Let Yourself Go ... To Old Hollywood

Making sense of the Lupino-Bogart feud

The 1941 Warner Brothers film High Sierra was a landmark in the careers of its stars, Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart—marking a transition from years of frustration to full-fledged stardom for both. High Sierra provided the first starring role for Bogart in a prestige project, and it was Lupino's first lead after her attention-getting supporting performance in They Drive By Night. Various sources relate different stories of the working relationship of the two new stars during this classic movie's production. Depending on what you read, you can get the impression that the two were close to lovers or that they throughly detested each other.

The feud stories were predominant in the period right before and after the film was released. For instance, shortly before the opening, an item in a nationally-syndicated gossip column claimed that Bogart and Lupino never spoke on set except in their scenes together. Several months later, a preeminent movie magazine headlined the Lupino-Bogart relationship in an article titled "Who Hates Whom in Hollywood"—saying "The Lupino-Bogart feud is one of Hollywood's liveliest."

Modern sources, however, frequently discount any feud based on observations from others working on the set. Film historian Eddie Muller claimed in a 2019 segment on TCM that the rumors Lupino and Bogart did not get along during High Sierra were "nonsense". The thoroughly-researched biography of Bogart by Ann Sperber and Eric Lax reports that "no one connected with High Sierra saw anything to suggest animosity between Bogart and Lupino; all the evidence is to the contrary."

Irving Rapper, dialogue director on High Sierra, provided key evidence used by Sperber-Lax and others to counteract the alleged feud. In a later interview, Rapper stated that "Bogie was crazy about Ida", and that "Ida was in love with [Bogart]". Lupino's and Bogart's respective spouses, actor Louis Hayward and actress Mayo Methot, visited the set frequently, and according to Rapper, "[Lupino] was evidently too charming. Mayo Methot was jealous."

Lupino was always effusive in her remembrances of Bogart, who died in 1957. For instance, she contributed an endearing tribute, including a story from their work together on High Sierra, as part of the 1967 television documentary Bogart. Lupino said:

I find it very hard to cry in front of a whole crew. Especially when they'd say, 'Quiet, everybody, quiet!' I'd freeze up. I couldn't do anything.

So, Bogey sensed this. This was the side of this man—this tough guy—that, you know, his friends knew. But I didn't know.

He took me to one side and looked at our director, Raoul Walsh, and gave him a sign, and he said, 'Listen, doll. If you can't cry, just remember one thing—I'm going to take the picture away from you.' Oh, I started to laugh. And I said, 'Now listen, Bogey, I can't cry. Don't break me up.' He said, 'All right, you're relaxed.' And I said, 'Yes, I am, but now I can't cry.' He said, 'All right, next step. Come on.' He walked me further away.

And he said, 'Just try to think of one thing. If you can't relate it to me or the character—my character, right now—go back to your childhood. Can you remember when you had to say goodbye to somebody—somebody you loved—and you thought you weren't going to see them again?' And I said, 'yes'.

And he said, 'Well think of that, baby, that of it!'

And there were tears in his eyes. And before I knew it, I was crying!

In a separate interview, Lupino said about Bogart that "It didn't turn out for us to be lovers. But we did care about each other. Being with him was absolutely heaven, and I guess he didn't think I was too bad."

In contrast to the claim in Sperber-Lax that "all the evidence [about a feud] is to the contrary", several notable pieces suggest the animosity rumors had some truth. First, shortly after the filming of High Sierra, Bogart repeatedly expressed the belief that Lupino had used her influence to prevent him from being cast with her again in Out of the Fog. Second, Sperber-Lax recount an interview Bogart gave three years later where he "allegedly acknowledged giving Lupino quite a verbal battering" during High Sierra.

Finally, a smoking gun came five years after the events. In 1945, Lupino herself wrote that she and Bogart did not speak for two years after High Sierra. This confession came in an article published in the November 1945 issue of Screenland magazine titled The Truth About Myself, by Ida Lupino. In the article, Lupino debunks numerous inaccuracies that had been related about her over the years. But with the High Sierra stories, she does the opposite:

According to gossip, I have been involved in more feuds than any other Hollywood actress. Actually, I have had only one real feud.

There are three kinds of Hollywood feuds—the real kind, the publicity type which is used to promote a picture, and the kind which isn't a feud at all but is just a slight misunderstanding which is blown up out of all proportion.

I once had a real feud with Humphrey Bogart, when we were working on 'High Sierra'. I have a way of kidding with a straight face; so has Bogey. Neither of us recognized the trait in the other. Each of us thought the other was being nasty, and we were both offended. For a long time we would pass each other with our noses up in the air. For two years we didn't speak. Then one day I was working on a picture with Paul Henreid and we went over to the set where Bogey was working to wish his director, Curtis Bernhardt, good luck on his new picture. Bogey had to look right at me and I at him. We both began to laugh—and that broke the ice. Now we are very good friends.

Seeing the contrasting stories from different sources over the years, I found it interesting to investigate how the Lupino-Bogart relationship was described in the press in real time.

High Sierra production

Ida Lupino was cast as a lead in High Sierra in early July, 1940. This came shortly after her excellent performance in They Drive By Night, her first film at Warner Brothers and the role that propelled her to major stardom. Paul Muni was slated for the male lead in High Sierra at the time. Within a week, though, Muni and Warner Brothers had broken up. The studio needed a new star—and Humphrey Bogart, who had been campaigning for the role, was the logical choice.

Lupino and Bogart had first met during the filming of They Drive By Night a couple months earlier. But they did not share many scenes together. So, according to Lupino, she "didn't get to know [Bogart] at the time."

Production on High Sierra began on August 5. The crew, led by director Raoul Walsh, initially travelled to the Arrowhead Springs resort in the mountains outside Los Angeles. Two weeks later they returned to Hollywood for studio setups. In mid-September, the company went on another location trip—this time to Lone Pine and the Sierra Nevada mountains. On September 19, they all returned to Hollywood, wrapping filming a week later.

In the initial press reports, there is no evidence of any problems between the film's two stars. A reporter for Photoplay magazine visited the set and found "real excitement":

Here was the picture Paul Muni dropped his Warners contract rather than make. Here was Bogey, as all Hollywood calls him, getting his first real starring role. And here was Miss Lupino, "the new sensation", as they told us, forgetting all about Ida's seven discouraging years already spent in flicker town.

In an August 28 column, Sheilah Graham related that while she was interviewing Ida Lupino on set, "Humphrey Bogart joins us. He is smiling and happy." The two stars good-naturedly discussed the film together. Ironically, in this interview, Lupino was compelled to deny rumors that she and Ann Sheridan were feuding after their work in They Drive By Night: "It's utter nonsense. Ann Sheridan and I have been friends ever since she came here seven years ago. Ann's first picture was with me. We lived together for a year. I don't blame her for not liking her part in 'They Drive By Night,' but she's too real a person to let it upset our friendship."

One alleged feud was shot down; but another soon was born. The next day Jimmie Fidler wrote that Lupino and Bogart "are stepping on each other's toes". He included no details. This is the only published indication of any discord between Lupino and Bogart that I have been able to find that was reported during production.

A couple weeks later, during the Lone Pine location shoot in mid-September, something more significant may have happened to affect Lupino and Bogart's relationship. On September 29, a few days after filming completed, Louella Parsons wrote:

I'm surprised to hear that there was plenty of temperament on the location of 'High Sierra', with most of the flare-ups between Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart. Ida is such a level-headed little person and I've known Humphrey so long it is difficult to believe they had trouble to the point of the little Lupino threatening to walk out. It's true that big success has come to both of them suddenly with the past year—but they're both real troupers who have never begrudged honors before. Well, location trips are tough on everybody's nerves so maybe that was the reason.

A few months later, Dorothy Kilgallen wrote that the "tiff" between Bogart and Lupino had started when the two and their spouses "shared a cottage... and stopped talking!"

Speculating on what may have precipitated a conflict, the Sperber-Lax book points out that, on September 18—the day before the company left Lone Pine—Warner Brothers executive producer Hal Wallis had decided to give Lupino top billing over Bogart. The next two days, studio records list Lupino as unable to work due to a rash or illness. Sperber-Lax then write:

In the absence of records no one knows whether Bogart took out his disappointment on Lupino or even if they had a direct confrontation. He knew well enough that she had nothing to do with the decision, and she later insisted that "he never said a word about" the [billing] change.

Sperber-Lax also report that Lupino thought Bogart was unhappy "toward the finish".

Some in the press tried to discount the discord rumors, even at the time. A photo taken in August at Arrowhead Springs resort, in the early stages of filming, was captioned in Screenland magazine's December 1940 issue: "This pleasant picture of Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart, left, with Irving Rapper, dialogue director, while on location for 'High Sierra', makes us doubt the rumors that Ida and Bogey were tiffing because one was trying to steal scenes from the other."

Immediately after High Sierra

Whatever friction between Lupino and Bogart that developed on the set of High Sierra had fallout a few months later with the casting of Out of the Fog (which had the working title of The Gentle People).

Warners, sensing they had a hit on their hands with High Sierra, considered re-teaming its two stars. In the last few weeks of 1940, while Lupino was working on The Sea Wolf with Edward G. Robinson and John Garfield, press items appeared suggesting that she and Bogart would do a picture titled Highway 99; other items paired them in The Gentle People. In December, Bogart was sent east to do a personal appearance tour with his wife in preparation for the opening of High Sierra a month later.

Bogart had not been notified of any new role. While on his New York trip, he sent a cable to Warners producer Henry Blanke asking if the "rumor" about The Gentle People was true, adding that it "seems like a good idea". Apparently the casting rumor was not true—at least not yet. James Cagney and George Raft were the studio's top choices, though both soon turned it down. Bogart continued his campaign for the role.

With advance publicity for the late January opening of High Sierra kicking into gear, new press items relating to the rumored Bogart-Lupino discord appeared. On December 27, Jimmie Fidler wrote that Bogart, in his appearances in New York, "could hold audiences spellbound with reports of how 'beautifully' he and Ida Lupino got along during the filming of that picture."

Then on December 31, Paul Harrison published this sensationalized item: "Except on one occasion—when she told him plenty—Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart spoke to each other only in the dialog on 'High Sierra'."

After all the other stories from the set of High Sierra, this—coming several months after filming completed—is not believable. It is perhaps a press agent's idea of how to get attention for the new movie by building on the earlier rumors. This item was re-printed numerous times in the lead up to the movie's opening a few weeks later.

Casting controversy

The Gentle People, released under the title Out of the Fog, was a high-profile Warner Brothers production based on a play by Irwin Shaw. Lupino was considered for a leading role as early as December, while, as we saw, Bogart was rumored for the male lead—an unsympathetic racketeer named Goff.

While Cagney and Raft had turned the Goff role down, Bogart was eager for it; and so was fellow Warner contractee John Garfield. In the latter half of January, while Bogart was pushing for a meeting with Jack Warner to discuss the role, several Hollywood columnists were printing that Lupino's husband, Louis Hayward, was a candidate as well—despite Hayward's not having a contract with Warners. One columnist even claimed that Hayward was being tested and that Lupino did the test with him. (Lupino and Hayward were definitely trying to find a vehicle to work together in at the time. Very soon, the couple would be cast together in Ladies in Retirement at Columbia, which was filmed in the early summer of 1941.)

As of January 31, 1941, internal Warners documents had Bogart penciled in for the Goff role in The Gentle People. But in the press and in the internal memos of the Warner executives, John Garfield had emerged as the most likely candidate. Sheilah Graham wrote that Garfield "probably" had the role; while behind the scenes, producer Blanke told Jack Warner that casting Garfield would eliminate "the problem of convincing Lupino to play with Bogart". On February 4, Jack Warner cabled executive producer Hal Wallis that "Lupino refuses to play in picture with Bogart." On February 7, Garfield's casting as Goff became official. Bogart was soon assigned to Manpower with Marlene Dietrich and George Raft.

The internal Warners documents claiming Lupino did not want to work with Bogart were devoid of the usual detail, according to Sperber-Lax. They suggest that it is possible "the studio invented the slight as a means of not casting Bogart and shifting the onus onto Lupino". Lupino's memories support this interpretation. In an interview decades later, she vociferously denied that she refused to work with Bogart in Out of the Fog, saying, "Warners was absolutely lying, completely untrue, completely untrue." [Ida Lupino: Beyond the Camera]. At the time, though, Bogart believed that Lupino had pushed him out of the film.

Suspension

Bogart's unhappiness with losing the Goff role was compounded when George Raft asked for him to be removed from Manpower. As Bogart saw it, Ida Lupino and George Raft were casting movies at Warners now—at his expense. On top of that, he strongly disliked the next script Warners gave him—Bad Men of Missouri. In early April, he refused that role and the studio suspended him.

During the suspension, Bogart's displeasure made the papers. On April 13, Whitney Bolton, presenting himself as a personal friend of Bogart's, wrote an opinion column in the Philadelphia Inquirer describing hostility between Lupino and Bogart during High Sierra—"icy goings-on"—although "they never actually had words". Then he repeats the story that Lupino did not wish to work with Bogart again and lambasts her repeatedly (and Raft as well). A sample: "The best that can be deduced from all those triple plays is that Miss Lupino and Raft skitter away from having an actor in their pictures. It would be possible for Bogart to get in there and pitch and steal 'Gentle People' from Lupino. It would be even less trouble for him to steal it from George."

This is a long, mean-spirited essay and hard to take literally—though coming from a self-identified friend of Bogart, it is evidence of significant bad feelings. Since this made it into print, what kind of talk was going on in private? The two years that Lupino mentioned of her and Bogart not speaking become understandable.

Epilogue

A month or so later, Bogart's professional situation turned around drastically when Warners put him back on the payroll and cast him as the lead in The Maltese Falcon. On the set of that legendary film in June, Bogart repeated the idea that Lupino had kept him out of the earlier film: "I was up for the John Garfield part in 'Out of the Fog', but Ida Lupino didn't want me." The bad feelings remained.

Within a few years of High Sierra, as Lupino recounted in her 1945 article, she and Bogart had transformed from cool antagonists into solid friends. An example comes from late 1944: Hedda Hopper tells of Bogart, with Lauren Bacall accompanying him during the early stages of their highly-publicized romance, taking time off from The Big Sleep to visit Ida Lupino on the set of Pillow to Post. Numerous other anecdotes in various publications show Lupino and Bogart socializing during the mid and late 1940s. And, of course, Lupino's own words in 1945 relate that they were "very good friends". Finally, there are Lupino's remembrances of Bogart many years later:

"When he liked you and he believed in you, he was the most loyal, wonderful guy in the whole wide world."

Sources

• Bogart by A. M. Sperber and Eric Lax, HarperCollins Publishers, 1997
• Bogart, television movie, directed by Marshall Flaum, 1967
• Newspapers.com archives for United States newspapers
• Media History Digital Library archives of Hollywood fan magazines and trade papers
• Ida Lupino: Beyond the Camera by Mary Ann Anderson, BearManor Media, 2018
• Ida Lupino: A Biography by William Donati, University Press of Kentucky, 2000
• Noir Alley, outro to High Sierra by Eddie Muller, Turner Classic Movies, March 17, 2019
• He Ran All the Way: The Life of John Garfield by John Nott, Limelight Editions, 2003

Notes

All information derived from internal Warner Brothers documents comes from the research presented in the Sperber-Lax biography of Bogart.

Assembling the cast of the noir classic Road House (1948)

The film noir classic Road House (1948) contains one of Ida Lupino's most compelling performances in a career full of them. It was made at a crossroads of her life and career, when she was in the middle of an extended transition from leading actress to being a writer, producer, and director.

As part of the larger story of the making of this film, here is the story of how its cast was assembled. This tale brings together a number of interesting personalities in post-war Hollywood, several of whom were also at critical points in their respective careers.

Originator: Ida Lupino

In September, 1947, Ida Lupino herself initiated the project that became Road House. Early that year, Lupino had finished her long-term contract at Warner Brothers. Seeking creative control over her acting career, she rejected a new exclusive contract and instead chose to become an independent producer. In February, she formed Arcadia Productions with producer Benedict Bogeaus and took on the job of producer of her own movies, with an ambition to produce others as well. By late summer, however, she had nothing to show for her hard work. (See this earlier article for more on this episode in Lupino's career.)

Meanwhile, amongst the many scripts, stories, and books she had been poring over in search of good material, Lupino found a story called The Dark Love, by Margaret Gruen and Oscar Saul. She decided that this story should be her next project. At this time, prominent Hollywood agent Charles Feldman was attempting to win her services, and he and Ida worked out a deal where they purchased the story rights for $20,000 and then sold them to 20th Century-Fox with the condition that Lupino play the lead. Her salary would be $95,000, plus $15,000 profit on the story sale. Feldman waived his commissions and Lupino joined his agency.

Interestingly, this story deal happened at virtually the same time that Lupino dissolved Arcadia Productions. The first mention of Lupino's interest in Dark Love in the Hollywood press was on September 2, 1947 in a Hedda Hopper column. The very next day Sheilah Graham carried an item that "Ida Lupino and Benedict Bogeaus have called off their picture deal. They couldn't get together on story or price." Ten days after that, Louella Parsons broke the news that Lupino would be doing The Dark Love—already retitled Road House—at 20th Century-Fox.

Could the Lupino-Bogeaus breakup have been precipitated by The Dark Love? Why did Lupino not attempt to produce The Dark Love herself via Arcadia Productions as she had tried with other material? Here are some considerations: first, after seven months of unsuccessful attempts at producing other pictures, she was frustrated with that role; second, Feldman's deal was very lucrative for her and also provided her choice of story; third, she had a contractual obligation to 20th Century-Fox for one picture—an obligation that had been outstanding for several years.

So Lupino gave up her independent production efforts—temporarily, it turned out—and returned to acting at one of the large Hollywood studios. The fact that she had selected the story, though, was a major difference from her earlier career, when she was a contract player with little to no say in the material she was given.

Co-star Victor Mature?

The initial press reports for Road House in September mentioned Victor Mature as Lupino's leading man. Mature, a star at 20th Century-Fox for several years but long derided as an actor, was riding a wave of good notices for his performance in Kiss of Death—released the previous month. As Louella Parsons wrote in her item announcing the Road House role for Lupino, "I used to feel I could take or leave [Victor Mature] as an actor, but now I do not want to leave him, because he is that good." In mid-October, Hedda Hopper wrote that Mature was the "hottest star in town".

Road House was originally slated to begin production in November. It would not actually start until late the next March. Press reports are not explicit about the reasons for the delays, but it is likely that finding a director and casting the two leading male roles contributed. Four directors turned down the project, according to William Donati in his Lupino biography. And while Lee J. Cobb was the initial name tossed around for the "heavy" role, according to film historian Eddie Muller in the 2008 DVD commentary, 20th Century-Fox studio chief Darryl Zanuck wanted hot newcomer Richard Widmark. Waiting for him to be available may thus have been another reason.

Victor Mature was still being mentioned in the press as Lupino's leading man as late as November 24. But that same month, other reports suggested that The Chair for Martin Rome (later released as Cry of the City) would be Mature's next film. Indeed, that film started production in late December and Mature was in the starring role. The identity of Lupino's co-star for Road House was still up in the air.

Lupino did not let the delays stop her from preparing. In late December, Sheilah Graham wrote that "most of the story takes place in a bowling alley. And that's where you'll find Ida these days and evenings—learning to bowl."

Academy-award candidate Celeste Holm

The next casting news did not come until January 26, 1948, when the press reported that Celeste Holm had "an important role in Road House". Holm was an ex-Broadway actor, most notable for originating the role of Ado Annie in the 1943 stage hit Oklahoma. In 1946, she signed a contract with 20th Century-Fox and did a couple roles in relatively unnoticed musical films. By early 1948, however, she was receiving spectacular notices for her first dramatic role, in Gentleman's Agreement—including Academy Award talk as supporting actress. That film had been released just two months earlier in New York and Chicago and was still not released nationally.

Director Jean Negulesco

A director for Road House was finally found two weeks later. On February 11, Edwin Schallert of the Los Angeles Times reported that 20th Century-Fox had signed Jean Negulesco to helm the movie. Negulesco was coming off eight years at Warner Brothers—most recently directing Johnny Belinda. During production of that film, Jack Warner became annoyed that Negulesco was taking too many pictorial shots. Hedda Hopper described the aftermath in her January 29 column: "Jean Negulesco brought in Johnny Belinda for $1,300,000—nearly $250,000 under budget. Then 10 days before Christmas, has was laid off by Warners and hasn't worked since. If that's gratitude, we should find a new meaning for the word. I'm told by those who have seen it that Belinda is one of the most sensitive, beautiful and artistic pictures ever made."

Negulesco recalled, "After Warner gave me the sack, I was very sad and I thought of going back to painting and quit making films." Zanuck and 20th Century-Fox snapped up Negulesco in February and paid him $3000 a week, three times his previous salary. Negulesco told Hopper, "At the first producers' meeting, I thought I was being kidded when asked [by Zanuck], 'What can I do to make you happy? Just name it.'"

Lupino was no doubt pleased that Negulesco was on board. Her last film, Deep Valley, completed over a year earlier at Warner Brothers, was also directed by Negulesco. During that film, she was extremely happy working with Negulesco and his crew. She was reported saying that she wanted him to direct her next picture. She also stated that she would stay at Warners if they allowed her to choose her own directors. Her demands weren't met by Warners, yet Negulesco was indeed directing Lupino's next film—at 20th Century-Fox. Could Lupino have pulled strings with Zanuck behind the scenes? Interestingly, Negulesco recalls that Zanuck told him at their first meeting, "I've watched a film of yours that I liked a lot: Deep Valley."

Richard Widmark, aka 'Tommy Udo'

In late February, the two male leads were finalized, clearing the way for production to start within a few weeks. Hedda Hopper reported that Cornel Wilde and Richard Widmark would fill those roles.

Richard Widmark entered Road House on a career trajectory similar to Celeste Holm. He, too, was ex-Broadway actor and newcomer to Hollywood who was receiving huge plaudits for his most recently released film. Unlike Holm, Widmark's breakout had come in his very first film, Kiss of Death—the same film that raised Victor Mature's acting reputation in the late summer of 1947—where Widmark played the maniacal Tommy Udo, a character infamous for pushing a woman in a wheelchair down a flight of stairs.

Widmark was currently finishing up The Street With No Name as another murderer. In January, he had told Hedda Hopper, "This will be my last [such role]. I didn't come into pictures to be typed as a killer; I'm an actor—I hope." His transition away from psychopaths would take a bit longer, however, as his role in Road House would be similar.

Leading man Cornel Wilde

Cornel Wilde, Lupino's new leading man in Road House, was one of 20th Century-Fox's top stars of the previous few years. He had already been in two films with Lupino—both before he hit the big time. In High Sierra (1941) he had a small role, while in Life Begins at Eight-Thirty (1942), he had been Lupino's love interest, with the top male role filled by Monty Woolley.

Wilde's breakthrough came in 1945 with the role of Frederic Chopin in the biopic A Song to Remember, for which he earned an Academy Award nomination as best actor. His most recent project had been The Walls of Jericho at 20th Century-Fox, with Linda Darnell, Anne Baxter and Kirk Douglas. After that completed, he spent a lot of his energy—unsuccessfully—trying to find a suitable Broadway play for him and his wife Patricia Knight.

The marriage of Wilde and Knight was on the volatile side, apparently, and attracted a lot of attention by the Hollywood press. The previous summer, Edwin Schallert of the Los Angeles Times, discussing a temporary break up, wrote that their relationship was "considered one of the most celebrated of love idylls In Hollywood history". Wilde had also gotten a reputation related to his attempted promotion of his wife's career. In November 1947, Louella Parsons wrote that Humphrey Bogart "doesn't want to be another Cornel Wilde and get himself disliked at the studio or criticized in the press because he keeps asking for his bride as his movie partner." Parsons reassured Bogart, "I don't think your case and the Cornel Wilde case are in the least comparable. Betty [Bogart's wife Lauren Bacall] has already made a success and I never heard of your trying to push her."

A glittering cast

So by late February, 1948, the Road House lineup was full of celebrated stars. Darryl Zanuck was clearly not holding back. With top-billed Ida Lupino was one of 20th Century-Fox's top male box office stars and two of the hottest new supporting players. Director Negulesco said of Road House: "It's the finest cast I've ever had."

As the cast was finalized, Widmark and Holm both received Academy Award nominations for their supporting roles in their most recent films: Kiss of Death and Gentleman's Agreement, respectively. Director Negulesco also had just had a breakout, award-nominated performance of his own— Johnny Belinda—though the full impact of that awaited its release later in 1948. He would receive an Academy Award nomination for best director the next year.

On March 10, The Hollywood Foreign Press Association gave their Golden Globe award for best supporting actress to Celeste Holm and their award for best male newcomer to Richard Widmark. Then, on March 20—two days before Road House started production—Holm won the Academy Award, while Widmark lost out to Edmund Gwenn for Miracle on 34th Street. Road House was starting on a high note for its supporting cast.

Stay tuned for the next edition, which will cover the making of the film and its aftermath for Lupino, Wilde, Widmark, Holm, and Negulesco.

. . .

Further watching

• Watch the full movie Road House here
• Better yet, buy the great Kino Lorber blu-ray

Sources

• Newspapers.com archives for United States newspapers
• Media History Digital Library archives of Hollywood fan magazines and trade papers
• Ida Lupino: A Biography by William Donati, University Press of Kentucky, 2000
• Jean Negulesco: The Life and Films by Michelangelo Capua, McFarland & Company, Inc., 2017

The Making of Moontide — a Noir Fairy Tale

The movie Moontide (1942) made a big impact on me when I first saw it nearly four years ago, as one of the earliest of Ida Lupino's films that I watched. What hit me were its touching romance, its wonderful performances, and its unique and memorable atmospherics—claustrophobic and dark despite its mostly outdoors seaside setting.

Moontide is the tale of the relationship between a drifter and the troubled woman he rescues from an attempted suicide, and the complications due to the jealousy of one of the drifter's companions.

The film was described as a "noir fairy tale" in the 2008 mini-documentary on the making of the film—a phrase which I find to be a concise and accurate description.

What follows is the story behind the making of this memorable film. It is based on what I have learned via press reports in newspapers, trade papers, and fan magazines from the time of the film's production—with occasional contributions from later sources. I would love to be able to explore documents contained in the 20th Century-Fox archives, but alas, that remains a task for some indeterminate future. Meanwhile, the mini-documentary, Turning the Tide: The Ill-Starred Making of Moontide, provides a window to some internal studio discussions.

The story is particularly compelling because the stars of Moontide, Jean Gabin and Ida Lupino, are both fascinating people who were at critical moments in their respective careers. And, among other things, production of the film coincided with the entry of the United States into World War 2.

Origins

The story of Moontide begins with the prolific character actor Willard Robertson, who had been a lawyer and playwright earlier in his career. Robertson wrote the novel, titled Moon Tide, while working on location on the set of the 20th Century-Fox epic Brigham Young. This was Robertson's first novel, yet upon its publication in the summer of 1940, it immediately attracted the attention of Hollywood studios. 20th Century-Fox soon purchased the rights for $30,000. (See this earlier essay for more on Robertson and his novel.)

Enter Jean Gabin

In April, 1941, Fox production chief Darryl Zanuck decided that story of Moon Tide would be ideal as the first Hollywood vehicle for the French star Jean Gabin.

Gabin had just arrived in Hollywood after several years of resisting overtures from American movie producers. At the time of those earlier refusals, Gabin had said, "I am happy in France. My friends and my people live here. Money is unimportant." But he changed his mind about working in Hollywood after the Nazi take-over of France.

A year before the Moon Tide announcement, Gabin was still in France, on a leave from the French navy, when the German invasion cut him off from his ship. He fled from his home outside Paris towards the south of France, literally a few minutes ahead of the invading forces—in a harrowing three-week journey along roads congested with refugees. By the time he arrived at the port of Toulon for his next Navy assignment, the French had signed an armistice and he was demobilized.

Before long, German officials approached Gabin and offered him the choice of putting his celebrity to use in making Nazi propaganda films or else risking confinement in a concentration camp. He decided this was the time to seek work in Hollywood. He contacted a producer friend, Andre Devan, who had moved to the American film capital before the war and now worked at 20th Century-Fox, for help arranging visas and transportation to the United States. Devan went to Darryl Zanuck, who jumped at the chance to sign the French star.

Gabin's signing by 20th Century-Fox was reported by Louella Parsons in late January 1941. Gabin traveled to Lisbon and sailed for the U.S. in late February. He arrived in New York City aboard the Exeter in early March, after what he described as "the worst trip I ever had in my life." Amongst the few possessions he had with him were his favorite bicycle and his accordion. He did not speak any English.

The press quoted him saying regarding the feelings of his fellow Frenchmen about the war:

Those who are pro-British say every night in their prayers, Please God let the gallant British win quickly. Those who are anti-British say Please God let the dirty British win right away.

Gabin's arrival in New York City was one day too late for him to attend the U.S. opening of his 1937 hit Pepe le Moko. (That French-made film had been re-made in Hollywood in 1938 as Algiers, starring Charles Boyer. To avoid competition, the original had been withheld from the American market for several years.)

After a week, Gabin left by train for California. He arrived on March 17, ill from a combination of flu and nerves. 20th Century-Fox took him to the desert in Palm Springs to allow him to recuperate for a couple weeks. The studio's plans were to give Gabin six months to learn English before they would expect him to start on any movies.

Gabin reported to the studio in early April and talked to the Hollywood press for the first time, using Andre Devan as a translator. A week later, Zanuck, with Gabin's approval, selected Robertson's novel Moon Tide for the actor's screen debut in America. Zanuck assigned Mark Hellinger as producer and John O'Hara to write the screenplay. A week later, Ida Lupino—a favorite of Hellinger's, who had worked with her on two films the previous year at Warner Bros.—was reported to be Gabin's co-star. (For more on the casting of Lupino's role in Moontide, see this earlier essay.)

Gabin was a big hit with the Hollywood press corps. "The man of the hour right now in Hollywood is Jean Gabin," wrote Dorothy Manners in early May. The gossip columnists noted that Marlene Dietrich had quickly become his primary public companion, though Ginger Rogers intruded occasionally. (Gabin was in a long-term separation from his wife in France, though the press often portrayed him as single.) The press frequently described Gabin as "the French Spencer Tracy". This moniker did not please Gabin, but he soon met with Tracy himself and the two became friendly.

By late May, some press reports suggested that 20th Century-Fox was considering putting Gabin into a different movie for his American debut—Swamp Water, to be directed by fellow French expatriate Jean Renoir. These notions were put to rest publicly by mid-June and Moontide was again the target for Gabin's first Hollywood production.

During these early months in Hollywood from the spring to the fall of 1941, Gabin learned English via his studio-assigned tutor, with significant assistance from Marlene Dietrich, and from studying the films of Clark Gable. He felt that to be effective he must be able think in English. Gabin was displeased with the initial script, and Nunnally Johnson was brought in to re-write it.

Ida Lupino: "The most sought after young actress in Hollywood"

For Ida Lupino, the months between her casting in late April and the eventual start of filming in November were eventful. As of April, 23-year-old Lupino was on a nearly year-long run of successful films at Warner Bros. since her career-making turn in They Drive By Night. She had done co-starring roles in High Sierra and The Sea Wolf, and was at that time wrapping up another one in Out of the Fog.

Lupino had the career foresight to avoid signing an exclusive contract with Warners when she hit it big there. Her next project was a starring vehicle at Columbia for her and her husband Louis Hayward—the thriller Ladies in Retirement. She had also signed a two-picture deal with 20th Century-Fox, of which Moontide was the first announced. In June, Warners started preparing their first starring vehicle for Lupino, The Hard Way, which initially was targeted to begin in September or October.

In July, Louella Parsons described Lupino as "the most sought after young actress in Hollywood". Parsons announced that 20th Century-Fox had another project for her, opposite Tyrone Power in Benjamin Blake (later renamed Son of Fury), a swashbuckling adventure film. This one fell through for Lupino, though—perhaps due to what happened next at Warner Bros.

Warners had additional plans for Lupino before The Hard Way. They wanted her to play a supporting role in Kings Row behind Ann Sheridan and Ronald Reagan. Lupino did not like the role or the billing. After heated discussions, she turned it down. Warners suspended her and assigned her the title role in Juke Girl. After more heated discussions, she also refused to do that one—and received another suspension in early October. (See this earlier essay for more on how these events almost cost her one of her iconic roles.)

Fortunately, within a few weeks, Warners and Lupino had patched up their differences. This likely smoothed the way for her to shift to 20th Century-Fox for Moontide before her scheduled return to Warners for The Hard Way.

On November 10, just a few days before she reported to Fox, Lupino co-presided at an event she had helped organize—to raise funds to help several dozen refugee European artists and scholars being held in Nazi concentration camps in occupied France to travel to the U.S. Columnist Cal York wrote in Photoplay, "Orson Welles and Ida Lupino presided and never has Cal heard more stirring speeches than the ones delivered by these two."

Production begins

Back in late September, on Nunnally Johnson's recommendation, Fox had hired famous surrealist artist Salvador Dali to construct a nightmare sequence for Moontide. The studio planned to evaluate the sketches Dali produced and then decide if it was feasible to reproduce them. In the end, the set carpenters were baffled by what Dali asked for and the nightmare sequence ended up being designed by others.

As November approached, 20th Century-Fox and Jean Gabin were ready to begin Moontide. Fritz Lang was assigned to direct. Thomas Mitchell was given the role of the jealous friend, while Claude Rains was cast as the "gentle philosopher". Gabin and Lang spent a day at the harbor at San Pedro gathering "color" for the film. For additional color, Lupino, in a story related by her biographer William Donati, took Gabin on a reconnaissance of the streets of skid row in central Los Angeles.

Lupino almost missed her first day of wardrobe tests at Fox in mid-November. When she didn't arrive on time, the studio called her house, and her house boy found Lupino unconscious in the bathroom, reportedly felled by ether fumes while cleaning her hair.

Shooting started the week of Thanksgiving, on Monday, November 24. The plot-line, as reported in the trade papers—involving a potential suicide by Gabin's character and the death of Lupino's character—was quite different from what emerged in the final product. That first week, Sen Young, a young Chinese actor playing the part of a Japanese fisherman, was quoted in the press discussing how the character he played was "unwholesome". He added, in apparent reference to the Japanese atrocities in China over the previous few years, "I think my countrymen will understand."

The large boxer dog that accompanies Gabin's drifter character Bobo for most of the film was discovered by Fritz Lang one day when he was taking a shortcut across a neighbor's yard and was chased by it. Lang decided the dog, named Officer Smith, was a good symbol of Bobo, so he cast the dog in the film.

Jean Gabin's acting style led to some complications with his male supporting cast in the early days of the production, as related by Whitney Bolton of the Philadelphia Inquirer:

This is Jean Gabin's first American picture and the French star is a noted under-player. He speaks quietly, slowly and in low tones. ... Thomas Mitchell, next in rank, came on the set for work and saw Gabin—and heard him. "He's playing it down," said Tommy. "I'll show them what playing down really is." And he started underplaying. Claude Rains came on the picture the third day, quickly saw what he was up against, and set out to teach two seasoned under-players how really to underplay.

After a few days of this underplaying contest, Zanuck saw the rushes and sent out a short note, concluding with "Get that dialogue up to where we can hear what they are saying."

Pearl Harbor attacked, Fritz Lang departs

Less than two weeks into production, the country was shaken by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The U.S. was now at war, and the entire west coast, was gripped by fear of Japanese air raids or even an invasion. Los Angeles harbor was suddenly off-limits to filming, which made it fortuitous that producer Hellinger had earlier had a bait barge set built on the Fox studio lot. This set would end up a large part of the unique atmospherics of Moontide.

War, and the potential of air raids or invasion, did not catch Ida Lupino unprepared. For the previous six months, she had been training and serving in the local chapter of the Women's Ambulance and Defense Corps. The training for the ambulance driving and dispatch duties had involved first aid, mechanics, and more. Lupino took her duties, including being on 24-hour call for emergencies, seriously and was commissioned a lieutenant shortly after the new year.

Around the time of Pearl Harbor, Fritz Lang was removed from the project and Archie Mayo took over the direction. Press reports initially suggested Lang and the studio differed over story development. A later column by Sheilah Graham suggested that Lang and Gabin had severe difficulties working together due to the language barrier. Gabin said, "When I started my first Hollywood picture, Moontide, I was nervous and couldn't understand a word anyone said." After Mayo took over, "suddenly I found I understood everything."

Story changes were indeed made to Moontide right after the Pearl Harbor attack. Fox chief Darryl Zanuck and Hellinger decided to make the ending more upbeat by not having Lupino's character die. Was this, on top of the language difficulties with the star, what led to Lang's leaving the film?

Assorted production notes

Despite the subtitle of Fox's mini-documentary on the 2008 DVD—"The Ill-Starred Making of Moontide"—subsequent proceedings on the set appear to have gone fairly smoothly.

Several press items cite that Ida Lupino's wardrobe for Moontide cost the meager total of $19.72. A column in Modern Screen magazine expanded on that, saying that "Ida admits depressing outfits have a bad effect on her—make her feel lowdown." So just before filming began, she bought a "luscious new wardrobe to help her shake her gloom after a day at the studio." But after the Pearl Harbor attack, she put her new clothes in a trunk and vowed to stick to her Women's Ambulance Corps uniform.

In mid-January, Thomas Mitchell was being affected by what he had to do for his first time playing a villain. After two days of filming a scene where he had to beat up Lupino and throw her into a tank of live bait, he was allegedly a "complete wreck". Interestingly, no such scene exists in the copy of the film available on DVD today—the beating is implied via editing. Was the brutal scene cut before or after the initial previews and why?

A few days later, Hedda Hopper reported that Lupino was "limping about with a gash on her leg caused by a fall off the moat on the set of Moontide". Can we presume this was not related to the beating scene?

Director Mayo adjusted his attitude to some repeated airborne frustrations while filming an outdoor scene, as reported by Paul Harrison:

Finally everything seemed to be straightened out for another try. Ida Lupino and Jean Gabin took their places. But as the scene began, Mayo spotted the approaching specks of a particularly big covey of Army planes. "Cut!" He screamed. "Here come some more Army bombers—"

But even as he yelled it, Mayo's expression changed and his rage subsided in a shrug. He grinned and added: ". . . thank God!"

On January 30, Ida Lupino filmed an exhausting scene where her character attempted to drown herself in the ocean—filmed in a pool on the lot. Oily scum, kelp, and other floating debris were added to the water to enhance the realism. As related by columnist Frederick Othman:

Inside, Miss Lupino was swimming and swimming and swimming. It was tough. Every time she was about to go under, something went wrong. An arc would burn out. The kelp would sink. The waves would be too high.

That worried Mayo, a kindly citizen. It pained him to see his leading lady shivering there between swims, and then to see her paddling down the middle of the pool. She already had a cold, and she was feeling badly. After nearly two hours of it, she was a weary lady. (The art of the motion picture sometimes is an exhausting one.)

Eleven a.m. came. The waves were exactly right. The arcs were primed. The seaweed was in the proper place. And there was Miss Lupino swimming wearily from her end of the pool toward the camera. She was using a kind of dog paddle, keeping her head high out of the scummy water.

"Get your hair wet, honey," called Mayo.

Miss Lupino tried, but she could not bring herself to go under—too tired, maybe, and too nervous. She got to the middle of the kelp and she almost passed out. "Archie," she called, "I'm all done in."

Two stalwarts in swimming trunks dived in and hauled her to shore. Mayo sent his assistant outside for a slug of brandy, strictly for medicinal purposes. The man brought back two glasses. One held the brandy, the other contained a water chaser. Miss Lupino gulped the brandy. Then she took the glass of water and poured it over her head.

Next she climbed into the ocean, paddled to the middle of it and sank. Perfectly. Everything exactly right, including wet hair.

This is another case where very little of this arduous scene appears to have made it into the final cut.

Gabin's brief shirtless scene early in the film was added at the insistence of his frequent companion Marlene Dietrich. She wanted to show off the muscles he had developed from bicycle rides around Beverly Hills.

Robin Coons related some good-natured ribbing while filming one day, as Gabin, with the dog beside him as usual, strode along the breakwater on the set. On the sidelines, Lupino watched him and said, "He's swell!" Mayo chimed in, "What a sweet guy! He's swell!" and other crew members then joined in a chorus of compliments.

Ida Lupino's friend Joan Fontaine was starring in This Above All on the Fox lot at the same time that Moontide was in production. One day, as Modern Screen reported, Lupino and Fontaine were having lunch in Fontaine's dressing room when Fontaine's co-star Tyrone Power asked to join them. The next day, Power brought Charles Boyer from the Tales of Manhattan set. As the days went by, more and more stars joined the group and it became known around the studio as the Fontaine salon.

During this period, Lupino and Fontaine wrote joint articles about each other and their friendship that were published in Hollywood magazine's June 1941 issue: "Loopy Lupino" by Joan Fontaine, and "Mad Pixie" by Ida Lupino. Amongst other interesting tidbits, Lupino wrote that they dropped into each others' dressing rooms daily, and one time they rhumbaed all through lunch before Archie Mayo came in saying, "Get some rest before I paddle you."

After production

As Moontide wrapped production in mid-February 1942, a new romance between Jean Gabin and Ginger Rogers was heating up in the press. The two had a few dates the previous spring when he was new arrival and knew little English. Then in January, he visited Ginger on the set of Fox's Tales of Manhattan. Now they were an item.

"When [Ginger] left by train for her Oregon ranch, it was Jean who had flowers wired to Ginger at every train stop!" reported the column May Mann's Going Hollywood. On February 17, Ginger arrived in New York on vacation and to attend the premiere of her film Roxie Hart. Jean Gabin arrived in New York the next day and was seen "here, there and everywhere" around town with her, according to Sheilah Graham. At the Roxie Hart premiere, they sat in the front row of the balcony and held hands. Gabin had his own press reception at the Waldorf-Astoria on February 20. Ginger was among those in attendance.

By mid-April, Fox had positive initial screenings of Moontide and had scheduled the official "world premiere" for April 29 at the Rivoli theater on Broadway. The studio launched a big advertising push almost exclusively focused on Jean Gabin and his sex appeal to women and his working-man appeal to men. They were clearly hoping that Gabin could be turned into an American star on the order of Clark Gable. The ads barely discussed the movie and only briefly mentioned Lupino and the top-notch supporting cast of Claude Rains and Thomas Mitchell. (See this earlier essay for some examples of Fox's "Gabbin' About Gabin" advertising campaign.)

A statement about why women were attracted to Gabin was reportedly told by Lupino to producer Hellinger—and fit right in to the marketing: "First, it's his boyishness. You want to mother him to help him along. And then you feel you never know when you're going to get a punch in the jaw."

Gabin travelled to New York City to attend the premiere. Marlene Dietrich accompanied him, as his brief attachment to Ginger Rogers had ended by April. The American Theater Wing War Service sponsored the event, with proceeds going to their war relief efforts such as the Stage Door Canteen.

The premiere was the first to be held on Broadway under new war-time "dim-out" regulations. The dim-out was an attempt to prevent skyglow from city lights that led to enemy submarines being able to spot silhouetted allied ships far out at sea. The customary spotlights and other brilliant displays were not turned on—the only lights on the outside of the theater were the marquee, and those were turned off at 10 pm. Famed opera singer and movie star Grace Moore opened the festivities by singing the national anthem. More than two hundred members of the Free French movement were in attendance and the theater was "virtually filled to capacity".

Reception

Reviews for Jean Gabin were almost uniformly positive. Lupino and the supporting cast were also very well-received. Reviews for the movie were frequently positive, but far more mixed. The mood, atmosphere, and romance that is so appealing to some, including me, was not universally so.

Film Daily wrote, "[Gabin] is a blessed relief from the pretty-boy type that has cluttered up American screens.Motion Picture Herald called him "enormously effective". Herbert Cohn of the Brooklyn Eagle said he is a "vastly appealing romantic actor". Walter Winchell wrote that Gabin "will be darling of the fan clubs when the femmes get over their gasps and organize".

Lupino was also singled out for her contribution. Showmens Trade Review said, "Ida Lupino achieves such a sensitive and deeply impressive performance of the outcast saved from self-destruction that one is easily tempted to single it out as the picture's finest." Wanda Hale of the New York Daily News wrote, "The role of the girl is in the hands of one of the best, Ida Lupino, who has been commanding lavish praise from critics since she gave up comedy for drama."

Overall, Motion Picture Herald said that "Moontide has the indelible touch of art, which assures its appeal to critics, but it also has the indelible touch of life, which insures a much wider audience." Photoplay magazine gave it their top rating of "outstanding" and placed Gabin and Lupino at the top of their list of "Best performances of the month".

Two prominent publications came down more harshly on the movie, however. Variety wrote that "as a box office and entertainment entry, the picture scores only moderately" and that "Gabin doesn't show the spark of Gable or Tracy". They did add that "Miss Lupino shows talent, freshness and perfect adaptability for her role." The New York Times, in the person of Bosley Crowther, described Moontide as a "ponderously moody film" and that "all of [the cast] need much more than a vague and irresolute script, much more than synthetic scenery and manufactured moods."

Moontide spent a bit over three weeks at the Rivoli, with what appears to have been relatively weak box office. It then opened across the country starting in late May. In some cities it did very well, but in others, not so much. Given the big marketing push 20th Century-Fox had put behind Gabin, this mixed box office showing must have been a disappointment.

Epilogue

After filming completed on Moontide, Ida Lupino went virtually immediately back to Warner Bros. to start on The Hard Way, which began in early March. 20th Century-Fox had designs for her as well, with a starring role in The Blind Man's House planned to start in April. (See this earlier essay for more on what happened to this project.)

Lupino became severely ill shortly after The Hard Way began and was unable to return to work until early June. Her next film for 20th Century-Fox, filmed in the late summer of 1942 after The Hard Way finally completed, ended up being the drama Life Begins at Eight-Thirty with Monty Woolley.

Gabin's plans at 20th Century-Fox were in flux. Shortly after the premiere of Moontide, he was quoted by Herbert Cohn of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle saying, "You know, I am a Westerns fan. I love them. Someday I want to make one like Hoot Gibson and Tom Mix. Maybe they will let me." That was not in the cards.

As of early in the production of Moontide, his next project was to be a former Tyrone Power swashbuckler Down to the Sea in Ships. As of the completion of Moontide, the plan was a project called The Night the World Shook, which Archie Mayo was assigned to direct thanks to his success working with Gabin. This project did not happen, though—nor did any other for Gabin at Fox over the next year. He spent a significant amount of time working at the Hollywood Canteen.

Gabin eventually bought out his Fox contract, made one more Hollywood movie at Universal—directed by fellow Frenchman Jean Renoir—then joined General Charles de Gaulle's Free French forces and was part of the division that liberated Paris in 1944. He eventually resumed his film career in France and became the legend that is known today.

"When will we have another like it?"

To close out the story of the making of Moontide, here is a quote from a theater exhibitor in Columbus, Kansas from the "What the Picture Did for Me" feature in Motion Picture Herald of November, 1942. It fits my own feelings well:

One of the finest entertainments we have played, which went straight to the hearts of all. Jean Gabin's acting marvelous, and this Lupino girl can act rings around many other stars. They're still talking about "Moontide" here and asking when we will have another like it.

Further reading and viewing

• Watch Moontide itself on YouTube! Or buy it on the 2008 Fox Film Noir DVD while it is still available

• "Turning the Tide: The Ill-Starred Making of Moontide", documentary, Fox Film Noir DVD of Moontide, 20th Century Fox, 2008

• "Ida Lupino: A Biography" by William Donati, University Press of Kentucky, 2000

Sources

• Newspapers.com archives for United States newspapers
• Media History Digital Library archives of Hollywood fan magazines and trade papers

Other articles on this blog referenced in this article

• The Making of Moontide: Origins
• Which actresses were considered for Jean Gabin's co-star in Moontide?
• How did Ida Lupino almost lose her first Warners starring vehicle to Bette Davis?
• Blind Man's House: an important picture that was never made
• Gabbin' About Gabin: Advertising Moontide

The Making of Moontide (1942): Origins

The movie Moontide (1942) was one of the earliest of Ida Lupino's films that I watched, nearly four years ago. I found it while looking to discover "noir" films, due to its presence in a DVD collection of 20th Century-Fox noir films.

Moontide may not be classic noir in its storyline, but it certainly has exceptional noir cinematography. It left a big impression on me—for its touching romance, its tremendous performances, and its unique and memorable atmospherics—dark and claustrophobic despite its mostly-outdoors setting on a foggy bait barge in Los Angeles harbor.

Moontide is also notable for being the first of only two American films made by the legendary French film star Jean Gabin.

This is part of a series of posts on the making of that film.

Origins: The novel

The story of Moontide begins with the prolific character actor Willard Robertson. Born in 1886, Robertson began his career as a lawyer, but with a strong interest in writing and acting that led him to switch careers. In the early 1920s, two of his plays were adapted into films. Around 1930, another writing gig brought him out to Hollywood, where, initially out of curiosity, he fell into character acting in small roles. By 1940, a reporter encapsulated Robertson's feelings as, "He has been typed so hard, there is not much pleasure in making pictures, and his only interests are boats, deep-sea fishing and books."

In the spring of 1940, Robertson was cast as a Mormon elder in the big budget 20th Century-Fox epic Brigham Young, starring Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell and Dean Jagger. The company spent many weeks on location in Utah, the Sierra-Nevada and other locales. Robertson said the only thing to do at nights was to play poker, and he did not like poker. So he retired to his cabin and wrote a novel—his first. That novel became Moon Tide, published in late August 1940, around the time that Brigham Young premiered.

The novel Moon Tide attracted a lot of attention before it was even published. In mid-August, Variety reported that "virtually all major film companies" were interested in the screen rights and that story editors compared the writing to that of John Steinbeck. Reviews of the book published over the next few months were almost uniformly positive. A reviewer in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat wrote, "It is a moving and ironic tale, told with tenderness and commendable restraint." The Chicago Tribune said that the novel "indicates definitely that writing is [Robertson's] natural field."

A few weeks after the novel's publication, Variety reported that the price for the screen rights had been placed at $25,000, and at some point over the next few months, 20th Century-Fox closed the deal for $30,000. (That is equivalent to well-over half a million dollars in 2020.) Robertson must have been thinking of a screen adaptation early on, as he later said that he had written in a good part for himself. That role, however, would eventually be played by Claude Rains.

After selling his novel, Robertson continued his character acting career. He also found the time to write at least two more novels—"South from Yesterday", published in 1943, and "Oasis", published in 1944. I don't believe either were adapted into films, though 20th Century-Fox appears to have been interested in the former in its early stages, according to a December 1941 item by Oakland Tribune columist Wood Soanes.

On April 5, 1948, Robertson died suddenly in Hollywood at the age of 62. One of his last of his 144 film credits was in the Warner Bros. drama "Deep Valley" (1947), starring Ida Lupino.

How did Ida Lupino almost lose her first Warners starring vehicle to Bette Davis?

The role of the viciously ambitious older sister in The Hard Way (1943) could be considered the pinnacle of Ida Lupino's career as a Hollywood movie star. It is the role for which she received her most prestigious award—Best Actress from the New York Film Critics Circle in 1943.

It is commonly cited that Lupino was given this role after Bette Davis had turned it down. The late film historian and television personality Robert Osborne quotes Davis later expressing regret for that decision: "How did I let that one get away?"

It turns out, though, that Warner Bros. intended The Hard Way to be an Ida Lupino vehicle virtually from the beginning. So how did Bette Davis have the chance to turn it down?

Let's follow the story.

At the time that The Hard Way surfaced as a project for Warner Bros. in mid-1941, Bette Davis was the top dramatic actress on the lot and amongst the most celebrated actresses in Hollywood. Meanwhile, Ida Lupino was a rapidly-rising dramatic star at the same studio, having made a splash a year earlier in a supporting role in They Drive By Night, and then continued her momentum with co-starring roles in High Sierra, The Sea Wolf, and Out of the Fog. Though Warners was her primary studio, Lupino had avoided signing an exclusive contract, and her next project was a starring vehicle—her first—at Columbia called Ladies in Retirement.

Warners had been building up Lupino as a star for nearly a year and was overdue to provide their own starring vehicle for her. According to the initial press reports, The Hard Way would serve that purpose. The Film Daily had an item on June 5, 1941:

Warner Bros. has signed Irwin Shaw, whose "Gentle People" Warners filmed under the title of "Out of the Fog," to prepare the scenario for the Ida Lupino vehicle, "The Hard Way".

The next day, Hollywood columnist Louella Parsons wrote:

These heartless, cruel girl roles cannot come too tough for Ida Lupino who doesn't even object to a nice murder now and then—on the screen I mean. So she's greatly intrigued over Jerry Wald's new story, "The Hard Way," which Hal Wallis selects for her as her next for Warners.

These were the first press reports concerning The Hard Way that I have found. Could Bette Davis have been offered the part before this? It is certainly possible, though the evidence, if any, is not public. But Davis was offered the role—publicly—a few months later.

How did Lupino almost lose her first Warners starring vehicle to Bette Davis?

Only July 1, a few weeks after the initial press reports on The Hard Way, and while Lupino was working at Columbia in the final stages of Ladies in Retirement, Warners assigned her to the supporting role of Cassie in King's Row. Lupino strongly resisted this assignment, suggesting, according to William Donati's biography of her, that the part was too small and the billing too low.

Warner Bros. had severe trouble finding another prominent actress willing to do the role of Cassie. By the end of August, with King's Row well into production, they again pressed Lupino to play Cassie. This time she turned down the role for good, was put on suspension, and left Hollywood for a vacation in New York. Louella Parsons reported that the studio ordered Lupino to report back to the lot at the end of the month for her next part as the title character in Juke Girl—"or else".

Clearly, the Warners-Lupino relationship was in the dumps after the King's Row dispute. On her New York City trip. Lupino talked to the press about how she loved the city, but would "probably" return to Hollywood because she was looking forward to doing Moontide at 20th Century-Fox with Jean Gabin. Left unsaid was that she was not pleased with the Juke Girl role Warners expected her to do, and that she and the studio executives were in another bitter dispute.

On September 18, Film Daily reported that "Warner Bros. would like to have Ginger Rogers for the lead in Irwin Shaw's The Hard Way". No other details were included. Was this for the younger sister role eventually played by Joan Leslie or Lupino's role as the older sister? In either case, The Hard Way would no longer have been an Ida Lupino vehicle.

The Warners-Lupino situation again blew up in the press two weeks later. On October 4, as Lupino was returning to Hollywood by train, Louella Parsons reported that Lupino had rejected Juke Girl and taken another suspension.

The same day, in what cannot be a coincidence, Film Bulletin wrote, "Formerly scheduled for Ida Lupino, The Hard Way has been tossed Bette Davis' way."

Warners was apparently so displeased with Lupino turning down two successive assignments, that they were playing hardball by taking away her first starring vehicle for them. According to the Donati bio, Warners also threatened to cancel Lupino's contact.

Ten days later, Louella Parsons wrote that the studio was trying to assemble a superstar cast of Davis, Ginger Rogers, and Cary Grant for the film, saying "it is more than wishful thinking", though salaries alone would make it extremely expensive. Wishful thinking it was, though. It must have been at this point that Bette Davis turned down The Hard Way.

After mid-October, press reports on The Hard Way go quiet. Donati wrote that the tension between Warners and Lupino eased when Warners allowed her to participate in a sequence of the ensemble film Forever and a Day at RKO. Her chapter of the film appears to have been filmed in early November. Shortly after this, she reported to 20th Century-Fox to begin work on Moontide opposite the French star Jean Gabin. Moontide would occupy her into February.

Meanwhile, Warner Bros. was moving ahead with The Hard Way, assigning Vincent Sherman as director and working on script revisions. By late November, Warners and Lupino were presumably back on good terms, as she was announced as the star in a new project, albeit one that never came to fruition.

Presumably it was at this time that Warner Bros. put Lupino back in The Hard Way. She was enthusiastic about the revised script she received in December.

And so, as Donati put it, her career crisis at Warner Bros. had ended. Just after the new year, the press was reporting that Warners would claim Lupino back for The Hard Way after Moontide completed. Indeed, she started on The Hard Way in early March 1942.

Of course, by that time, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor had happened and the United States was at war. Other crises were at hand.

What happened to Elinor Norton (1934)?

While browsing an old Hollywood fan magazine in this age of coronavirus quarantines and restricted travel, my eye caught a photograph of a spectacular mountain setting. This monochrome photograph showed a distant view of large mountains behind a lake. The foreground was framed by two massive tree trunks, with the small figure of a casually-dressed young woman leaning against one. A large caption in this December 1934 issue of Screenland said, "The Most Beautiful Still of the Month". A smaller caption revealed more: "Claire Trevor in 'Eleanor Norton'".

Claire Trevor—a known quantity for me—a star or top supporting actress of many well-known Hollywood films of the 1930s and 1940s, including John Ford's Stagecoach (1939) with John Wayne, Murder My Sweet (1944) opposite Dick Powell's hard-boiled detective Philip Marlowe, and John Huston's Key Largo (1948), with Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, and Edward G. Robinson.

Elinor Norton was another matter. This was a film I had never heard of—and from a portion of Claire Trevor's career I knew nothing about. Her career prior to her brief, Oscar-nominated, performance in William Wyler's Dead End (1937) was a black hole to me. I immediately decided to find out more about this movie.

This turned into quite a hunt, as Elinor Norton is clearly the most now-obscure movie I have ever looked into. Using my quick, informative, go-to references of old Hollywood fan magazines and U.S. newspaper archives (which include TV listings), I found no clear evidence that this movie has had showings since the 1930s. The only references in later decades I found were in nostalgia articles discussing the 1930s, or in listings of all of Claire Trevor's movies upon her death in 2000.

I am curious if anyone under the age of 90 has seen this movie.

The story of the film Elinor Norton starts with the 1933 best-selling novel The State vs. Elinor Norton, by Mary Roberts Rinehart. In contrast to the film, the novel is not obscure these days. It can be purchased as an e-book at popular web sites, plus it has been re-published as a paperback as recently as 2001.

Fox Film Corporation promptly purchased the rights to Rinehart's successful book. This was Fox prior to the momentous merger with 20th Century studios—which happened the next year—creating 20th Century-Fox. Fox was still one of the major Hollywood studios of the era, but financially troubled. A substantial fraction of pre-merger Fox films are obscure these days as they have not been in wide distribution for decades. A devastating film vault fire in New Jersey in 1937 destroyed a large cache of early Fox film prints—particularly devastating for their old silent films. For a number of pre-merger Fox films that still exist, the best recent opportunities to see them have been at screenings at New York City's Museum of Modern Art.

As of May 1934, Fox was planning for established star Helen Twelvetrees to play the principal role in the film that was then titled the same as the novel, The State vs. Elinor Norton. Hamilton MacFadden was assigned to direct. The film would start after MacFadden and Twelvetrees finished She Was a Lady. By June, though, Twelvetrees' name was no longer attached to the Norton film, and the press reported that the role was up for grabs. The studio conducted over two hundred interviews and fifty screen tests before assigning the role to their 24-year-old contractee Claire Trevor in July.

Trevor had only been in Hollywood for a year. She was coming off an appearance as Shirley Temple's mother in Baby Takes a Bow (1934), one of the child superstar's earliest starring vehicles. Elinor Norton, produced by Sol Wurtzel's unit at Fox like all her previous films, would be her first starring role. (Wurtzel's unit generally handled lower-budget films.) The story called for three men to act as her various love interests. These roles were soon cast with Hugh Williams, Norman Foster, and Gilbert Roland. None of these were huge names, with Roland probably the most notable.

"This is the big chance," Trevor told a Brooklyn Daily Eagle columnist as filming got underway in early August. "Up till now I've always played hard-boiled gals and sob sisters and that type of woman. But this is my first chance to be a lady (sob sisters arise!). For the first time, too, I'm allowed to wear good clothes. I've got 22 changes of costume. Both the wardrobe mistress and I are going dizzy keeping track of them. But it's just grand."

In mid-August, the company travelled a few hundred miles north of Hollywood to the eastern Sierra Nevada mountains near Bridgeport, California. There, they filmed at Twin Lakes and the Hunewill Ranch. This was a repeat visit for director MacFadden, who had also filmed She Was a Lady in the Bridgeport area earlier in 1934.

Twin Lakes is clearly the location of the "Most Beautiful Still of the Month" that started this investigation. I found a modern-era photograph that shows a near identical mountain-and-lake profile.

By late August, the crew had returned to Fox's Western Avenue studio. Constance Bennett dropped by one day to watch her companion (and future husband) Gilbert Roland play a love scene with Claire Trevor.

As production wrapped up in September, Fox officially shortened the name of the film to Elinor Norton and signed Gilbert Roland to a long-term contract. In early October, Claire Trevor left for a brief vacation in New York. The official release date was set for November 9.

The first ads for movie showings of Elinor Norton appeared in small towns in mid-October, suggesting the release date had been moved up. The first reviews in the trade papers showed up on October 20. None of the ones that I have found were positive—or even neutral. The exhibitor ratings were equally dismal.

Here are some quotes from various of these reviews: "much unnecessary footage", "tepid as entertainment", "a tiresome and unpleasant drama", "stilted dialogue", "direction is uneven", "a jinx to a good cast", "no interest in the story", "whatever interest might have been engendered has been nullified by the quality of the acting, direction and production", "it falls short of being interesting or entertaining".

Photoplay magazine stated, "It is an unbelievably dull picture." The Independent Exhibitors Film Bulletin editorialized, "Would it not be an excellent boon to the movies if audiences more often gave the 'bird' to trash like this?"

Nonetheless, as the movie was being released, producer Wurtzel was reportedly so pleased with Claire Trevor's performance that she was allowed to keep her entire wardrobe from the film. As we heard above, that would have been a substantial gift!

After Trevor's New York vacation, she returned to Fox studios to begin work on Dante's Inferno with up-and-comer Spencer Tracy. Within a few months, Fox studios had merged with 20th Century to become 20th Century-Fox. Daryl Zanuck took over and a new era began at the studio. Wurtzel and Trevor remained under the new management. Director MacFadden was released.

Claire Trevor's career grew as her first starring vehicle plunged into obscurity. In interviews given by Trevor over the next few years that I have found, Elinor Norton is not mentioned.

A nitrate print of Elinor Norton resides under the care of the UCLA Film and Television Archive. It is reportedly not in good condition.

. . .

Further reading

• "Claire Trevor: The Life and Films of the Queen of Noir" by Derek Sculthorpe, McFarland & Company, Inc., 2018
• "Hamilton MacFadden, Who?" by Anne Morra, www.moma.org, "Inside/Out" column from April 16, 2015

Sources

• Newspapers.com archives for United States newspapers
• Media History Digital Library archives of Hollywood fan magazines and trade papers

Acknowledgements

Thanks to "Forever Hollywood" @foreverhollywo3 on Twitter for helping find out more about the state of the print of Elinor Norton held by UCLA.