TCM Schedule for Wednesday, October 17

[Longhorn]

4:30am Jazz Singer, The (1927)
A cantor's son breaks with family tradition to go into show business.
Cast: Al Jolson, May McAvoy, Warner Oland.. Dir: Alan Crosland.. BW-89 mins, TV-G

6:00am These Glamour Girls (1939)
A drunken college boy invites a taxi dancer to spend the weekend at his snobbish school.
Cast: Lew Ayres, Lana Turner, Tom Brown.. Dir: S. Sylvan Simon.. BW-79 mins, TV-G

7:30am Seven Sweethearts (1942)
A father insists that his seven daughters marry in order, from eldest to youngest.
Cast: Kathryn Grayson, Van Heflin, S.Z. Sakall.. Dir: Frank Borzage.. BW-98 mins, TV-G

9:15am Affairs Of Martha, The (1942)
A servant's scandalous novel lands her employers in hot water.
Cast: Marsha Hunt, Richard Carlson, Spring Byington.. Dir: Jules Dassin.. BW-67 mins, TV-G

10:30am Pride And Prejudice (1940)
Jane Austen's comic classic about five sisters out to nab husbands in 19th-century England.
Cast: Greer Garson, Laurence Olivier, Edna May Oliver.. Dir: Robert Z. Leonard.. BW-118 mins, TV-PG

12:30pm Kid Glove Killer (1942)
A police scientist investigates the mayor's murder.
Cast: Van Heflin, Marsha Hunt, Lee Bowman.. Dir: Fred Zinnemann.. BW-74 mins, TV-PG

2:00pm Lost Angel (1943)
A girl raised to be a genius gets lost and discovers the simple pleasure of life.
Cast: Margaret O'Brien, James Craig, Marsha Hunt.. Dir: Roy Rowland.. BW-91 mins, TV-G

3:45pm Cry Havoc (1943)
A group of war nurses fights to survive the siege of Bataan.
Cast: Margaret Sullavan, Joan Blondell, Ann Sothern.. Dir: Richard Thorpe.. BW-97 mins, TV-PG

5:30pm Music For Millions (1944)
A pregnant musician awaits her husband's return from World War II.
Cast: Margaret O'Brien, June Allyson, Jimmy Durante.. Dir: Henry Koster.. BW-118 mins, TV-G

7:30pm Festival of Shorts #51 (2007)
Features the Technicolor Warner Bros. comedy short Service With a Smile (1934).
C-19 mins

What's On Tonight: TCM PRIME TIME FEATURE: GEORGE STEVENS

8:00pm Greatest Story Ever Told, The (1965)
All-star epic retelling of Christ's life.
Cast: Max von Sydow, Dorothy McGuire, Claude Rains.. Dir: George Stevens.. C-199 mins, TV-G

11:30pm Shane (1953)
A mysterious drifter helps farmers fight off a vicious gunman.
Cast: Alan Ladd, Jean Arthur, Brandon de Wilde.. Dir: George Stevens.. C-118 mins, TV-G

1:45am Place in the Sun, A (1951)
An ambitious young man wins an heiress's heart but has to cope with his former girlfriend's pregnancy.
Cast: Montgomery Clift, Elizabeth Taylor, Shelley Winters.. Dir: George Stevens.. BW-122 mins, TV-PG

[Longhorn]

1. Music for Millions (1944)

Eight-year-old Margaret O'Brien won a special Academy Award® as Outstanding Child Actress of 1944, a year when her films included Music for Millions, Meet Me in St. Louis, Jane Eyre, The Canterville Ghost and Lost Angel. Renowned critic James Agee described O'Brien at that stage as "incredibly vivid and eloquent - almost as hypnotizing as Garbo." At the Oscar® ceremonies on March 15, 1945, as Bob Hope presented O'Brien with her miniature award, he lifted her up so she could reach the microphone and jokingly complained, "Will you hurry and grow up, please?" Music for Millions was Oscar-nominated that year for Best Original Screenplay, but lost to the Swiss film Marie-Louise, starring Josiane Hegg.

A patriotic World War II musical drama from MGM, Music for Millions features O'Brien as the enterprising six-year-old sister of June Allyson, who plays string bass in Jose Iturbi's orchestra during a wartime crunch that means most of the musicians are female. The sentimental story revolves around the concerns of the Allyson character about the GI husband she hasn't heard from in months. Jimmy Durante, in an unusual bit of casting, plays Iturbi's manager - although The Great Schnozzola is given a chance to perform "Toscanini, Iturbi and Me" (a variation on his "Toscanini, Stokowski and Me") and "Umbriago," a number written especially for the film that would become one of Durante's most celebrated nightclub pieces.

Producer Joe Pasternak and director Henry Koster had recently moved to MGM from Universal, where they had created a series of musicals starring Deanna Durbin that had saved that studio from financial ruin. The team repeated the pattern of the Durbin movies with the highly successful Music for Millions, enlivening the plotline with frequent concert performances of works by Dvorak, Grieg, Victor Herbert, Debussy, Tchaikovsky, Liszt, Handel and Chopin. Koster thoroughly enjoyed his cast, later describing O'Brien as a "born actress," Durante as "probably the most wonderful man I have ever worked with" and Allyson as a "great, great talent - she really had the spark."

O'Brien and Allyson became so close during filming that Allyson would later recall that "little Maggie O'Brien's picture was the only one I kept on my dresser." The two actresses, who later played sisters again in Little Women (1949), both remembered being known at MGM as the "town criers" because of their ability to weep convincingly at the drop of a hat. O'Brien in particular had honed her crying skills to a fine point. In a Directors Guild of America Oral History interview, Koster recalled O'Brien asking, "Mr. Koster, do you want the tears to be just visible in my eyes or rolling down the cheeks?" When asked what she meant, the tot continued: "I can control that. I think of something very sad when I have them roll down my cheeks, or just a little sad when you just want my eyes to get wet."

Producer: Joe Pasternak
Director: Henry Koster
Screenplay: Myles Connolly
Cinematography: Robert Surtees
Art Direction: Cedric Gibbons, Hans Peters
Costume Design: Kay Dean, Irene
Original Music: Walter Bullock, Walter Donaldson, Harold Spina, Herbert Stothart (all uncredited)
Editing: Douglass Biggs
Principal Cast: Margaret O'Brien ("Mike"), Jose Iturbi (Himself), June Allyson (Barbara Ainsworth), Jimmy Durante (Andrews), Marsha Hunt (Rosalind), Hugh Herbert (Uncle Ferdinand), Harry Davenport (Doctor), Marie Wilson (Marie), Connie Gilchrist (Travelers Aid Woman).
BW-118m. Closed captioning.

by Roger Fristoe