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I'm rewatching It Happened One Night and was reading up on it. I know IMDb is iffy with its trivia section, but it mentions a handful of times that Colbert, Gable, and others who were offered parts but declined all hated the script / being in the movie. Even Columbia Pictures didn't think much of it. But my question is, assuming it's true, why? What was it about the movie that so many all disliked?
I understand why they still made the movie, the contract system and so on. And I realize it was just before Hays Code, so maybe there was a moral objection to the script? But that doesn't seem too likely.
Thank you for any insight!
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didn't it win like 5 oscars?
Was first to sweep Picture, Actor, Actress, Director
Don't forget writing!
Won all of the big 5 awards. Only two other movies have ever done it. Silence of the Lambs and One flew over the cuckoos nest.
Yep, so joke's on everyone who rejected/disliked it, including the Oscar winners Gable and Colbert.
I can only say Myrna Loy was offered the part of Ellie and turned it down. She later said the script she turned down bore little resemblance to the eventual movie.
Just like Madame Web!
Oooh, so the rewrites changed it significantly. That's interesting.
I think you put your finger on the problem with IMDb is iffy about its trivia section. Almost no one sources their trivia posts, and in fact I got a trivia post rejected because I tried to incorporate a reference.
Yeah years and years ago I would spend hours looking up facts for my favorite films.
Until I unfortunately found out like 80% of it is made up and or not even fact checked. Shame really.
IMDb can be iffy full stop. I once tried reporting some images from a silent movie that were tagged with the names of the wrong actors and provided the correct information instead. Also tried reporting an incorrect character name from a later movie, providing screenshots from the actual movie where you see the character's name writtten down, and from the movie's credits. Got absolutely nowhere in both cases, it was so frustrating I just didn't bother after that. Meanwhile, in the trivia for other films I've seen things that are straight up opinions, shit like "<actor x> is much too old for <actress y> and they look gross together". It's damn ridiculous.
Right, but in this case, it seems fairly solid that this movie was rejected by many in Hollywood.
Yeah IMDB trivia makes wikipedia look like a reliable source.
Columbia was a very small studio at the time. Capra was still relatively new, as were screwball comedies. It also sounds like the script wasn't great. It must have either undergone revisions or it was just the line deliveries that sold it in the end. Columbia was sending the script to stars from big studios who had little to gain from taking a chance at a small studio.
^ This is the answer. Actors had no right of refusal on scripts in those days, and they were assigned to pictures whether they liked it or not. Capra's "It Happened One Night" was the first film to win all top five Oscars. It was a huge hit. Gable's appearance in a sleeveless T made T-shirts fashionable.
There's a similar story about "Casablanca." It started out as a B picture starring B player Ronald Reagan as Rick. It was thrown together at the last minute to take advantage of the global publicity of Roosevelt's war counsel with Churchill and Stalin in the city of Casablanca. The story had no ending when filming began. And yet is considered one of the best movies all time and is especially noteworthy for the writing and the acting.
The Gable t-shirt trivia in this film was actually his lack of one. He removes his shirt in the "Walls if Jericho" sequence, revealing his bare chest. A measurable drop in t-shirt sales was the result...
Thank you! This definitely makes sense.
The fact that people hated the script that was shown to them before filming doesn’t mean Hollywood hated the movie. There were a lot of changes made to the script when they actually made the movie.
True, but Gable and Colbert complained during filming. In fact, Colbert purportedly complained every single day. I realize the actors have a limited view during filming, but they had the final script and were still complaining.
I don't remember details, but Be Kind Rewind did a YouTube video on this movie. I'll try to find the link.
https://youtu.be/w9P6aquSqHw?si=jWk4QCJa8joz32HY
Just watched it, and it has led to me adding both the Torch Singer (1933) and The Smiling Lieutenant (1931) to my list, neither of which I had heard of before.
Well, it's nearly 11.30 pm where I am, but I'm going to watch that right now - thank you!
I know it was quite modern for its time, but it's one of my favourite films and I had no idea there was any discord with it.
I loved it when I first saw it -- on TV!
The first issue was the script. I'm unsure of the changes but I do know that once production started both Colbert and Gable complained bitterly about it, and Capra actually agreed and got Riskin to do extensive rewrites.
That original script seems to have been a tripping point for a lot of potential stars, as it was turned down over and over before they managed to sign Colbert and Gable. Colbert initially declined because she'd already worked with Capra and didn't much like him, but finally agreed after a salary increase.
According to John Eastman's book Retakes Louis B. Mayer refused to buy the story for MGM because he felt the father, eventually played by Walter Connolly, wasn't given the respect that a wealthy captain of industry deserved. Columbia, a small studio at the time, finally picked it up later on.
I believe that's the core of it, a poor first draft of a script that didn't spark much imagination or confidence. I've never read anything about the Code getting in the way, it's considered a Pre-Code film and does feature elements that never would have been approved only four months after its release. Though Colbert did object to the scene where she shows off her leg to get a car to stop for them, that was a personal objection and not based on any official regulations. She agreed to do it after a body double (a chorus girl) was brought in.
There are a fair few enduring classics with a story like this, a film with absolutely no confidence from anyone involved that somehow caught lightning in a bottle.
From reception on wiki it sounds it was more of a mixed bag. Colbert did hate it. It doesn't say why. But reviews were moderate to positive.
That's fair. I mean, it did win five Oscars. I think it was more how rejected the script was before filming. And why did Colbert hate it so much...
It seems that lots of people in the movie hated the original script only. But Colbert herself said after the filming was done that she just made the worst movie of her career. But it doesn't say anything else in that context, so that's all we got I guess.
Best Picture Oscar Winner & 4 others.
Yes, and numerous rejections by actors before filming began. That's the part I'm interested in.
I think, 90 years from now, “Why did they hate…?” will be an all too common question about these times we live in. And the answer will be “Because they hated everything.”
Interesting. I really enjoyed it. it wasn't OVERLY special or anything, seemed like just a pretty run-of-the-mill romantic comedy to me, but very well executed with a charismatic lead
I dunno but I just tried to rewatch and couldn’t finish it. The infantilism of the Colbert character and Gable’s smug arrogance just doesn’t sit with me anymore. I couldn’t laugh at it.
I didn't hone in on the actors so much, but I remember watching it years ago and thinking it was an all-time classic comedy. I just rewatched it and I liked it, but nowhere near as much as before.
Gable was loaned out to Columbia from MGM where he was under contract and considered the "king" of that most-prestigious studio. Columbia at the time was considered second rate. Gable would be paid his usual salary from MGM and Columbia would pay MGM a premium for his services. Studios would make money loaning out their stars and the actors wouldn't see any of it. No wonder Gable was pissed off.
Colbert on the other hand was under contract at Paramount but was allowed to make "outside" films if her schedule allowed. It did this time and Columbia paid her twice what she was making per picture at Paramount.