthful past in "Don't Open Till Doomsday", an especially memorable installment of the cult classic anthology series, "The Outer Limits." Hopkins had four husbands; her third was director Anatole Litvak. She died September 10, 1972.

by Roger Fristoe