A Fever in the Blood

Last updated
A Fever in the Blood
A Fever in the Blood film poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Vincent Sherman
Screenplay by Roy Huggins
Harry Kleiner
Based onA Fever in the Blood
by William Pearson
Produced byRoy Huggins
Starring Efrem Zimbalist, Jr.
Angie Dickinson
Jack Kelly
Don Ameche
Ray Danton
Herbert Marshall
Rhodes Reason
Robert Colbert
Carroll O'Connor
Cinematography J. Peverell Marley
Edited by William H. Ziegler
Music by Ernest Gold
Distributed by Warner Bros.
Release date
  • January 28, 1961 (1961-01-28)
Running time
117 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

A Fever in the Blood is a 1961 Warner Bros. American courtroom drama directed by Vincent Sherman with music by Ernest Gold, cinematography by J. Peverell Marley and editing by William H. Ziegler. It is based on the 1959 novel of the same name by former lawyer William Pearson. The film stars Efrem Zimbalist Jr., Angie Dickinson, Jack Kelly and Don Ameche. Carroll O'Connor appears in his film debut.

Contents

Plot

Judge Leland Hoffman and district attorney Dan Callahan take a weekend hunting trip. Both men will seek their party's gubernatorial nomination. When socialite Paula Thornwell is found murdered in her posh estate, Callahan is summoned back to the city. Because of the high-profile nature of the case, Callahan handles the prosecution himself. The victim's estranged husband, industrialist Walter Thornwall, becomes Callahan's prime suspect. Mr. Thornwall is charged with murder and Hoffman is assigned to hear the case.

The pressures of the courtroom turn the affable Callahan into a ruthless, vindictive prosecutor, determined to win a conviction at any cost. During his testimony, police sergeant Michael Beers exclaims that Thornwall had once threatened his wife. The defense makes a motion for mistrial, triggering Callahan's immediate objection. After a tense moment of reflection, Judge Hoffman orders Beers' testimony stricken from the record, but he denies the request for a mistrial. The jury later finds Thornwall guilty, and Callahan appears free to obtain the gubernatorial nomination.

However, Thornwall's gardener is found to be the actual murderer when he is apprehended by police on a lesser crime. Callahan uses the gardener's confession to free Thornwall, motivated by political self-promotion. When delegates at the party's state convention consider their nominee, they reject Callahan in favor of Hoffman, the quiet man of conscience.

Cast

Production

Director Vincent Sherman at first considered the story "old-fashioned...with dismal prospects." Screenwriter Roy Huggins agreed and attempted to update the script. [1]

The film features a roster of Warner Bros. television contract players. Sherman criticized the casting of television actors such as Jack Kelly and Efrem Zimbalist Jr. because he felt that their presence on screen would "cause audiences to regard the film as merely an enlarged TV program." [1] Huggins also felt that the actors were miscast and that Zimbalist was too young for the role of the judge. [2]

Studio head Jack L. Warner wanted to grant television actors such as Kelly, star of the series Maverick , a chance to star in a feature film. Warner once commented that "naturally they want to get out of TV because the work is not easy. They want to get into features where they can have an easier occupation." [3] [4]

Reception

In a contemporary review for the Los Angeles Times , critic Philip K. Scheuer wrote: "Remember when movies told stories? 'A Fever in the Blood' tells a story; it is ALL story, a little like the kind, with political backgrounds, that Frank Capra used to do so well. ... The wind-up is pure fairytale—or pure Capra—but it sends you out with your faith restored, for the moment anyway, in the Great American Dream." [5]

Kate Cameron of the New York Daily News wrote: "The political atmosphere seems authentic, but some of the moves in the game are too patently contrived to convince an audience that it is witnessing a real-life drama." [6]

In the Chicago Tribune , critic Mae Tinee remarked: `"Some of the bargaining and manipulation behind the scenes is moderately interesting, but the final scenes, in which the best man wins in a walkaway, struck me as highly unconvincing." [7]

Related Research Articles

<i>Maverick</i> (TV series) American TV series (1957–1962)

Maverick is an American Western television series with comedic overtones created by Roy Huggins and originally starring James Garner as an adroitly articulate poker player plying his trade on riverboats and in saloons while traveling incessantly through the 19th-century American frontier. The show ran for five seasons from September 22, 1957, to July 8, 1962 on ABC.

<i>77 Sunset Strip</i> Television series

77 Sunset Strip is an American television private detective drama series created by Roy Huggins and starring Efrem Zimbalist Jr., Roger Smith, Richard Long and Edd Byrnes. Each episode was one hour long when aired with commercials. The show ran from 1958 to 1964. The character of detective Stuart Bailey was first used by writer Huggins in his 1946 novel The Double Take, later adapted into the 1948 film I Love Trouble.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Efrem Zimbalist Jr.</span> American actor (1918–2014)

Efrem Zimbalist Jr. was an American actor best known for his starring roles in the television series 77 Sunset Strip and The F.B.I. He is also known as recurring character "Dandy Jim Buckley" in the series Maverick and as the voice of Alfred Pennyworth in the DC Animated Universe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Long (actor)</span> American actor (1927–1974)

Richard McCord Long, also known as Dick Long, was an American actor best known for his leading roles in three ABC television series, The Big Valley, Nanny and the Professor, and Bourbon Street Beat. He was also a series regular on ABC's 77 Sunset Strip during the 1961–1962 season.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edd Byrnes</span> American actor and singer (1932–2020)

Edward Byrne Breitenberger, known professionally as Edd Byrnes, was an American actor, best known for his starring role in the television series 77 Sunset Strip. He also was featured in the 1978 film Grease as television teen-dance show host Vince Fontaine, and was a charting recording artist with "Kookie, Kookie ".

Roy Huggins was an American novelist and an influential writer/creator and producer of character-driven television series, including Maverick, The Fugitive, Hunter, and The Rockford Files. He became a noted writer and producer using his own name, but much of his later television scriptwriting was done using the pseudonyms Thomas Fitzroy, John Thomas James or John Francis O'Mara.

<i>Sugarfoot</i> American Western TV series

Sugarfoot is an American Western television series that aired for 69 episodes on ABC from 1957-1961 on Tuesday nights on a "shared" slot basis – rotating with Cheyenne ; Cheyenne and Bronco ; and Bronco. The Warner Bros. production stars Will Hutchins as Tom Brewster, an Easterner who comes to the Oklahoma Territory to become a lawyer. Brewster was a correspondence-school student whose apparent lack of cowboy skills earned him the nickname "Sugarfoot", a designation even below that of a tenderfoot.

Gerald Drayson Adams was a Canadian-born American business executive and literary agent when he began writing for films in the 1940s. The Oxford University-educated Adams specialized in action/adventure and western films. His films include Dead Reckoning (1947) starring Humphrey Bogart, The Big Steal (1949), Armored Car Robbery (1950), His Kind of Woman, The Black Sleep (1956), and Kissin' Cousins (1964), starring Elvis Presley, for which he received a WGA award nomination. Adams also wrote for television series, including the pivotal episodes "Hostage" with James Garner and Jack Kelly and "Stampede" with Efrem Zimbalist Jr. for Maverick (1957) as well as "The Savage Hills" with Diane Brewster for the same series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jack Kelly (actor)</span> American actor

John Augustus Kelly Jr. was an American film and television actor most noted for the role of Bart Maverick in the television series Maverick, which ran on ABC from 1957 to 1962.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Colbert</span> American actor (b. 1931)

Robert Louis Colbert is an American actor best known for his leading role as Dr. Doug Phillips on the ABC television series The Time Tunnel and his two appearances as Brent Maverick, a third Maverick brother in the ABC/Warner Brothers western Maverick.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kathleen Crowley</span> American actress (1929–2017)

Kathleen Crowley was an American actress. She appeared in over 100 movies and television series in the 1950s and 1960s, almost always as a leading lady.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andra Martin</span> American actress (1935–2022)

Andra Martin was an American actress who appeared in many television series and a few movies as a contract player for Warner Bros. in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jacqueline Beer</span> French actress (born 1932)

Jacqueline Beer is a French actress and beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss France 1954 and represented her country at Miss Universe 1954 where she placed Top 16. She was Chair of the Board of Directors of the Thor Heyerdahl Institute, located in Larvik, Norway. Her second husband was scientist Thor Heyerdahl. She was sometimes credited as Jacqueline Baer.

<i>Girl on the Run</i> (1958 film) 1958 private detective film

Girl on the Run is a 1958 private detective film directed by Richard L. Bare and starring Efrem Zimbalist Jr., Erin O'Brien, Shepperd Strudwick, Edd Byrnes and Barton MacLane.

Edward Thomas Marion Lawton Hargrove Jr. was an American writer.

<i>The Chapman Report</i> 1962 film

The Chapman Report is a 1962 American Technicolor drama film starring Shelley Winters, Jane Fonda, Claire Bloom and Glynis Johns. It was made by DFZ Productions and distributed by Warner Bros. It was directed by George Cukor and produced by Darryl F. Zanuck and Richard D. Zanuck, from a screenplay by Wyatt Cooper and Don Mankiewicz, adapted by Gene Allen and Grant Stuart from Irving Wallace's 1960 novel The Chapman Report. The original music was by Leonard Rosenman, Frank Perkins and Max Steiner, the cinematography by Harold Lipstein, the color coordination images and main title design by George Hoyningen-Huene, and the costume design by Orry-Kelly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ray Danton</span> American actor, director and producer

Ray Danton was a radio, film, stage, and television actor, director, and producer whose most famous roles were in the screen biographies The Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond (1960) and The George Raft Story (1962). He was married to actress Julie Adams from 1954 to 1981.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shady Deal at Sunny Acres</span> 10th episode of the 2nd season of Maverick

"Shady Deal at Sunny Acres", starring James Garner and Jack Kelly, remains one of the most famous and widely discussed episodes of the Western comedy television series Maverick. Written by series creator Roy Huggins (teleplay) and Douglas Heyes (story) and directed by Leslie H. Martinson, this 1958 second-season episode depicts gambler Bret Maverick being swindled by a crooked banker after depositing the proceeds from a late-night poker game. He then surreptitiously recruits his brother Bart Maverick and a host of other acquaintances to mount an elaborate sting operation to recover the money.

John Eugene Mather was an American radio and television actor, best known for playing The Cisco Kid on radio and for being the original voice of Wally Walrus.

References

  1. 1 2 Sherman, Vincent. Studio Affairs: My Life as a Film Director. Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press, 2021.
  2. Green, Paul. Roy Huggins: Creator of Maverick, 77 Sunset Strip, The Fugitive and The Rockford Files. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2014. p. 69.
  3. Dixon, Wheeler W. Death of the Moguls: The End of Classical Hollywood. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2012. p. 212.
  4. Alexander, Linda J. A Maverick Life: The Jack Kelly Story. Duncan, OK: BearManor Media, 2013.
  5. Scheuer, Philip K. (1961-01-26). "'A Fever in the Blood' Ingenious in Plot". Los Angeles Times . p. 11, Part III.
  6. Cameron, Kate (1961-04-15). "Brooklyn Paramount Has 2 Warner Films". New York Daily News . p. 24.
  7. Tinee, Mae (1961-01-16). "Movie Tells Ambition of Politicians". Chicago Tribune . p. 10, Part 4.