TCM Schedule for Thursday, June 19 -- Race and Hollywood

[Staph]

There are three wonderful films featured during the day today -- The Quiet Man, The Trouble with Harry, and Strategic Air Command. All three are well worth watching and adding to your cinematic cultural education. And tonight we continue the theme of Race and Hollywood: Asian Images in Film, with a look at bi-racial relationships and marriages. Enjoy!

(And send a few good thoughts my way today. I'm having a root canal at 7:30 AM.)


5:45am -- Legend of the Lost (1957)
Three adventurers search for a treasure in a forbidden desert temple.
Cast: John Wayne, Sophia Loren, Rossano Brazzi.
Dir: Henry Hathaway.
C-108 mins, TV-G

The only John Wayne/Sophia Loren feature.


7:45am -- The Quiet Man (1952)
An Irish ex-boxer retires to Ireland and searches for the proper wife.
Cast: John Wayne, Maureen O'Hara, Barry Fitzgerald.
Dir: John Ford.
C-129 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- Winton C. Hoch and Archie Stout, and Best Director -- John Ford

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Victor McLaglen, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color -- Frank Hotaling, John McCarthy Jr. and Charles S. Thompson, Best Sound, Recording -- Daniel J. Bloomberg (Republic Sound Department), Best Writing, Screenplay -- Frank S. Nugent, and Best Picture

At the film's conclusion, after the credits, we see Kate and Sean standing in their garden waving good-bye. 'Maureen OHara turns to John Wayne and whispers something in his ear, evoking a priceless reaction from Wayne. What was said was known only to O'Hara, Wayne and director John Ford. In exchange for saying this unscripted bit of text, O'Hara insisted that the exact line never be disclosed by any involved parties. In her memoirs she says that she refused to say the line at first as she 'couldn't possibly say that to Duke' but Ford insisted, claiming he needed a genuine shock reaction from Wayne. The line remains a mystery to this day.


10:00am -- Captain Caution (1940)
When a ship's captain dies at war, his daughter takes command.
Cast: Victor Mature, Louise Platt, Leo Carrillo.
Dir: Richard Wallace.
BW-86 mins, TV-G

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Sound, Recording -- Elmer Raguse

J. Pat O'Malley's first film.


11:30am -- Captain Scarface (1953)
A group of foreign agents plots to blow up the Panama Canal.
Cast: Barton MacLane, Leif Erickson, Virginia Grey.
Dir: Paul Guilfoyle.
BW-70 mins, TV-PG

This was the feature-film directorial debut for Paul Guilfoyle, better known as a character actor in the 1930s and 1940s, mostly playing crooks. He is no relation to the Paul Guilfoyle who plays Captain Jim Brass on CSI.


12:45pm -- The Joe Louis Story (1953)
In this biography, champion boxer Joe Louis fights to make a name for himself.
Cast: Coley Wallace, Paul Stewart, Hilda Simms.
Dir: Robert Gordon.
BW-87 mins, TV-G

Coley Wallace, who plays Joe Louis, was himself a professional boxer (20-7-0 over six years). Wallace is the only person to have ever beaten Rocky Marciano in the ring, when they were both amateurs. Wallace went on to play Louis a second time in Raging Bull (1980).


2:15pm -- The Trouble With Harry (1955)
A corpse creates a world of trouble for several passersby who each believe they may have caused the death.
Cast: Edmund Gwenn, John Forsythe, Shirley MacLaine.
Dir: Alfred Hitchcock.
C-99 mins, TV-PG

The film was unavailable for decades because its rights (together with four other pictures of the same period) were bought back by Hitchcock and left as part of his legacy to his daughter. They've been known for long as the infamous "5 lost Hitchcocks" amongst film buffs, and were re-released in theatres around 1984 after a 30-year absence. The others are The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Rear Window (1954), Rope (1948), and Vertigo (1958).

Shirley MacLaine's first film.


4:00pm -- Strategic Air Command (1955)
A baseball star takes to the air to help plan the U.S.' aerial defense.
Cast: James Stewart, June Allyson, Frank Lovejoy.
Dir: Anthony Mann.
C-114 mins, TV-G

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Writing, Motion Picture Story -- Beirne Lay Jr.

Some have speculated that the plot was inspired by Ted Williams who was drafted for Korean War service as a Marine Corps pilot, at the height of his baseball career.


6:00pm -- The Desperate Hours (1955)
Escaped convicts terrorize a suburban family they're holding hostage.
Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Fredric March, Arthur Kennedy.
Dir: William Wyler.
BW-113 mins, TV-14

Fredric March's part was intended for Spencer Tracy, a good friend of Humphrey Bogart's, but neither Tracy nor Bogart was willing to concede top billing to the other.


What's On Tonight: TCM SPOTLIGHT: RACE AND HOLLYWOOD


8:00pm -- Bridge To The Sun (1961)
An American woman marries a Japanese diplomat on the eve of World War II.
Cast: Carroll Baker, James Shigeta, James Yagi.
Dir: Etienne Perier.
BW-112 mins, TV-PG

True story of an American woman and her Japanese husband, forced into an internment camp at the beginning of WWII and later deported to Japan. Their daughter Mariko has an interesting history herself. Mariko Terasaki left Japan in 1949 to pursue a much-interrupted education and earned a B.A. degree from ETSU in 1953 with a major in English and a minor in French. She married Mayne Miller, an attorney active in politics, and they moved to Wyoming, where she still resides in Casper. As an Honorary Consul-General, her role is “to strengthen and expand good relations between the people of Wyoming and Japan.”

Though raising a family of four sons, Miller found many issues, both domestic and international, so compelling that she became involved in politics at the state and national levels. She served on the Democratic National Committee for five years and was elected to the executive committee of the DNC in 1976. She has served on the steering committee of the National Women's Political Caucus, as board member of Americans for Democratic Action, and on the Wyoming Commission for Civil Rights and the Wyoming Commission for Women.


10:00pm -- China Doll (1958)
A World War II veteran searches for the daughter he left behind in China.
Cast: Victor Mature, Li Li Hua, Ward Bond.
Dir: Frank Borzage.
C-99 mins, TV-PG

Applying for membership in the swank Los Angeles Country Club at the heighth of his fame, Victor Mature was turned down and told that the golfing facility did not accept actors as members. His response: "I'm not an actor - and I've got 67 films to prove it!"


12:00am -- Sayonara (1957)
American soldiers in post-war Japan defy convention when they fall in love with local women.
Cast: Marlon Brando, Red Buttons, Miyoshi Umeki.
Dir: Joshua Logan.
C-147 mins, TV-PG

Won Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- Red Buttons, Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Miyoshi Umeki, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration -- Ted Haworth and Robert Priestley, Best Sound, Recording -- George Groves

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Marlon Brando, Best Cinematography -- Ellsworth Fredericks, Best Director -- Joshua Logan, Best Film Editing -- Arthur P. Schmidt and Philip W. Anderson, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium -- Paul Osborn, and Best Picture

Audrey Hepburn was offered the role of a Japanese bride opposite of Marlon Brando but turned the role down. She explained that she "couldn't possibly play an Oriental. No one would believe me; they'd laugh. It's a lovely script, however I know what I can and can't do. And if you did persuade me, you would regret it, because I would be terrible."


2:30am -- The World Of Suzie Wong (1960)
A Hong Kong streetwalker tries modeling and falls for the artist who's painting her.
Cast: William Holden, Nancy Kwan, Sylvia Sims.
Dir: Richard Quine.
C-126 mins, TV-PG

As an former student of the Royal Ballet School in London, a 20-year-old Nancy Kwan was discovered by producer Ray Stark after the coveted role of Suzie Wong was up for grabs after French-Vietnamese actress France Nuyen suffered a bout of chronic laryngitis.


4:45am -- Double Harness (1933)
After tricking a playboy into marriage, a woman sets out to win his love honestly.
Cast: Ann Harding, William Powell, Henry Stephenson.
Dir: John Cromwell.
BW-69 mins, TV-PG

This film hadn't been shown for decades and was found in a Merian C. Cooper collection which had been used for television. A two-and-half minute sequence that had been cut from the print was located in a French negative discovered in the National Center for Cinematography in France and restored to the print. The brief segment had been cut for television because it indicated that the characters of "Joan Colby" and "John Fletcher" were having pre-marital sex.

[Staph]

1. Sayonara (1957)

It's sad to say, but one has a hard time writing about the production of any film that starred Marlon Brando without focusing on the actor's attempts to drive everyone who worked with him stark raving bonkers. Joshua Logan's Sayonara (1957) is no exception, although it's one of those pictures that gloriously survived Brando's grating degree of self-satisfaction. Brando's crew and co-stars somehow weathered the storm to make it one of the more probing films about racial prejudice to be released in the 1950s and it became a major hit.

Brando plays Maj. Lloyd Gruver, a U.S. Army soldier who's stationed in Japan during the Korean War. Gruver is engaged to the daughter (Patricia Owens) of an Army General (Kent Smith). But his best friend, an enlisted man named Joe Kelly (Red Buttons, who won an Oscar® for his role) has created a controversy by falling in love with a beautiful Japanese woman (Miyoshi Umeki). The Army brass frowns upon interracial romances, and they do everything they can to drive a wedge between Kelly and his true love. Gruver is also somewhat prejudiced against the Japanese, but that all changes when he meets and falls hard for a traditional dancer named Hana-ogi (Miiko Taka). This sets off a powder keg of institutionalized racism that leads to both tragedy and romance.

Logan's original intent was to convert James Michener's popular novel, Sayonara, into a Broadway musical. But, when that didn't pan out for legal reasons, he aimed to adapt it into a straight-forward drama. For a while, there was talk of getting Rock Hudson to star, but Logan had wanted to work with Brando for some time, so, against his better judgment, he approached the mercurial actor with the script.

During his first meeting with Brando, Logan got a taste of what he was in for- Brando spent virtually the entire meeting pontificating on Hollywood's often stereotypical portrayal of Asians. He finally told Logan that he would consider the role, then they could meet again at a later date. "He was perfectly right," Logan wrote in his autobiography, Movie Stars, Real People, and Me, "except that I wondered if he would ever listen to anyone else talk but himself." At their next meeting, Brando took special interest in the fact that Logan stopped to pick some dead leaves off of a sickly plant. He then sniffed the air around Logan and asked him if he was wearing "lemon scent." When the surprised Logan explained that, yes, his cologne probably had a lemon base, Brando quickly excused himself and left the meeting!

Brando's willful eccentricities forced Logan to consider casting a "name" female lead as a counter precaution. The only problem was that there weren't any Asian performers who carried that kind of clout, and Logan's only other choice, Audrey Hepburn, politely declined, saying that people would laugh at her trying to inhabit such a character. So, it was back to Brando, who Logan's producing partner, William Goetz, now referred to as "Lemon Scent."

After more dilly-dallying, which led to Logan loudly issuing an ultimatum, Brando accepted the part, saying that he was impressed when Logan took time out of their second meeting to tend to a sick plant...and that he didn't know Logan wore lemon scent. But, aside from a few instances of carefully-applied charm, that was as agreeable as Brando would ever get. He proceeded to argue with his sensitive, pleasantly aromatic director throughout the shoot, most of which took place on location in Japan. Logan felt that Brando often tested him to see if he was really committed to making a good film. But Brando, as was the case with so many of his other pictures, also took special interest in perpetrating practical jokes on anyone who tried to make him act like a mature person, and that included producer Goetz.

Filming was no easy task, since the slightest lapse in etiquette could offend the producers' Japanese hosts (it also didn't help matters that a little troublemaker named Truman Capote was on hand, ready to skewer the entire enterprise for a magazine back in the states). One evening, after Logan and Goetz had held a press conference announcing the movie, Goetz received a phone call from an American reporter who accused him of being drunk before the media. Goetz was mortified by the totally unfounded accusation, knowing that such an event would reflect very badly on the production. After an intense bout of shouting, the reporter revealed himself to be Brando, who was just having a little "fun" with the boss.

But Brando saved the best for last. On one of the final days of filming, he appeared on the set looking deeply depressed - with his right arm in a sling. Brando explained to Logan, who was properly mortified by the sight, that a stand-in was horsing around with him and accidentally dislocated his shoulder.

Everyone, Logan included, was anxious to get home, and Brando was in many of the remaining shots. Most importantly, though, this sort of thing would be extremely time-consuming and expensive, with camera set-ups that would have to be re-blocked to keep Brando from having to use his injured arm, if that were actually possible. In a panic, Logan asked Brando if he could at least move his fingers. Brando weakly replied that he could, then added, "The only thing I can't do is this," at which point he raised his perfectly healthy arm high above his head and slapped his bicep.

Director: Joshua Logan
Producer: William Goetz
Screenplay: Paul Osborn (based on James Michener's novel) Cinematography: Ellsworth Fredericks
Editing: Philip W. Anderson, Arthur P. Schmidt
Music: Franz Waxman
Songwriter: Irving Berlin
Production Design: Edward S. Haworth
Set Design: Robert Priestley
Costume Design: Norma Koch
Choreography: LeRoy J. Prinz
Principal Cast: Marlon Brando (Maj. Lloyd Gruver), Red Buttons (Joe Kelly), Miyoshi Umeki (Katsumi), Ricardo Montalban (Nakamura), Patricia Owens (Eileen Webster), Miiko Taka (Hana-ogi), Martha Scott (Mrs. Webster), James Garner (Capt. Mike Bailey).
C-147m. Letterboxed.

by Paul Tatara

[Lydia Leftcoast]

4. Marlon Brando was one to talk about stereotyping of Asians!

He played such a role as the Okinawan interpreter in Teahouse of the August Moon.

[Longhorn]

2. So many gems in your tidbits of information!

I don't always take the time to read them but I will from now on because they are so interesting and funny! Thanks for taking the time to compile all of that! I enjoyed reading the article about Sayonara, too. :hi:

[CBHagman]

3. Good luck with your root canal!

:hi:

And I hope you find some relief in the movies, though I can't let this pass without saying that the anecdotes about Marlon Brando have me wondering if he was more trouble than he was worth. I keep hoping to read someone hit him over the head with the clapper board or something.