TCM Schedule for Friday, January 29, 2021 -- What's On Tonight: Guest Programmer Amanda Seyfried

[Staph]

In the daylight hours, TCM is all about youthful adventures. And brava, TCM, one of the eight adventures actually involves a girl! Then in prime time, TCM calls on Amanda Seyfried (she played Marion Davies in Mank (2020)) to choose the films for the evening. Not surprisingly, one of the films she chose is Citizen Kane (1941), the subject of Mank, along with a couple of Marion Davies' films. Enjoy!


6:00 AM -- Captains Courageous (1937)
1h 56m | Drama | TV-G
A spoiled rich boy is lost at sea and rescued by a fishing boat where hard work and responsibility help him become a man.
Director: Victor Fleming
Cast: Freddie Bartholomew, Spencer Tracy, Lionel Barrymoore

Winner of an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Spencer Tracy

Nominee for Oscars for Best Writing, Screenplay -- Marc Connelly, John Lee Mahin and Dale Van Every, Best Film Editing -- Elmo Veron, and Best Picture

When production finally wrapped in late February 1937, Spencer Tracy was relieved. "Well, I got away with it," he said later. "Want to know why? Because of Freddie, because of that kid's performance, because he sold it 98 per cent. The kid had to believe in Manuel, or Manuel wasn't worth a quarter. The way he would look at me, believe every word I said, made me believe in it myself. I've never said this before, and I'll never say it again. Freddie Bartholomew's acting is so fine and so simple and so true that it's way over people's heads. It'll only be by thinking back two or three years from now that they'll realize how great it was."


8:00 AM -- Treasure Island (1934)
1h 42m | Adventure | TV-G
Robert Louis Stevenson's classic tale of a young boy out to foil pirates and find a buried treasure.
Director: Victor Fleming
Cast: Wallace Beery, Jackie Cooper, Lionel Barrymore

MGM boss Louis B. Mayer insisted on a happy ending, so there had to be a re-shoot. Wallace Beery so resented this that he sabotaged the extra work by blowing his lines, staying in his dressing room for hours or taking long breaks. As a result, what was scheduled as a one day shoot took four days.


9:45 AM -- Lord of the Flies (1963)
1h 30m | Drama | TV-14
Schoolboys marooned on a Pacific island create their own savage civilization.
Director: Peter Brook
Cast: James Aubrey, Tom Chapin, Hugh Edwards

In 1996, 35 years after the film was made, the BBC created a documentary about the making of the film called "Time Flies", which reunited the main cast and crew on the beaches of the Caribbean where it was filmed; an article written by one of the actors, Tom Gaman, mentioned that of the boys, only the one who played Ralph (James Aubrey), pursued an acting career. Others went on to have very different ones: Gaman became a freelance forester in Inverness, California; Hugh Edwards (Piggy) became an engineer for a Russian firm; Tom Chapin became a gold mine geologist in Nevada and the twins David Surtees and Simon Surtees (Samaneric) remained together, living with their families in the UK and working as a guidance counselor and political administrator respectively. (NOTE: Contrary to Mr. Gaman's article, another of the boys besides James Aubrey, Nicholas Hammond, who played Robert, had a quite extensive film AND TV career, playing, among other roles, one of the children in The Sound of Music (1965) and the title role in TV's The Amazing Spider-Man (1977).)


11:30 AM -- Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Book (1942)
1h 49m | Adventure | TV-G
A boy raised by wolves adjusts to life among humans.
Director: Zoltan Korda
Cast: Sabu, Joseph Calleia, John Qualen

Nominee for Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- W. Howard Greene, Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration, Color -- Vincent Korda and Julia Heron, Best Effects, Special Effects -- Lawrence W. Butler (photographic) and William A. Wilmarth (sound), and Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture -- Miklós Rózsa

Sabu never actually starred in Indian movies, and was only in British, European, and Hollywood films. He was lined up to star in Indian films, but could not get a valid work permit, because he was a naturalized US Citizen, (even though he was born in India), however, to this day, many people still regard him as an Indian movie star


1:30 PM -- Bomba, the Jungle Boy (1949)
1h 11m | Adventure | TV-G
A photographer and his daughter discover a wild boy in the jungle.
Director: Ford Beebe
Cast: Johnny Sheffield, Peggy Ann Garner, Onslow Stevens

This was the first of 12 features, made over a six-year period (1949-55), starring Johnny Sheffield as Bomba that were made by "Poverty Row" studio Monogram Pictures. Sheffield had made his last Tarzan movie two years earlier. After the last Bomba feature was made in 1955, it would mark the end of Sheffield's film career.


2:45 PM -- Adventure Girl (1934)
1h 9m | Adventure | TV-G
A female explorer and her aged father search the Guatemalan jungle for a lost city.
Director: Herman Raymaker
Cast: Joan Lowell, Captain Nicholas Wagner, William Sawyer

Most of the location shooting seems to have been done in Chichicastenango and Antigua, Guatemala, neither of which is anywhere near the Rio Dulce where the story is set. Scene's from Chichicastenango, the native village, include film of the Sunday market and scenes shot around the small church of El Calvario. The Spanish colonial ruins of Antigua Guatemala stand in for "lost" Mayan city in the jungle.


4:00 PM -- Zebra in the Kitchen (1965)
1h 32m | Comedy | TV-G
A young boy tries to liberate animals from the city zoo.
Director: Ivan Tors
Cast: Jay North, Martin Milner, Andy Devine

Last film of Harry Strang, one of Hollywood's most prolific bit part character actors, with almost 600 individual credits to his name from before 1930. The stern-faced, emaciated-looking Strang specialized in playing prison guards, sheriffs, detectives, along with assorted townsfolk for more than thirty-five years.


5:45 PM -- The Yearling (1946)
2h 14m | Drama | TV-G
A Florida boy's pet deer threatens the family farm.
Director: Clarence Brown
Cast: Gregory Peck, Jane Wyman, Claude Jarman Jr.

Winner of Oscars for Best Cinematography, Color -- Charles Rosher, Leonard Smith and Arthur E. Arling, and Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration, Color -- Cedric Gibbons, Paul Groesse and Edwin B. Willis

Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Gregory Peck, Best Actress in a Leading Role -- Jane Wyman, Best Director -- Clarence Brown, Best Film Editing -- Harold F. Kress, and Best Picture

Clarence Brown insisted that his actors wear no make-up to achieve a naturalistic look. Claude Jarman Jr. had to wear a straw hat in between takes so that his fair skin didn't burn, while the pale Jane Wyman had to sit under a sun lamp for 15 minutes to make it look like she spent most of her time outdoors.



WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: PRIMETIME THEME -- GUEST PROGRAMMER AMANDA SEYFRIED



8:00 PM -- Citizen Kane (1941)
1h 59m | Drama | TV-PG
The investigation of a publishing tycoon's dying words reveals conflicting stories about his scandalous life.
Director: Orson Welles
Cast: Joseph Cotten, Dorothy Comingore, Agnes Moorehead

Winner of an Oscar for Best Writing, Original Screenplay -- Herman J. Mankiewicz and Orson Welles (On Friday, July 19th, 2003, Orson Welles' Oscar statuette went on sale at an auction at Christie's, New York, but was voluntarily withdrawn so the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences could buy it back for just 1 dollar. The statuette, included in a large selection of Welles-related material, was going to be sold by Beatrice Welles, the youngest of the filmmaker's three daughters and the sole heir of his estate and was expected to sell at over 300,000 dollars.)

Nominee for Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role -- Orson Welles, Best Director -- Orson Welles, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Gregg Toland, Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration, Black-and-White -- Perry Ferguson, Van Nest Polglase, A. Roland Fields and Darrell Silvera, Best Sound, Recording -- John Aalberg (RKO Radio SSD), Best Film Editing -- Robert Wise, Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic Picture -- Bernard Herrmann, and Best Picture

In the 1970s, film critic Pauline Kael wrote an essay called "Raising Kane". In it, she credited co-screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz for writing the entire script for this film, while alleging that Orson Welles "didn't write one line of the shooting script." However, this conclusion has very little factual basis, and was largely based on hearsay. Kael, for her part, tried to distance herself for the controversy later in life, insisting that the whole issue had been blown out of proportion, and that her essay, written as an introduction to a published copy of the "Kane" screenplay, was taken out of context. Subsequent writers examined internal studio memos, telegrams and drafts enough to conclude that both Welles and Mankewitcz had contributed significantly to the final script, though Welles had, at one point tried to bribe Mankewitcz into ceding his credit to Welles. Frank Mankiewicz, son of Herman J. Mankiewicz maintained that Welles' effort resulted more from anxiety than greed: as his contract stipulated that he would direct, produce, act in and write the film, Welles feared RKO would refuse to pay him in full. The final consensus among critics holds that the shooting script was actually based on an idea conjured by the two men, and that an initial draft by Mankiewicz was heavily altered by Welles. Both men continued to contribute to the script throughout shooting combining their work into the final version. Nevertheless, the controversy continues to the present day.


10:15 PM -- Cain and Mabel (1936)
1h 30m | Comedy, Musical | TV-G
The publicity romance between a prizefighter and a showgirl turns into the real thing.
Director: Lloyd Bacon
Cast: Marion Davies, Clark Gable, Allen Jenkins

Nominee for an Oscar for Best Dance Direction -- Bobby Connolly for "1000 Love Songs"

About the massive "Thousand Love Songs" number, Marion Davies said, "I was up on the top with this Madame Pompadour number. They had to put ice on my wrists and chain me to the rail. I was just on a shelf, and I'd look down and think, 'Uh-o'h. But I was used to the heat because I had been in the Follies in the summertime with fur costumes. So it didn't bother me much, but I didn't dare look down. I kept looking up, and all I saw was the top of the stage. I was up there about an hour and a half . . . Then the music started, and I felt the lights going on me, and I hiccupped. I was roasting. I kept wondering, 'How long is this going to last?' Finally, it took ladders to get me down. The costume alone weighed about 56 pounds."


12:00 AM -- Page Miss Glory (1935)
1h 33m | Comedy | TV-G
A con artist creates a composite photo to win a beauty contest, then has to find the real thing.
Director: Mervyn Leroy
Cast: Marion Davies, Pat O'Brien, Dick Powell

Both Marion Davies and Mary Astor had been major stars in silent films.


2:00 AM -- When a Stranger Calls (1979)
1h 37m | Adaptation
A babysitter is tormented by a series of ominous phone calls.
Director: Fred Walton
Cast: Charles Durning, Carol Kane, Colleen Dewhurst

Throughout the opening segment, director Fred Walton gradually increased the feeling of suspense by making each subsequent phone call ring a touch louder than the previous one. They escalate from eerie to jarring and finally infuriating.


3:45 AM -- The Caller (1987)
1h 38m | Horror
A widow living in an isolated cabin lets a mysterious stranger use her phone.
Director: Arthur A. Seidelman
Cast: Malcolm McDowell, Madolyn Smith, Charles Band

Written by Michael Sloane.


5:30 AM -- Living Stereo (1958)
7m | Short, Documentary | TV-G
The RCA Victor company explains one of their innovations, the stereophonic phonograph record.
Cast: Bob Baggs


5:40 AM -- Duck and Cover (1951)
9m | TV-PG
In this short film, a monkey's prank on a turtle demonstrates how to survive a nuclear attack.
Director: Anthony Rizzo
Cast: Leo M. Langlois III, Ray J. Mauer, Robert Middleton


5:50 AM -- The Your Name Here Story (1964)
9m | TV-PG
This comedic short film spoofs generic company promotional advertisements.