TCM Schedule for Wednesday, October 1 -- 80TH ANNIVERSARY OF RKO STUDIOS

[Longhorn]

5:30am MGM Parade Show #10 (1955)
George Murphy introduces clips from "A Guy Named Joe" and "Guys and Dolls."
BW-26 mins, TV-G

6:00am Street Girl (1929)
A girl from the wrong part of town finds a new life managing a jazz band.
Cast: Betty Compson, Ned Sparks, Jack Oakie. Dir: Wesley Ruggles. BW-87 mins, TV-G

7:30am Rio Rita (1929)
A Texas Ranger finds love while tracking an outlaw.
Cast: Bert Wheeler, Robert Woolsey, Bebe Daniels. Dir: Luther Reed. BW & C-102 mins, TV-G

9:15am Seven Keys to Baldpate (1929)
Peace and quiet elude a writer hiding away in a mysterious country inn.
Cast: Richard Dix, Miriam Seegar, Lucien Littlefield. Dir: Reginald Barker. BW-73 mins, TV-G

10:30am Dixiana (1931)
A circus star falls for a society playboy in 19th-century New Orleans.
Cast: Bebe Daniels, Bert Wheeler, Robert Woolsey. Dir: Luther Reed. BW & C-100 mins, TV-G

12:15pm Girl Crazy (1932)
City slickers try to turn a broken-down ranch into a resort.
Cast: Bert Wheeler, Robert Woolsey, Eddie Quillan. Dir: William A. Seiter. BW-74 mins, TV-G

1:30pm Bird of Paradise (1932)
An island visitor falls for a Polynesian beauty slated for sacrifice to the gods.
Cast: Dolores del Rio, Joel McCrea, John Halliday. Dir: King Vidor. BW-82 mins, TV-PG

3:00pm Most Dangerous Game, The (1932)
A big game hunter decides to stalk human prey.
Cast: Joel McCrea, Fay Wray, Leslie Banks. Dir: Irving Pichel. BW-63 mins, TV-PG

4:15pm Animal Kingdom, The (1932)
An intellectual publisher can't choose between his society wife and his free thinking former love.
Cast: Leslie Howard, Ann Harding, Myrna Loy. Dir: Edward H. Griffith. BW-85 mins, TV-G

5:45pm 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

7:00pm Cross-Fire (1933)
A war hero takes on gangsters who've invaded a wild West town.
Cast: m Keene, Betty Furness, Edgar Kennedy. Dir: Otto Brower. BW-55 mins, TV-G

What's On Tonight: TCM SPOTLIGHT: 80TH ANNIVERSARY OF RKO STUDIOS

8:00pm Cimarron (1931)
A husband and wife fight to survive in the early days of the Oklahoma Territory.
Cast: Richard Dix, Irene Dunne, Edna May Oliver. Dir: Wesley Ruggles. BW-124 mins, TV-PG

10:15pm Lost Squadron, The (1932)
Veteran flyers from World War I find work as movie stuntmen.
Cast: Richard Dix, Mary Astor, Erich von Stroheim. Dir: George Archainbaud. BW-79 mins, TV-G

11:45pm What Price Hollywood? (1932)
A drunken director whose career is fading helps a waitress become a Hollywood star.
Cast: Constance Bennett, Lowell Sherman, Neil Hamilton. Dir: George Cukor. BW-88 mins, TV-G

1:15am King Kong (1933)
A film crew discovers the "eighth wonder of the world," a giant prehistoric ape, and brings him back to New York, where he wreaks havoc.
Cast: Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, Bruce Cabot. Dir: Merian C. Cooper, Ernest B. Schoedsack. BW-105 mins, TV-PG

3:00am Our Betters (1933)
An American heiress marries into the British nobility.
Cast: Constance Bennett, Gilbert Roland, Anita Louise. Dir: George Cukor. BW-83 mins, TV-PG

4:30am Christopher Strong (1933)
An aviatrix's affair with a married man could cost her her career.
Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Colin Clive, Billie Burke. Dir: Dorothy Arzner. BW-78 mins, TV-PG

[Longhorn]

1. Christopher Strong (1933)

Katharine Hepburn had made a dazzling film debut as John Barrymore's daughter in A Bill of Divorcement (1932). There had never been anyone like her before in movies, and critics and audiences didn't quite know what to make of her angular looks and aristocratic speech, her confident and somewhat mannered acting. She was odd, but she was also strikingly original. Autocratic producer David Selznick personally disliked Hepburn. He was annoyed by her independence and constant challenging of his authority, but he knew a star when he saw one, and he wasted no time in signing her to a long-term contract at RKO. For Hepburn's second film and first starring role, Selznick had chosen Three Came Unarmed, the story of a girl raised in the jungle who comes to civilization. But that project fell through, and instead, Hepburn starred in Christopher Strong (1933).

Christopher Strong, played by Colin Clive, is a middle-aged nobleman and politician, happily married with a grown daughter. Hepburn is Lady Cynthia Darrington, a dedicated aviatrix so consumed by flying that she has no time for romance. The two fall in love, and their affair threatens Strong's marriage and career. To direct, Selznick chose one of Hollywood's few women directors, Dorothy Arzner. Playwright Zoe Akins was selected to adapt Gilbert Frankau's novel. Most people thought that the character of Cynthia was based on Amelia Earhart, but Arzner said she was based on British aviatrix Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia. (In the novel, the character was actually a race car driver.) Actual newsreel footage of parades and famous flights added veracity to the film version of Christopher Strong.

The combination of three strong-willed women did not always proceed smoothly. In fact, Arzner at one point threatened to quit the film unless Hepburn stopped interfering with her direction. Arzner stayed, and publicly, she and Hepburn expressed mutual respect, if no great warmth. In her autobiography, Hepburn says that Arzner "was very good....She wore pants. So did I. We had a good time working together." In the film, Cynthia's mannish wardrobe was similar to Arzner's. For Zoe Akins, Hepburn had little use. She found Akins pretentious and nouveau riche, and thought her script for Christopher Strong was not very good. Nevertheless, one of Akins' plays would be the basis for Hepburn's next film, Morning Glory (1933), which would win her the first of four Best Actress Oscars.

Colin Clive, who played the title character, is best known for playing the doctor in Frankenstein (1931). Most critics thought Clive was stodgy in Christopher Strong, and had no chemistry with the vibrant young Hepburn, that he was unlikely to inspire the kind of passion the script suggested. About Hepburn's performance, the critics were as divided as they had been about A Bill of Divorcement. She was so unlike any conventional ingénue that they couldn't agree whether she was beautiful or gawky, brilliant or artificial. But more and more, they were coming to the same conclusion as the New York American's Regina Crewe: "that troubled, masque-like face, the high, strident, raucous rasping voice, the straight, broad-shouldered boyish figure -- perhaps they may grate upon you, but they compel attention, and they fascinate an audience. She is a distinct, definite, positive personality -- the first since Garbo." Whatever the shortcomings of Christopher Strong, it still proved conclusively that Katharine Hepburn could carry a film. And the role helped develop the strong, independent feminist screen image that reflected Hepburn's own.

Producer: David O. Selznick, Pandro S. Berman
Director: Dorothy Arzner
Screenplay: Zoe Akins, based on the novel by Gilbert Frankau
Editor: Arthur Roberts
Cinematography: Bert Glennon
Costume Design: Howard Greer
Art Direction: Van Nest Polglase
Music: Max Steiner
Cast: Katharine Hepburn (Cynthia Darrington), Colin Clive (Christopher Strong), Billie Burke (Elaine), Helen Chandler (Monica), Ralph Forbes (Harry Rawlinson), Jack LaRue (Carlo).
BW-78m. Closed captioning.

by Margarita Landazuri