TCM Schedule for Friday, September 24 -- TCM Prime Time Feature -- High Stakes Poker

[Staph]

A trio of great gambling films finishes out the week. Enjoy!


6:00am -- Escape Me Never (1947)
A composer forsakes his innocent bride to romance his brother's fiancee.
Cast: Errol Flynn, Ida Lupino, Eleanor Parker, Gig Young
Dir: Peter Godfrey
BW-104 mins, TV-G

A remake of 1935's Escape Me Never, starring Hugh Sinclair, Elisabeth Bergner and Penelope Dudley-Ward.


7:49am -- One Reel Wonders: A Lady Fights Back (1944)
The saga of the Normandie is recounted from her life as a luxury liner, the horrific fire that nearly destroyed her, and her resuscitation to join in the war effort.
Narrator: John Nesbitt
BW-10 mins

The closing shot shows the Normandie being towed away and the narrator suggests that she would be repaired and returned to service. However, by this time the war had turned in the Allies favor and it was realized that by the time repairs were complete the war would be over. Ultimately, the Normandie never sailed again and was sold for scrap.


8:00am -- Lady Luck (1947)
A woman from a family of gamblers marries one and tries to reform him.
Cast: Robert Young, Barbara Hale, Frank Morgan, James Gleason
Dir: Edwin L. Marin
BW-98 mins, TV-PG

"The Hedda Hopper Show - This Is Hollywood" broadcast a 30 minute radio adaptation of the movie on March 8, 1947 with Robert Young and Barbara Hale reprising their film roles.


9:45am -- Kid Glove Killer (1942)
A police scientist investigates the mayor's murder.
Cast: Van Heflin, Marsha Hunt, Lee Bowman, Samuel S. Hinds
Dir: Fred Zinnemann
BW-74 mins, TV-PG

First feature film directed by Fred Zinnemann.


11:00am -- Conflict (1945)
A man murders his wife so he can be free to marry her sister.
Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Alexis Smith, Sydney Greenstreet, Rose Hobart
Dir: Curtis Bernhardt
BW-86 mins, TV-PG

Jack L. Warner had Joan Crawford, who had just joined Warner Bros. and was looking for her first role at the studio, in mind for the role of Kathryn Mason (eventually played by Rose Hobart), and sent the script for the film to her. However, after reading the script, Crawford told her agent to tell Warner that "Joan Crawford never dies in her movies, and she never ever loses her man to anyone".


12:30pm -- The Younger Brothers (1949)
Three law-breaking brothers try to go straight, only to be hounded by a vengeful detective.
Cast: Wayne Morris, Janis Paige, Bruce Bennett, Geraldine Brooks
Dir: Edwin L. Marin
C-77 mins, TV-G

A nitrate print of this film survives in the UCLA Film and Television Archives.


2:00pm -- The House Across The Street (1949)
Mob pressure sends a crusading reporter from the front page to the advice column.
Cast: Wayne Morris, Janis Paige, Bruce Bennett, Alan Hale
Dir: Richard Bare
BW-70 mins, TV-PG

A remake of Hi, Nellie! (1934), Love Is on the Air (1937), and You Can't Escape Forever (1942).


3:15pm -- The Sun Comes Up (1949)
Lassie helps an embittered woman find happiness with an orphaned boy.
Cast: Jeanette MacDonald, Lloyd Nolan, Claude Jarman Jr., Lewis Stone
Dir: Richard Thorpe
C-93 mins, TV-G

Jeanette MacDonald's final film.


5:00pm -- The Arnelo Affair (1947)
A neglected wife gets mixed up with an hypnotic charmer and murder.
Cast: John Hodiak, George Murphy, Frances Gifford, Dean Stockwell
Dir: Arch Oboler
BW-87 mins, TV-PG

Frances Gifford suffered serious head injuries in an auto accident in 1948. After continued repercussions, she was admitted to Camarillo State Hospital in 1958. She was released in 1978.


6:30pm -- Out Of The Fog (1941)
A racketeer terrorizes a small fishing community until he falls in love with a fisherman's daughter.
Cast: John Garfield, Ida Lupino, Thomas Mitchell, Eddie Albert
Dir: Anatole Litvak
BW-85 mins, TV-PG

Humphrey Bogart was originally chosen to play Harold Goff. However, Ida Lupino had just finished shooting They Drive by Night (1940) and High Sierra (1941) with Bogart, and they had not gotten along. Lupino protested, and because she'd had a bigger name than Bogart at the time, she got her way, forcing an angry Bogart to shoot off a telegram to Jack L. Warner asking, "When did Ida Lupino start casting films at your studio?"


What's On Tonight: TCM PRIME TIME FEATURE: HIGH STAKES POKER


8:00pm -- A Big Hand for the Little Lady (1966)
A pioneer woman replaces her ailing husband in a poker game after he loses most of their money.
Cast: Henry Fonda, Joanne Woodward, Jason Robards Jr., Paul Ford
Dir: Fielder Cook
C-95 mins, TV-G

This film provides the final screen appearance of comedian Chester Conklin, who had appeared in about 300 movies from 1913.


9:45pm -- The Sting (1973)
Two con men hit the big time to take on a gangster in '30s Chicago.
Cast: Paul Newman, Robert Shaw, Eileen Brennan, Robert Redford
Dir: George Roy Hill
C-129 mins, TV-MA

Won Oscars for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration -- Henry Bumstead and James W. Payne, Best Costume Design -- Edith Head, Best Director -- George Roy Hill. Best Film Editing -- William Reynolds, Best Music, Scoring Original Song Score and/or Adaptation -- Marvin Hamlisch, Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Factual Material or Material Not Previously Published or Produced -- David S. Ward, and Best Picture (Julia Phillips became the first female producer to win the Best Picture category.)

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Robert Redford, Best Cinematography -- Robert Surtees, and Best Sound -- Ronald Pierce and Robert R. Bertrand

According to costume designer Edith Head's biography, Robert Redford and Paul Newman, both of whom have blue eyes, wanted their shirts to be blue in order to emphasize their eyes. As a compromise, Head outfitted each man in blue in alternating scenes. Unfortunately, although it is an attractive story, it's a complete myth. A simple viewing of the film reveals the truth. Newman is never outfitted in blue in the whole film. He is first seen in a white vest in the brothel scenes. On the train he alternates between a brown striped shirt and a white one, which may or may not be a continuity error. From then until the end of the film, he is seen exclusively in a dinner jacket and white shirt. Redford wears a blue shirt on a couple of occasions, but even this doesn't really fit with this oddly persistent legend.


12:00am -- The Cincinnati Kid (1965)
Card sharps try to deal with personal problems during a big game in New Orleans.
Cast: Steve McQueen, Edward G. Robinson, Ann-Margret, Karl Malden
Dir: Norman Jewison
C-103 mins, TV-14

Director Sam Peckinpah insisted on changing an early expository scene in which a girl in her underwear is massaged with a vibrator. He removed the vibrator from the scene altogether and had the girl lie naked but completely covered with a fur coat. Producer Martin Ransohoff was unhappy with the shift in tone and fired Peckinpah.


2:00am -- Incubus (1965)
An evil spirit plots to snare the soul of a courageous and good man.
Cast: William Shatner, Milos Milos, Allyson Ames, Eloise Hardt
Dir: Leslie Stevens
BW-74 mins, TV-14

In his commentary for the DVD, William Shatner recalled an incident that occurred when the cast and crew first arrived in Big Sur, California. He remembers who he thought of as a male "hippie" approaching the company, and inquiring into their endeavor. Shatner says that the cast and crew reacted with some hostility to his interest, which angered him in turn. The "hippy" then loudly put a curse on their production, which some people believe came in effect. Just one year after this film came out, as its prints were being destroyed, William Shatner was cast in "Star Trek" (1966), cinematographer Conrad L. Hall got his first Academy Award nomination, actor Milos Milos murdered the estranged wife of Mickey Rooney and then killed himself, and actress Ann Atmar committed suicide.


3:15am -- The Devil Within Her (1975)
A pregnant woman learns she is about to give birth to Satan's child.
Cast: Joan Collins, Eileen Atkins, Donald Pleasence, Ralph Bates
Dir: Peter Sasdy
C-94 mins, TV-MA

Also known as I Don't Want To Be Born and Sharon's Baby.


5:00am -- The Relaxed Wife (1957)
The modern miracle of tranquilizers helps working men and their wives deal with life's little problems.
C-13 mins, TV-G

A promo for drugs!


5:15am -- Perversion For Profit (1965)
This anti-porn documentary shows a floodtide of filth engulfing the country in the form of newsstand obscenity
Cast: George Putnam narrates.
BW-31 mins, TV-MA

A promo for porn!

[Staph]

1. A Big Hand for the Little Lady (1966)

The stakes were high and so was the star power in A Big Hand for the Little Lady (1966). Director Fielder Cook, known mostly for his TV work (Patterns (1956), the 1966 Emmy Award-winning version of Brigadoon), plays out a hand of aces in only his second feature outing, with a cast that includes Henry Fonda, Jason Robards, Joanne Woodward, Charles Bickford and Burgess Meredith. And that's just to start. The lucky draw runs deep, with a second-to-none supporting cast of trump cards like Paul Ford as the local banker and Kevin McCarthy as a love-struck poker player.

Fielder also directed the original teleplay, Big Deal in Laredo (1963), on which A Big Hand for the Little Lady was based. The teleplay (along with the later big-screen adaptation) was penned by Sidney Carroll for the DuPont Show of the Week. Both Carroll and Fielder received Emmy nominations for their hand in Big Deal in Laredo, along with another familiar name - Walter Matthau. Matthau was nominated for an Emmy for Best Single Performance by an Actor (presumably for the role Henry Fonda would take to the big screen), but sadly, no record of this live performance exists. As Jason Robards later said it, television in those days was "like a one-night stand."

But perhaps the biggest star of A Big Hand for the Little Lady is the poker game itself. While there are no violent gun battles in this Western, the card game at the center of the film is just as suspenseful as a shootout. Of course this is no ordinary poker hand. It's a sure winner - so big that it causes one player to have a heart attack and another to secure a bank loan. Fielder captures the tension of the game masterfully, every draw a life or death situation that leaves the audience holding its breath. And that's no small feat considering that most of the movie takes place in the back room of a saloon, without an outlaw or a gunfight in sight. But A Big Hand for the Little Lady is a comedy at heart. The surprise ending lets us in on the joke and makes a second viewing of the movie even more amusing.

Movie buffs will want to keep a sharp lookout for silent screen veteran Chester Conklin, who appeared with Charlie Chaplin in many of his Keystone comedies, not to mention his role in Erich von Stroheim's Greed (1924). Conklin makes his last film appearance here, billed in the credits as simply "Old Man in Saloon" (whose name just happens to be Chester). And there's a cameo by Mae Clarke, a leading lady in the '30s. Clarke's most memorable role was probably opposite James Cagney in The Public Enemy (1931). She's the gangster's moll who receives the old grapefruit in the face courtesy of Cagney. Clarke went on to play the bride of Frankenstein (1931) opposite Colin Clive and to co-star in several other 1931 successes like Waterloo Bridge and The Front Page. But Clarke's career fizzled fast, reducing the actress to bit parts, walk-ons and B movies. Her final leading role came in King of the Rocket Men (1949). In A Big Hand for the Little Lady, look fast and you might recognize Clarke, in her second-to-last film appearance, as Mrs. Craig, the woman at the bank window.

Producer/Director: Fielder Cook
Screenplay: Sidney Carroll
Production Design: Robert Emmet Smith
Cinematography: Lee Garmes
Film Editing: George Rohrs
Original Music: David Raksin
Principal Cast: Henry Fonda (Meredith), Joanne Woodward (Mary), Jason Robards, Jr. (Henry Drummond), Charles Bickford (Benson Tropp), Burgess Meredith (Doc Scully), Paul Ford (C.P. Ballinger), Kevin McCarthy (Otto Habershaw), Robert Middleton (Dennis Wilcox).
C-95m.

By Stephanie Thames