TCM Schedule for Monday, June 23 -- 75TH ANNIVERSARY OF SAG

[Longhorn]

4:01am Short Film: From The Vaults: Italy'S In Season (1967)
C-7 mins

4:15am Wild Is The Wind (1957)
A woman marries her late sister's husband but finds true love with his son from an earlier marriage.
Cast: Anna Magnani, Anthony Quinn, Anthony Franciosa. Dir: George Cukor. BW-110 mins, TV-PG

6:15am MGM Parade Show #7 (1955)
Ray Bolger performs in a clip from "The Great Ziegfeld"; Debbie Reynolds introduces a clip from "The Tender Trap." Hosted by George Murphy.
BW-26 mins, TV-G

6:45am Two-Gun Man From Harlem (1938)
When a cowboy is framed for murder, he travels to Harlem and masquerades as a gangster.
Cast: Herb Jeffries, Marguerite Whitten, Mantan Moreland. Dir: Richard C. Kahn. BW-65 mins, TV-PG

8:00am Home in Oklahoma (1946)
A small-town editor and a big-city reporter investigate a wealthy rancher's mysterious death.
Cast: Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, George "Gabby" Hayes. Dir: William Witney. BW-72 mins, TV-G

9:15am Band Wagon, The (1953)
A Broadway artiste turns a faded film star's comeback vehicle into an artsy flop.
Cast: Fred Astaire, Jack Buchanan, Cyd Charisse. Dir: Vincente Minnelli. C-112 mins, TV-G

11:15am Tortilla Flat (1942)
Inhabitants of a Southern California fishing village strive for the simple pleasures of life.
Cast: Spencer Tracy, Hedy Lamarr, John Garfield. Dir: Victor Fleming. BW-99 mins, TV-PG

12:57pm Short Film: One Reel Wonders: Frontier Days (1945)
C-17 mins

1:15pm Duel In The Sun (1946)
A fiery half-breed comes between a rancher's good and evil sons.
Cast: Jennifer Jones, Gregory Peck, Joseph Cotten. Dir: King Vidor. C-144 mins, TV-14

3:45pm Summer And Smoke (1961)
A small-town spinster's repressed love for the local rebel spells danger.
Cast: Geraldine Page, Laurence Harvey, Una Merkel. Dir: Peter Glenville. C-118 mins, TV-PG

6:00pm Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
A dowager tries to buy a lobotomy to silence the woman who witnessed her son's murder.
Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor, Montgomery Clift. Dir: Joseph L. Mankiewicz. BW-114 mins, TV-PG

What's On Tonight: TCM PRIME TIME FEATURE: 75TH ANNIVERSARY OF SAG

8:00pm Movie Crazy (1932)
A stagestruck young actor accidentally receives somebody else's invitation to test in Hollywood.
Cast: Harold Lloyd, Constance Cummings, Kenneth Thomson. Dir: Clyde Bruckman. BW-96 mins, TV-G

9:45pm Kennel Murder Case, The (1933)
Society sleuth Philo Vance investigates a murder tied to a Long Island dog show.
Cast: William Powell, Mary Astor, Eugene Pallette. Dir: Michael Curtiz. BW-73 mins, TV-G

11:15pm Kid From Spain, The (1932)
An innocent man accused of robbing banks masquerades as a bullfighter to escape the police.
Cast: Eddie Cantor, Lyda Roberti, Robert Young. Dir: Leo McCarey. BW-96 mins, TV-G

1:00am Mask Of Fu Manchu, The (1932)
A Chinese warlord threatens explorers in search of the key to global power.
Cast: Boris Karloff, Lewis Stone, Myrna Loy. Dir: Charles Brabin. BW-68 mins, TV-PG

2:15am Last Of Mrs. Cheyney, The (1937)
A chic jewel thief in England falls in love with one of her marks.
Cast: Joan Crawford, Robert Montgomery, William Powell. Dir: Richard Boleslawski. BW-98 mins, TV-G

4:00am For Me And My Gal (1942)
An unscrupulous song-and-dance man uses his partner and his best friend to get ahead.
Cast: Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, George Murphy. Dir: Busby Berkeley. BW-104 mins, TV-G

[Longhorn]

1. Kennel Murder Case, The (1933)

Michael Curtiz continued his rise to the top at Warner Bros. with this 1933 adaptation of S.S. Van Dine's popular mystery, the first Warner's film to feature noted society sleuth Philo Vance. In fact, he rather enjoyed taking on the sophisticated whodunnit. With Warner's rapid production schedule, he was already churning out several films a year, most of them forgettable. In 1933 alone, Curtiz would have six directing credits and direct two other films credited to others. Of these, only The Kennel Murder Case and the classic horror story Mystery of the Wax Museum were standouts.

As with his other films at Warner's, Curtiz kept things moving in The Kennel Murder Case. He used dissolves and wipes to race from scene to scene, while within scenes he used a mobile camera to cover up the genre's inevitable talkiness. He also was proving expert at getting actors to do their best. Powell gave his best performance of the year as Vance, with strong support from leading lady Mary Astor and sidekick Eugene Pallette. Thanks to Curtiz, the picture turned a surprising profit of almost $400,000, which helped him win better assignments at the studio. Two years later, Warner's would trust him with their first swashbuckler, Captain Blood, one of the studio's most lavish films of the thirties.

For Powell, The Kennel Murder Case seemed something of a setback. He had already played Vance in three early talkies at Paramount, starting with The Canary Murder Case in 1929. Two years later, he left Paramount for Warners, with the promise of better material, script approval and more money. But during his time there, he only appeared in one other film of distinction, the tragic romance One Way Passage (1932), with frequent co-star Kay Francis. Disappointed with his prospects at Warners, he would jump ship for MGM in 1934. That very year MGM would transform him into one of Hollywood's top stars as yet another sophisticated sleuth, Nick Charles in The Thin Man, with Myrna Loy as his partner in marriage and mystery.

Powell's move to MGM hardly marked the end for Philo Vance, who would resurface at Warners, Paramount and even MGM. Warren Williams took over the role at Warners in The Dragon Murder Case (1934), then moved to Paramount in 1939 for The Gracie Allen Murder Case, a story Van Dine wrote for the popular comedienne. MGM had other plans for Powell, so they cast Paul Lukas in The Casino Murder Case (1935) and Edmund Lowe in The Garden Murder Case (1936). Warners would remake The Kennel Murder Case as Calling Philo Vance in 1940, this time with James Stephenson as the sleuth.

Producer: Robert Presnell
Director: Michael Curtiz
Screenplay: Robert N. Lee, Peter Milne, Robert Presnell
Based on The Return of Philo Vance by S.S. Van Dine
Cinematography: William Reese
Art Direction: Jack Okey
Music: Bernhard Kaun (uncredited)
Costume Design: Orry-Kelly
Cast: William Powell (Philo Vance), Mary Astor (Hilda Lake), Eugene Pallette (Sgt. Heath), Ralph Morgan (Raymond Wrede), Jack LaRue (Eduardo Grassi), Helen Vinson (Doris Delafield), Robert McWade (District Attorney John F.X. Markham).
BW-74m.

by Frank Miller