TCM Schedule for Friday, July 29 -- Star of the Month -- Singing Cowboys

[Staph]

I'm not sure what today's daylight theme is. The only common denominator that I can find is that Cedric Gibbons was art director and Douglas Shearer edited the sound for most of these films. Considering their long careers (Gibbons is credited with 1050 titles and Shearer with 927), it is hard to find a group of MGM films from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s that these two were not involved with. In the evening, it's the last of the singing cowboys, featuring Rex Allen, Herb Jeffrey (one of the rare black singing cowboys!), and Ken Maynard. Enjoy!



6:00 AM -- No Time For Comedy (1940)
A wealthy culture vulture tries to steal a playwright from his actress wife.
Dir: William Keighley
Cast: James Stewart, Rosalind Russell, Charles Ruggles.
93 min, TV-G, CC

The original play by S.N. Behrman opened in Indianapolis, Indiana, on 31 March 1939.


8:00 AM -- Third Finger, Left Hand (1940)
A man-shy fashion editor pretends to be married until a suitor claims to be her husband.
Dir: Robert Z. Leonard
Cast: Myrna Loy, Melvyn Douglas, Raymond Walburn.
97 min, TV-G, CC

The director of the Production Code Administation (PCA) had MGM delete several gags that suggested Margot (Myrna Loy) was pregnant, since, he said, illegitimacy could not be the basis for a comedy.


10:00 AM -- Keeper Of The Flame (1942)
A reporter digs into the secret life of a recently deceased political hero.
Dir: George Cukor
Cast: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Richard Whorf.
101 min, TV-PG, CC

Louis B. Mayer was very unhappy about the film's political content, thinking it noncommercial. Katharine Hepburn too felt that the storyline was too dull and needed to be pepped up with some romance. She complained to producer Victor Saville about this but he ignored her comments, so Hepburn went directly to Mayer who was only too happy to make the film into a more conventional Hollywood romance.


12:00 PM -- Boys' Ranch (1946)
A ball player creates a ranch for troubled kids from the city.
Dir: Roy Rowland
Cast: Jackie "Butch" Jenkins, James Craig, Skippy Homeier.
97 min, TV-G

Based on the true story of Cal Farley, and the Boystown-like residential program that he created in 1939.


2:00 PM -- Courage Of Lassie (1946)
A young girl tries to rehabilitate the famous collie after his return from combat service in World War II.
Dir: Fred M. Wilcox
Cast: Elizabeth Taylor, Frank Morgan, Tom Drake.
C-93 min, TV-PG, CC

Although the title of the film suggests it, there is no mention of the character Lassie anywhere in the movie. The dog is named Bill!


4:00 PM -- Devotion (1946)
The Bronte sisters and their brother fight personal demons to realize their artistic ambitions.
Dir: Curtis Bernhardt
Cast: Ida Lupino, Paul Henreid, Olivia de Havilland.
107 min, TV-G, CC

Warners initially tried to borrow Joan Fontaine for Emily Bronte so she could play opposite her real life sister, Olivia de Havilland, but when an agreement couldn't be reached, the part was played by Warner contractee Ida Lupino.


6:00 PM -- Cynthia (1947)
A sheltered girl uses music as a means of winning her independence.
Dir: Robert Z. Leonard
Cast: Elizabeth Taylor, George Murphy, S. Z. Sakall.
98 min, TV-G

"Lux Radio Theater" broadcast a 60 minute radio adaptation of the movie on June 23, 1947 with Elizabeth Taylor, George Murphy and Mary Astor reprising their film roles.



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: STAR OF THE MONTH: SINGING COWBOYS



8:00 PM -- Under Mexicali Stars (1950)
Treasury agents join a traveling circus to catch a band of gold robbers.
Dir: George Blair
Cast: Rex Allen, Dorothy Patrick, Roy Barcroft.
67 min,

"Yeah, I rode bulls and buckin' horses for about two years when I first got out of high school, but I got tired of pickin' myself up off the arena floor, and I found that a guitar never kicked me, never hurt me a bit, so I decided I better stick with that." -- Rex Allen


9:15 PM -- The Last Musketeer (1952)
A cattle buyer gets mixed up in a brutal war over water rights.
Dir: William Witney
Cast: Rex Allen, Koko, Mary Ellen Kay.
67 min,

Rex Allen's horse was named Koko, "The Miracle Horse of the Movies."


10:30 PM -- Two-Gun Man From Harlem (1938)
When a cowboy is framed for murder, he travels to Harlem and masquerades as a gangster.
Dir: Richard C. Kahn
Cast: Herb Jeffries, Marguerite Whitten, Clarence Brooks
65 min, TV-PG

Followed by The Bronze Buckaroo (1939) and Harlem Rides the Range (1939)


11:45 PM -- Harlem Rides the Range (1939)
A singing cowboy protects the beautiful heir to a radium mine.
Dir: Richard C. Kahn
Cast: Herbert Jeffrey, Lucius Brooks, F. E. Miller.
56 min, TV-PG

Herb Jeffrey spent most of his career as a jazz singer, with the bands of Erskine Tate, Earl 'Fatha' Hines, Blanche Calloway, and Duke Ellington.


12:45 AM -- In Old Santa Fe (1934)
After losing his horse in a crooked race, a cowboy is framed for murder.
Dir: David Howard
Cast: Ken Maynard, Evalyn Knapp, H. B. Warner.
63 min, TV-G

This film is essentially Gene Autry's screen test. And after Ken Maynard's quarrelsomeness got him fired by studio head Nat Levine, Autry won his first starring role in The Phantom Empire, originally intended to star Maynard. Autry later helped quietly support Maynard when he was old and alcoholic.


2:00 AM -- Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One (1968)
Cameras capture the backstage drama as acting students audition for a film.
Dir: William Greaves
Cast: Patricia Ree Gilbert, Don Fellows, Jonathan Gordon.
C-75 min, TV-MA

Followed by Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take 2 1/2 (2005), featuring some of the same actors, 35 years later.


3:15 AM -- The Exiles (1961)
Three young Native Americans feel lost and isolated when they leave the reservation for the big city.
Dir: Kent Mackenzie
Cast: Yvonne Williams, Homer Nish, Tommy Reynolds.
73 min, TV-PG

Filmed in 1958, but a distributor could not be found. The film was released in a single theater in Los Angeles in 1961, and has since become a cult classic.


4:30 AM -- Salt Of The Earth (1954)
The wives of striking mineworkers fight to keep the union going.
Dir: Herbert J. Biberman
Cast: Will Geer, David Wolfe, David Sarvis.
C-92 min, TV-PG, CC

This was made by blacklisted director Herbert J. Biberman, screenwriter Michael Wilson, producer Paul Jarrico and composer Sol Kaplan largely in retaliation to the fact that they had been blacklisted. They reasoned that since they weren't allowed to work in Hollywood, they might as well make a film as pro-Communist as possible to fit the crime of which they had been accused. It was not shown in American theaters until 1965.