The Extras
The Extras
Frank Capra, Robert Riskin and the Early Days of Columbia Studios
In this episode, Victoria Riskin, daughter of Oscar-winning writer Robert Riskin and Fay Wray, and award-winning writer-producer Steven C. Smith reveal the impact of director Frank Capra and his friend and collaborator writer Robert Riskin on the early success of Columbia Pictures. We also discuss two audio commentaries they provided for inclusion in the recently released FRANK CAPRA AT COLUMBIA COLLECTION, featuring 20 films in HD, plus nine films in 4K, plus tons of extras, all on 27 discs.
Purchase links:
FRANK CAPRA AT COLUMBIA COLLECTION
Fay Wray and Robert Riskin: A Hollywood Memoir
Music by Max Steiner: The Epic Life of Hollywood's Most Influential Composer
Prepare to embark on an enlightening journey through the legacy of Frank Capra at Columbia Pictures. Learn how Capra's immigrant background and early hardships shaped his storytelling genius, contributing to Columbia's rise as a powerhouse in the film industry. From tackling the transition to sound films to creating financially and culturally significant works, Capra’s journey illustrates the power of determination and creativity. Through engaging anecdotes and insights, Steven and Victoria reveal how Capra's collaborations with Robert Riskin gave birth to classics like "It Happened One Night," demonstrating the strength of their partnership despite differing political ideologies during a tumultuous era.
Join our conversation as we celebrate the enduring messages of integrity and community values in films like "American Madness" and "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town." The fascinating history of "American Madness" unfolds, highlighting its timely relevance during the Great Depression and its innovative technical directing. Meanwhile, "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town" captures the triumph of the common man, with Gary Cooper's memorable performance and the film's seamless blend of comedy and drama. Through personal anecdotes and reflections, Steven and Victoria underscore the significance of these films, inviting listeners to appreciate the artistry and dedication behind Hollywood's most beloved classics.
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Warner Archive & Warner Bros Catalog Group
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Hello and welcome to the Extras, where we take you behind the scenes of your favorite TV shows, movies and animation and then release on digital DVD, blu-ray and 4K or your favorite streaming site. I'm Tim Millard, your host, and today I'm very excited to welcome back my good friend and award-winning writer-producer, stephen C Smith. To welcome back my good friend and award-winning writer-producer, stephen C Smith. Stephen is the author of Music by Max Steiner, the Epic Life of Hollywood's Most Influential Composer, also A Heart at Fire Center, the Life and Music of Bernard Herrmann, and he has written and produced hundreds of documentaries and behind-the-scenes extras, some of which we got to work on together when I was at Warner Brothers. So it's always a pleasure to have you, stephen.
Speaker 2:It's great to be back, Tim. Thank you.
Speaker 1:And also joining us is writer producer Victoria Riskin, former president of the Writers Guild of America West and daughter of Academy Award winning screenwriter Robert Riskin and actress Faye Ray. She's also the author of Faye Ray and Robert Riskin, a Hollywood memoir. Victoria, so glad to have you on the podcast.
Speaker 3:Thank you for inviting me. I'm happy to be here, Stephen it's always good to see you.
Speaker 1:I think we last had you on the podcast. We talked about His Girl Friday we did, and that was also a Columbia release, so you've been busy. Girl Friday, we did, and that was also a.
Speaker 2:Columbia release. So you've been busy. Yes, I'm thrilled that Sony, which owns Columbia, has been so good about restoring classic films, many of them in 4K or in Blu-ray, and putting them out in these deluxe editions with new featurettes. I got to do two documentaries for His Girl Friday, and I participated with Vicky in two of the commentaries on the new Frank Capra at Columbia set, and they've done some other documentaries for them recently. So, yeah, it's a thrill to see these films not only looking better than ever, but to give the movie lover a reason to revisit these titles, let's say to add these new additions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm just going to throw in my opinion and maybe you will agree or not, but there's been a number of 100th or centennial celebrations at the studios. A lot of them started around the same time. A year ago or so, it was the Warner Brothers 100th Right, and then is it this year or last year, the MGM. I think it's also MGM this year, is it not?
Speaker 2:Yeah, MGM is this year.
Speaker 1:Disney was last year, as I recall.
Speaker 2:All those studios were figuring out how to make it work at the same time, how to take these disparate smaller production companies and create the studio system.
Speaker 1:And I have to say kudos to Columbia, sony, because I think they're doing a terrific job of packaging for collectors, the library, some of the best and really putting effort and money into new content, new extras, like the ones we're going to talk about here, and I just love what they're doing. The packaging is fantastic.
Speaker 2:Beautiful I am too. It's thrilling. It's thrilling to go back to a project I did a few years ago to see Oliver, 1968's Best Picture winner, finally looking just absolutely gorgeous, sounding gorgeous in a way that just hadn't been possible for a long time. Obviously, technology has come a long way, but the transfers Lawrence of Arabia are stunning and while the Frank Capra films, which are of the 1930s in the set, and the 1920s, obviously don't have that Lawrence of Arabia scope, they're still gorgeously shot and it's a chance to really appreciate how beautiful those movies became, particularly as of about 32, 33, and then continuing to the end of Capra's time at Columbia at the end of the decade.
Speaker 1:And Victoria, it has to be exciting for you when you see your father's work represented and released like this for the fans.
Speaker 3:Well, I want to start by sending a valentine to the studio itself, because when I was writing my memoir there were several films that were not available to see and I got in touch with the studio and they set up a screening room for me and said what do you want to see? And they pulled out the old reels. It was pretty exciting and I had private screenings to see the films in good shape and beautiful condition and appreciate them. They just pop off the screen. The blacks and whites and the whole. The spirit of the film is so much stronger. But they also have a wonderful archive of photographs.
Speaker 3:So I was like a kid in a candy store going into the archives and they could not have been more welcoming and encouraging. So I think Sony's done a great job and I would say that that comes from probably from the top. What I mean by that is, I think the top executive appreciated Tom Rothman I think he's still there, right, I've left Hollywood but really appreciated the history of the studio and of course, capra and my dad played an important role in that turning point, as Stephen suggested, of bringing the studio into the grown-up world.
Speaker 1:Right, I know that studios have been bought, sold, you know, so there's a lot that goes into the centennials. Sometimes it makes sense from a business standpoint to do you know more or less, or whatever, so that complicates things a little bit. But I do like what Columbia is doing. The movies, of course, are fantastic, and the restorations that I've seen have been really fantastic. So before we dive into this Frank Capra collection at Columbia, I did want to ask you, victoria, a little bit about your book. I have not read the book, but I saw it. I'm like I really want to read this book now. Can you tell us what kind of got you motivated to want to do it and what was that experience like?
Speaker 3:Well, a book is always the happiest when it's done. You're always happiest when you've come to the end, right, because it can be such an absorbing experience. I did not spend a lot of my early life focusing on old Hollywood. What I was in search for was and this is what happens when you reach a certain level of maturity I wanted to find my parents again.
Speaker 3:Who were they really? Who was my father? What role did he play? He had died when I was young, and so he was sort of frozen in time for me, and I always thought of myself as a little girl looking up at him. In fact, he was not very tall, so by the time I ended the book, we were the same height, logically speaking. But I was in search of both of them their beginnings and their trip to Hollywood, what roles they played in Hollywood, but also who they were as people and the values that they had and how they, particularly my father, how his values were infused in his writing and the films that he chose to do, and then, of course, his relationship with Capra and how that worked. So it's a story of my life, but really mostly their lives, and seen through my lens.
Speaker 1:We're going to talk a little bit about how Capra and your father met, but before we move on from the book, how did your mother and father meet?
Speaker 3:Well, it's not exactly. Well, they met at a Christmas party hosted on Christmas Eve by Richard Barthelmas, if that name is familiar to old movie fans, and it was for people who were. They had to be single to come. It was sort of like early match dot com, but in a living room in Beverly Hills with filled with lights and music. And so my mother was there.
Speaker 3:She was single, she had divorced her first husband and she was feeling kind of cheerful and standing by the piano and kind of singing along the songs and dancing a little bit. And my father was like a little laser beam and he saw her and said I think I have to get to know her. So he walked over and chatted and then invited her to go to the movies. And they went to see the Grapes of Wrath, which is not exactly a cheerful movie, right, but her early years had been years of not having much money, of really struggling, and so she was very moved by the film and teary-eyed during the difficult passages and I think his heart melted. But years later he said something that he suggested to her that he had seen her and had an eye on her for many years before that. In fact, he had written a film that she starred in, for I think it was Columbia right. Stephen Ann Carver's Profession.
Speaker 2:Ann Carver's Profession. I'll have to look that up I can't remember if that was Warner's, or because your mother moved around studios a great deal. During the 1930s she did work at Columbia and she worked.
Speaker 3:I think I'm sure it was a Columbia picture, but I can't swear to it. But it was a story of a woman who was a very successful lawyer and how that impacted her marriage and the difficulty her marriage had in trying to as she becomes more and more successful and eclipses her husband. So it was actually a bit avant-garde in its own way and feminist in its own way and at the same time a little old fashioned. But she loved, she loved the script and she admired the writing and so she had her eye on Riskin for a long time.
Speaker 1:Interesting. Well, that's all the tease everybody's going to get here. You're going to have to buy the book.
Speaker 2:It's a great book. By the way, I mean Vicki's father, robert Riskin, not only was a great writer, but he must have been the most charming man and delightful of company, because prior to meeting your mother, he had had romances with Carol Lombard, with Linda Farrell. He was quite a ladies man, I should say in a serial way he was. These were relationships that lasted, and he maintained really good friendships with those ladies too, didn't he?
Speaker 3:He did, he did. And both of those women, carol Lombard and Glenda Farrell, were pretty terrific women, maybe not so much as reflected in the parts they played, but as I got to know them and doing research for the book, I thought they were wonderful.
Speaker 2:So and, by the way, you are absolutely right, ann Carver's profession is a Columbia movie, so maybe we'll see that on Blu-ray 4K one day.
Speaker 1:Well, the gist of our conversation today is about this wonderful 27-disc Frank Capra at Columbia Collection, and it has 20 different movies I believe in there, and we're going to talk about two of the ones that you two added audio commentaries to. But before we kind of dive into that, the obvious question here is Frank Capra at Columbia why pull out such a big collection? And the answer we all know is because of the importance. But let's dig into that a little bit. Stephen, what can you tell us about the early history of Cap Red Columbia?
Speaker 2:Indeed. Well, if you don't mind, tim, I'm going to go back just a few years to a company that had been formed when Harry Cohn, his brother and another associate borrowed money from what became the Bank of America and established this very modest studio. And it was impossible to get stars, and if you look at the early photos of the films being made, it almost looks like you're making a home movie. The sets are so small, the cameras are so small, and yet Harry Cohn was a man of tremendous fierce ambition and smart, because, yes, he was incredibly tough, but by the early 1930s he had made hires that were very strategic to improve the look and the feel of his films. Something that we talked about with Kimberly previously was the idea of having the costumes of Columbia films look better so they could entice actresses like Carol Lombard and Barbara Stanwyck to come over for one picture and to have better scripts. And that's and we'll talk more about Vicky's father, robert Riskin, and how Cohn really appreciated what Riskin could bring, not just to the Capra films but also to Columbia. There was MGM it was enormous and aspire not to the budgets of their films or the scope of their studio, but to produce, yes, a lot of bread and butter movies that made money and were inexpensive, but also to make enough really prestige films so that later Cary Grant and Irene Dunn and people like that would come to the studio. So, going back to the Capra of all of that, there's no question that Columbia was on the right track in terms of trying to create the more impressive looking films that Cone wanted to do silent film era.
Speaker 2:In comedy and I mean slapstick comedy, you know Max Sennett, hal Roach, he was a gag man and Capra was a tremendously like Cohn, ambitious person who knew, somewhat amorphously at the beginning but with more and more clarity, what he wanted to do, and that was to escape a childhood of poverty, of great struggle. He was born in an area that was part of Sicily. He came over to the US, I believe when he was seven, and the trip was absolutely miserable terrible conditions, typical, you know, immigrants packed together. A similarly horrible train trip across from New York to California where the family moved for various reasons. But and he later said quite poignantly that he was never a boy, that he was always a man, meaning that nobody was really protecting him, and his father was a kind of a slightly ne'er-do-well fellow. His mother was driven but he was really on his own to make it, like a lot of young children at the time. He sold newspapers and he had to defend himself on the streets from all kinds of attacks from other boys, from all sorts of things. So that will toughen a person up and, let's face it, there are not many people who make it to the top of the American film industry without having a toughness and a backbone, or at least an ability to go through a really terrible experience and say I'm going to get through this because I know what I want to do.
Speaker 2:And Capra had certainly great instincts about storytelling that developed over time. He observed people, he liked people and people liked working for him when he began having these early opportunities to direct and, like so many directors, the opportunities were more plentiful in the 20s because the film business was so disorganized these little companies would crop up and disappear and come around and sometimes, you know, I think it was Alan Dwan, a director, who supposedly got his break when the director was drunk and didn't show up or couldn't work. I mean, it was a really rough, hard scrabble, rough and tumble Wild West kind of business and that's one reason I love this period so much is because it doesn't have the rules, the giant infrastructure that we have now, the vertical integration. It was just a bunch of people trying to figure out how this new medium of the movies could make them money and, on the way, create art, almost accidentally at first. But Capra found his way to Columbia and it wasn't as if he was just suddenly a great discovery and master filmmaker. Like all filmmakers, he had to be a journeyman first. He had to work in different genres. He had to make mistakes. He wasn't happy with a lot of his early films, but he did the best he could and got better and better.
Speaker 2:And by the time sound took over, all the studios in Hollywood agreed by 1929 that they were only going to make talkies moving forward. Well, there were a couple of years where all the studios were figuring it out, but by, I think, 1931, capra was really at the forefront of directors making good talkies because he directed a comedy called Platinum Blonde. And it was called Platinum Blonde because it had this new young star named Jean Harlow in it in what you could argue is her first really good role in good film. And Capra realized that, unlike a lot of films of the time actors didn't have to speak very slowly in this stentorian stage like diction for people to understand them. No, people should talk like we're talking together now. So Platinum Blonde had pace, it had energy and that really put him on the track to get better projects and he began to collaborate with Vicky's father on some scripts and I'll leave that to Vicky to talk about.
Speaker 2:But the turning point for Columbia, without a question, is 1934's. It Happened One Night, a movie that is still shown to people, a movie that audiences still love. I've hosted screenings of it and people are enchanted by this film. It really is. It's of its time but timeless by this film. It really is, it's of its time but timeless. And the success of Capra, riskin, gable, colbert and everyone who worked on that film and Harry Cohn for bringing the elements together.
Speaker 2:That was a turning point for the studio because not only did it win Best Picture, which was unprecedented for Columbia, they were thought of as a B studio. It won the Best Picture, which was unprecedented for Columbia. They were thought of as a B-studio. It won the Best Picture. It won for the first time all of the top awards at the Oscars, something that didn't happen again for another 40-plus years, with One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. So this was really a milestone. And then that was like firing these talents out of a rocket. Suddenly, everything they did was gold. You get movies like Capra and Riskin collaborating on Mr Deeds Goes to Town. You get Lost Horizon. You get you know you Can't Take it With you 1938's Best Picture winner. You get Capra's last film for the studio, mr Smith Goes to Washington, and I'm some out. So so Capra really put the studio into an entire new stratosphere.
Speaker 1:Well, vicky, do you recall how your father kind of fit into that Columbia story, and did he work with Capra first or with Columbia first?
Speaker 3:No, Well, he came to Hollywood, like a lot of people did, after the crash the 1929 crash and he was. He had no money, but it turned out that Warner Brothers had decided to buy one of the plays that he'd written. He was writing for Broadway and there's a wonderful story in my book about how the agent who came offered him some money like $5,000, which was a huge amount of money to buy his property. For whatever reason, my dad decided I think this guy really wants this property, so I'm going to hold out. He had no money in his pocket and he said I think I'd rather. He said I'd like $50,000.
Speaker 3:He just gave him an enormous amount of money. The long and the short of it and it's a cute story. I don't want to cheat everybody out, but you can read it. In the end he was right. They were already filming the movie and they had to have the rights. And he ended up getting it paid $30,000 and then came to Hollywood and Harry Cohn offered him a contract.
Speaker 3:That was a time, as Stephen says, they were hiring a lot of writers who had been journalists or playwrights from New York to come out and work at the studio. And his first meeting with Frank Capra. He comes in and Capra's telling the story of a movie they're going to make and he recognizes that as his own play another play and he says he's sitting in the back of the room and Harry Cohn turns to him and says so, you wrote this thing, what do you think? And he said well, it was a flop on Broadway and if you make it as a movie, it just shows you're stupider than I am. That made Capra very angry. That was their first meeting. They went on and made the film. It was not a success, but actually I like this film.
Speaker 2:It's a good movie.
Speaker 3:It's a wonderful movie. It's called Miracle with Barbara Stanwyck and she's marvelous in it, and the reason it didn't do well is because it questioned the commercialization of religion and that was not popular to the viewing public. My dad understood that. They then worked on. Stephen mentioned Platinum Blonde. That's also one of my favorite films. But there you see Capra as a brilliant director. Timing and lighting is quite wonderful and you hear the brilliant dialogue of Riskin and you know if these two are going to get together it's going to go well. To the dialogue there was style, there was wit and it's still one of my favorites of the Riskin Capra films. So that was the springboard. I think they then looked at each other. They each went off and did other things, but I think they had their eye on each other to find ways to come together again. And they did with Broadway Bill and they did with. Of course it Happened One Night which just was off the charts.
Speaker 1:We know that they had a complicated relationship, kind of toward the end. But what do you think allowed them to work so well together and be so successful?
Speaker 3:I think they were wonderful complements to each other. They were both scrappy kids. My dad had grown up on the Lower East Side and then in Brooklyn. He knew what it was to fight with the Irish and the Italians and I think Capra had that same kind of wonderful, playful rough edge. They also loved each other's sense of humor. They bantered a lot. There was great playfulness and I'm not sure they ever even had a bad relationship.
Speaker 3:That might have been overplayed in some places, because when Capra finally left Columbia my father left first and went to work for Sam Goldman as a top executive and he was miserable and Capper was miserable under the yoke of Harry Cohn because they'd had so much conflict. And finally he leaves and the first thing they do is they form a company together and they meet John Doe. So that's what I know of the facts of their relationship. There were tensions later, but they were more understandable. It was a different time. It was the post-war era, so I could be a psychoanalyst of what was going on there. But it was not easy to have gone off to war, have the whole kind of industry shut down and then come back and rebuild a life. And it was a new style of filmmaking and new sensibilities in the post-war era that audiences wanted. Anyway, that's a whole other side of it.
Speaker 3:But what I think worked is there was no one who was more brilliant with dialogue and character than Robert Riskin and there was no one with a better sense of timing and bringing out the best in actors. And, having think, at that time Capra wanted to be a grand director. You know, epic, huge and it became a financial threat to the whole studio, that film and much was complicated about how to end the film and in many ways a quite wonderful film, it was touching on the idealism and so on. But I think that's where Capra and Harry Cohn were in. They were not only in battle in battle, and they were in legal battles with each other, Because who was going to have the final say? And that's always.
Speaker 2:Am I right, Stephen, about my history here I always turn very good on your history and I would say that ultimately Lost Horizon, which was released many times, made its money back. And during the war, Franklin D Roosevelt, when asked where I can't remember if it was certain officers or where something was taking place, he made a reference to it all being in Shangri-La, which is the paradise setting in Lost Horizon. And I think even people who have never seen or read the book of Lost Horizon have heard the phrase Shangri-La and know that it represents a kind of wonderful place to go to escape things. So Lost Horizon was the most challenging movie they made together because it wasn't a comedy, it was a very ambitious kind of fantasy film with social themes, and the remarkable thing is Harry Cohn, despite his concerns, backed them to the hilt, gave Capra everything he wanted to the end of production and it ultimately was a success.
Speaker 2:One thing I really love about this period from, let's say, it Happened One Night in 1934. I know that Capra and Riskin were already working together and we'll talk about at least one of those films, but especially starting with it Happened One Night there's this tremendous excitement of okay, what can we do now? You know what's possible, what can we do even better, and there are some really charming articles of that time. One of them I'll paraphrase where where a writer, in profiling the two men, says it's really unusual because you talk to Capra and he just wants to talk about Riskin, and you talk to Riskin and he wants to talk about Capra. So they really had kind of a magic together at this time. And I now live in the Palm Springs area, so it was very fun for me to be reminded that when they were starting some of their projects, Capra and Riskin would come to this area, to La Quinta, I believe, Right, Vicki, and they would stay at a hotel and they would get away two hours outside of Hollywood to something of a it must have felt like kind of a Shangri-La in 1935-ish or so and work here where they could be away from just anything other than their own imaginations.
Speaker 2:And so it's a very, very fertile period and it will be fun, I think, for viewers to look at the films which again, not you know, only some are written by Risk and they're all Capra-directed films. But they'll see how Capra develops from this person figuring out, you know, as everybody had to the grammar of film, what works, what doesn't, and then, you know, really swinging for the fences on some interesting films like the Bitter Tea of General Yen, which dared to suggest an interracial romance possibility between Barbara Stanwyck and a character who is Chinese. That was really taboo for the time and that came just before it happened one night. But then to do these movies that absolutely hit the sweet spot of commercial and critical success, you know also, and that have remained some of the best loved movies of the 30s. So it will be fun, I think, for people to watch these things in context.
Speaker 1:Let's dive right into American Madness.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes.
Speaker 1:In 1932, with that kind of thought in mind. You know, maybe you can give us a little bit of background on that story. But the two films we're going to talk about and of course it's a Wonderful Life you watch them and you just I don't know. You feel like they understand people in America and like where we came from and our immigrant stories, and I mean there's just so much there that was a part of their partnership, I'm assuming.
Speaker 2:Yeah, vicki, may I say for just a quick moment I think it's a great example of how two people who had, let's say, different views of politics in some respects and we won't get too political on this, but they were a little different in that Riskin was a real New Deal, franklin D Roosevelt liberal, and Capra was more of a conservative person, which a number of people in Hollywood were, and he was a self-made man, I mean, like a lot of people, who didn't get any help from anyone or, at least you know, really had to push to get help from people. He didn't see things the same way. Riskin did exactly. But what's great is how great that they didn't have the same point of view, because when you get people who are simpatico creatively, but they have a different perspective on the world, on how things should be run, some really interesting had helped him along the way and he didn't want to be giving away stuff.
Speaker 3:He thought people should dig in and take care of themselves, whereas my dad felt 25% of the American population was out of work and we should be helping and people along. And it's amazing that you see, in the films that they did there's a blending. I mean you could almost bring any point of view to some of those films and yet they did, I'm sure, debate things politically, but it didn't interfere with their love for each other and that's the remarkable thing. That's kind of lost. And there were all these battles going on inside of Hollywood as well and Frank was a little bit more sympathetic to the studio point of view and my dad was first kind of in the middle and then he sided with the labor movement in Hollywood and mostly for my dad it was especially for his fellow writers and the younger writers. They deserve to be respected and cared about. Whereas for Frank he felt here are these guys who had worked hard to build these studios and let's not take them on and criticize them In the end. Actually there were times when they blended together and worked together, when there were some labor issues and when they were forming the unions and ultimately Kampers sided with the unions. I just think it's so interesting to look at their relationship and see how beautifully they got along.
Speaker 3:I'll tell you a quick story about how they got along, because my first memory of Frank Capra and my dad is in the living room at our home in Bel Air and the two of them are doing circus tricks and throwing balls in the air and doing cartwheels. They were very playful together. They brought that out and I think my dad particularly brought that side of Frank's personality out and they traveled together, even not having anything to do with making movies. But they went to Russia, they went to England. Probably.
Speaker 3:It was hard in some ways for Frank during the war when my father went in his own direction and didn't work with him, and when he married my mother and suddenly there was another, you know, important center of my dad's life. I think you have a very powerful story of friendship with these two men. I've thought of actually writing a film about two men in Hollywood in the 1930s, and it had some sad moments too the loss of Frank's's son and then my father's illness and how Frank responded to that. There's a lot of powerful story in that friendship. So anyway, enough said.
Speaker 2:Yes, and underneath it all there is this tremendous time of tumult in America, all over the world. But this is the peak of the depression, is when their collaboration really started. And that sort of, you know, is something very, very much felt in one of the two films for which Vicki and I provided new audio commentary on the new set. And I have to admit I am just fascinated by the period in the early 30s when Hollywood had already gone this tremendous upheaval of change, putting in creating sound films, which meant rebuilding their studios, in effect, you know, creating sound departments, building sound stages that would work for sound, as opposed to the easier way, in a sense, of silent films, where the directors could verbally, you know, talk through a shot and that sort of thing. So the studios have already spent a great deal of money. And then the stock market crashes and for a little while nobody's really sure that it's going to cause a problem in Hollywood in 1930, but it does.
Speaker 2:And by 1932, studios are starting to go into receivership. People forget that Paramount Pictures went into receivership, rko went into receivership. People forget that Paramount Pictures went into receivership, rko went into receivership in 1933. These were studios hanging on by their fingernails trying to figure out what movies could keep them in business, what filmmakers could make the movies to keep them in business. And Columbia was a little bit ahead of even a Paramount in that it didn't own theaters like a lot of the big big studios did, so they didn't have to worry about keeping their theater chains going and having quite as much product to put into them.
Speaker 2:And that brings us to one of the two films that Vicki and I provided commentary on, the wonderful, real, I think overlooked gem in this Capra set that people are going to really enjoy, a 1932 film called American Madness. And just a brief word of context in 1932, it was thought that as much as $100 million was being hoarded by people not being put into banks because there were so many banks that failed, and that's well over a billion dollars today. So there was tremendous fear on the part of the American public about the banking industry. And, vicki, I know you can tell us much, much more about this film and how it came about.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, I would add to the perfect context, because the studio, well, the whole country, was in a depression but the studios were in crisis and going bankrupt Paramount, whether RKO, and we can talk about that later but FDR was encouraging people after he got elected to put your money back in the banks, they'll be all right. I mean because people were hoarding and putting whatever money they had under their mattresses. At the same time, columbia Pictures did not have a whole string of theaters, so it was in better financial shape in some ways. But the two people, the Giannini brothers, who started the Bank of Italy that became the Bank of America, liked movies. They first were loaning money to farmers, to Italian farmers up in the northern part of California, and they got interested in the movie business.
Speaker 3:And I don't remember which Giannini, but one of them was on the board of directors of Columbia Pictures and Cohen was very grateful to him and said to my dad, go write a movie about a bank and banking and the Giannini brothers. And he went and did an extensive interview. I think it was Doc Giannini, but I can't, I'm just.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it was Doc, yeah, it was Doc Giannini and came back and crafted the American Madness screenplay. And crafted the American Madness screenplay and, as Stephen knows, the first was it two directors. The first director was it was terrible, the direction was terrible, they had to stop everything and Capra was brought in to rescue the picture and did beautifully. But it's a story about the sense of panic that was streaming across the country, people taking money out of the banks, and so it follows along that emotional sense. And then, in very sort of, I would say Riskin-esque style, you had a banker at the center of the story who believed in loaning money to people he knew, who had character, and the bank board of directors the local board of directors wanted to sell the bank to a much bigger bank and that was no way to be loaning money, and so that becomes a piece of the story.
Speaker 2:Yes. So it's an unusual story and, unlike many of the early 30s films in which bankers were sometimes depicted as the bad guys and we know that gangsters were starting to be glorified by the likes of James Cagney and Edward G Robinson in the Warner Brothers films, Harry Cohn said make a movie to risk and write a movie where the banker is the hero and he's the good guy of the story. He's played by the wonderful Walter Houston, father of John Houston. John was not really doing much in the movie business yet, but Walter Houston was a well-known stage star and had begun to make more and more films and he's just wonderful casting as this man of extreme integrity who understands that, who can read people and and gauge a good investment. And what's unusual about it is this is no spoiler, because it's really what the movie is about is that it's about a run on a bank. It's something that we'll see in a later famous Frank Capra movie, but it's the title.
Speaker 2:American Madness suggests what is going to happen, which is that, due to plot machinations we won't reveal, people wrongly think that this bank is not safe and it's the kind of urgent, real-time action taken which and that may not sound like an exciting movie but it's really almost a thriller, a suspense movie, and what Capra did was he didn't change a word of risk and screenplay. He didn't recast one actor, apparently, but he had them rebuild the sets a little bit so that Walter Houston, playing the chief banker, his office, overlooks this big bank. So there's things going on, so there's a lot of energy in the shots and he put rhythm into it and he paced it up and it builds beautifully so that when the panic and the run on the bank starts in the last half hour of the movie, it's so gripping and it's just a terrific movie.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was not familiar with this film, and from the get go it just pulls you right in. It actually feels very modern.
Speaker 3:Yes it is. It does feel modern. I'll tell you a little side story. I don't know if your listeners would be interested, but I still love this film and I now live in Martha's Vineyard and I invited the president of my local bank to come and see the film, because we have a community bank, which means that it's owned by the people depositors, it's not owned by another company. And I said this is what you're all about and I want to remind you of how important you are in a community, that sense of the bank important you are in a community, that sense of the bank knowing the people and caring about the community and supporting good business and the depositors versus the money hungry guys who just want to turn a profit. This feels very modern indeed. Well.
Speaker 1:I was talking specifically about the style of filmmaking as well, in the sense that the very first shot we start. Well, it's not the very first shot, but very soon we're. We're looking at the vault and we're showing the mechanisms of how it's pretty difficult to break into a vault. So just in terms of I think, like close-ups and and the way it was cut and setting up of the what would the plot point of breaking into the bank, how's that going to happen? And and just setting up that suspense, as you mentioned, I thought was fantastic. And then the melodrama, of course, around that is of its period, but I just thought some of the other elements of the technical directing was very much.
Speaker 3:And there's some overhead shots and there's a lot of movement.
Speaker 2:Tracking shots as people talk and you know, in those days quite often actors would just stand and give you the exposition. Capra has several tracking shots where they're talking and moving and I love that there's a shot early on as Pat O'Brien's talking and they're moving past the teller windows and you just really get a sense of the environment. It and you just really get a sense of the environment. It feels very real, even though it's a set, and you might think that bankers would be opposed to a film that shows that things can go wrong in their banks and for a time, you know, it's looking a little scary as to whether this bank is going to survive. But in fact and this is something very smart that I think Kerry Cohn was primarily responsible in doing, and this is something very smart that I think Kerry Cohn was primarily responsible in doing he pointed out to the censors that they made this movie with the Giannini brothers supporting it and that this movie was intended to show people that banks were safe.
Speaker 2:And this is still this is the last year of Herbert Hoover's presidency. He's going to be voted out in November, around the time that this movie is coming out, and the censors in fact really got behind this movie and embraced it and the publicity kind of talked about the fact that this was a movie that was, you know, had a social message for it. So he completely, the studio completely turned the censors around from being against the film to pointing to it as an example of how film can help the country at that time, I just want to contrast this film, or these films, with what was being made at MGM at the time, which is not to say I don't love MGM films so.
Speaker 3:but by contrast, mgm was making glossy films with stars. They were relying on stars, not so much on these more humanistic storytelling that was so important to connect with the average American during that period and that was the strength of Columbia and Capra and Riskin together.
Speaker 1:I think for those like myself who haven't seen the film before the way it's shot and the storytelling, which I thought was quite progressive as well, and then, of course, the whole banking thing it's really enjoyable. I think also that you mentioned that there are some precursors here, or some elements that Capra comes back to with it's a Wonderful Life, Stephen. Maybe you could explain a little bit more about that.
Speaker 2:Well I can. It's not, frankly, an area of expertise for me. That is, post-columbia Capra, where he was forming his own production company and the great hope was that the prestigious filmmakers who united to create that organization would be able to make movies of their choosing. Alas, it did not work out that way. But of course it's. A Wonderful Life found a great afterlife.
Speaker 2:Afterlife, and one can't help but see a recurrence of a theme that runs through those 30s Capra films, particularly the ones written by Riskin and also Mr Smith Goes to Washington, this notion of the individual against the system.
Speaker 2:And we all know that George Bailey in Savings and Loan is in a situation not dissimilar from some aspects of American madness, but they're, you know they're different. But I think they speak to Capra's recognition that American people wanted to believe that the people who were in charge of their institutions, whether they were small and local or large in the government, say, were really taking care of them and concerned about them. And that's sort of a theme that even carries over in the other movie for which we did a commentary, mr Deeds Goes to Town, which is generally a much more lighthearted film. Its third act has more drama, but that's a romantic comedy. But again it has that idea that you have an individual who listens to what they used to say, we used to call the common man. You know, the person without power, we can say perhaps today and takes on large institutions different ones in Mr Deeds, but that's a constant Capra theme. It's a Riskin theme, for sure.
Speaker 1:Well, why don't we talk about Mr Deeds Goes to Town 1936? I'm sure this is pretty much a beloved film that many people know, but maybe you could give us a little rundown for those who maybe aren't as familiar with the film.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. This is a charming 1936 romantic comedy written by Vicki's dad, directed by Capra and starring Gary Cooper and the wonderful Jean Arthur Capra and starring Gary Cooper and the wonderful Gene Arthur. And it's about a very simple man, played by Cooper Longfellow Deeds, who finds himself the surprise inheritor of a fortune. And, of course, where there's a will there are relatives, as the saying goes. There aren't relatives here, but there are certainly people who want to take his money, steal his money, do bad things with his money, and it's a classic story of a hero who seems very simple, to the point of well, he is naive in some ways, particularly when it comes to romance, but he was actually quite smart when it comes to reading people. We see that throughout the film film.
Speaker 2:And you know, it's, I think, safe to say in a Capra film that the simple man quote unquote, that the quote unquote common man is going to be quite a match for the forces, the authority figures that try to exploit him, that are corrupt.
Speaker 2:Now, that may sound like a cliche, it may sound like something you've seen a thousand times, but the beauty of this movie is how quickly you get involved with the character of Longfellow Deeds, so beautifully played by Cooper. Then you're thrust into kind of the big city atmosphere that is personified by Jean Arthur's wised up newspaper woman who assumes another identity to try to get the inside story on Deeds. And it's the specificity of the writing, it's the wit of the dialogue, it's the connection between the actors, it's a fabulous supporting cast. You know, a decade later, I think Preston Sturgis would really borrow the notion that Cap a million movies and scene after scene, people who even at that time would have had much larger roles were willing to come in and do small parts in this because it was recognized quite early on as a project of equality. And, vicki, I'd love to hear your thoughts about it films.
Speaker 3:To be honest, I think Gary Cooper is so wonderful and beautiful performance and represents the integrity of the common man, as you would say, and that whole theme of he comes to New York and he seems like a naive who's going to be taken advantage of by the powerful leaders, lawyers and power brokers and he realizes ultimately that money doesn't make you happy and that you have a responsibility. And it's heartbreaking because he falls in love with Gene Arthur. I shouldn't tell the whole story. That's not even there, right?
Speaker 2:Okay, it's a good book I think you gave him, you gave yourself as a very accomplished screenwriter, so I think you gave us the perfect look right there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but there's so much I love about it and I know it must have had a big influence on my dad because he named his dachshund Mr Deeds, and Mr Deeds continued to be important in our life Even when we were little kids. After the war, we had Mr Deeds as our favorite pet.
Speaker 3:But, I think these characters that my dad created lived inside of his head.
Speaker 3:They were real people in some ways, in some realm inside of his mind, and represented something that was very important to him, which was remembering that people are basically decent and helping each other out.
Speaker 3:These were important themes for him and you don't know if the romance is going to come together or not, so I'm not going to, I'm not going to tell the ending of the film, but I do want to have a little a chance to point out that in the final scene there is a banter about people's oddities and funny things that they do, like doodling, and there's this whole little moment when that is used as an example the kind of funny things people do who are normal. And my dad invented the word doodle and I just think I have to go on record telling you that and even though there's some sort of Merriam-Webster dictionary says they think it maybe came from some other ancient word, but he invented that word and later in his life he wrote a story at the time of a film he did called Magic Town, in which he reminded it was a newspaper story the public that he had invented that word and he was looking for some new words to invent.
Speaker 2:And for those of you out there who think well, what about Yankee Doodle, the song that came before that? That word might have existed, but it was her father who gave it the meaning that we all associate with it that is drawing. So yes, To doodle.
Speaker 3:He gave it a verb. How's that?
Speaker 2:Yes, it becomes now something and that dates back to Mr Deeds Goes to Town. And one of the other things I really love about this movie is that it accomplishes something that people try and it often doesn't work. It's essentially a romantic comedy for about 70% of the way and then there is a scene of intense drama. I mean a gun is pulled and it's life and death suddenly and the movie changes tone and that is the hinge that takes us in a really arresting manner into a different kind of film. For a while it's a drama and then eventually it's brought around to a very emotionally satisfying ending with great warmth and heart to it.
Speaker 2:But I have to say that it's a testament to Capra and Riskin that they would dare to create a sequence that is so suddenly different and dramatic and have it work. And apparently when the movie was first shown to critics and journalists covering it, at the end of that scene the audience applauded of Hollywood insiders. They were just so impressed with how that scene had worked and they related to what was being said in it. And again, you'll have to watch the movie to really know what we're talking about. But it's a great example for screenwriters and directors to watch and see how you can have these different tones and because life is full of these different tones comedy, romance, tragedy, drama, whatever and Mr Deeds has so much of that and I think that's another reason that when we get to the end of this movie, we really feel like we've been on such a fabulous journey with people that we care about and you know, it moves us, it moves and it moves us.
Speaker 3:I want to just make one more comment. For anyone who's going to be watching this film is look at the secondary characters, look at the cast, and you see them in Capra films over and over again. Some of this, these character actors, these small roles, but it's a wonderful ensemble that Capra put together.
Speaker 2:To be sure.
Speaker 1:So these are just two fabulous films that are part of this amazing Frank Capra set celebrating 100 years of Columbia Pictures. 20 films on here, and it's so great, Victoria, that you could come on and talk about your father's collaboration on so many of these films. One thing I've learned today is just how tightly they are connected with some of these fantastic films. Stephen, your thoughts on this set and this release and your involvement with it.
Speaker 2:I'm so happy that soon I can have in one place so many movies that I love. Lady for a Day we haven't talked about it a beautiful movie based on a Damon Runyon story about a rundown woman who it's a very sort of magical fable from the writer the origin writer of Guys and Dolls. There are several Barbara Stanwyck movies and she's always fascinating to watch, particularly so early in her film career when she's already a terrific actress and she really connected on a personal level with Capra and I think you can see that in the movies you get the later Capra. His last film at Columbia, mr Smith Goes to Washington, a movie that is, yes, it has a happy ending we all wish could happen in real life. But so much of it is still true and relevant. And yeah, lost Horizon we've talked about. You can't take it with you.
Speaker 2:1938's Best Picture winner, a huge hit on Broadway, adapted for the screen by Vicky's father, robert Riskin. Lots of extras, a new documentary. I don't want to sound like a total shill, but as a movie buff I really can't wait to have all this material.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, that's kind of what we do on this podcast, stephen. We talk about movies that are coming out on 4K or Blu-ray and if you aren't familiar with them, we try to help people who are. And if you love the movie, it's great to revisit together. And I guess the really unique and wonderful thing is that we got to hear from you, victoria, and the personal stories that your memories of your father and your mother and their relationship to these films. So thank you so much for coming on and sharing those.
Speaker 3:Oh, it's been my great pleasure and I hope you get a chance to read the book, because it'll be a deep dive into a personal life of Hollywood of the 1930s.
Speaker 2:Yeah, vicki's book on her parents is extraordinary. You get such a sense of Hollywood from the 20s to the 50s really, and beyond with your mom. It's a beautiful story.
Speaker 1:Well, this was a lot of fun. Stephen and Victoria, Thank you so much for coming on the podcast.
Speaker 2:Tim, it's been a pleasure being here and I hope I'll see you again soon. Take care, both of you.
Speaker 3:This was great soon.
Speaker 1:Take care both of you. This is great For those of you interested in purchasing Frank Kampra at Columbia Collection, there is a purchase link in the podcast show notes and on our website at wwwtheextrastv. If this is the first episode of the Extras you've listened to and you enjoyed it, please think about following the show at your favorite podcast provider and if you're on social media, you can find our links on the show notes here. And for our long-term listeners, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review at iTunes, spotify or your favorite podcast provider. Until next time you've been listening to Tim Millard, stay slightly obsessed you.