Four Mothers | |
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Directed by | William Keighley |
Written by | Stephen Morehouse Avery |
Produced by | Hal B. Wallis |
Starring | Priscilla Lane Rosemary Lane Lola Lane Gale Page |
Cinematography | Charles Rosher |
Edited by | Ralph Dawson |
Music by | Heinz Roemheld |
Production company | |
Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
Release date |
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Running time | 86 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Four Mothers is a 1941 American drama film and sequel to Four Daughters (1938) and Four Wives (1939). The film stars Claude Rains, Jeffrey Lynn, May Robson and featuring the Lane Sisters: Priscilla Lane, Rosemary Lane and Lola Lane. [1] [2] It was directed by William Keighley and is based on the story "Sister Act" by Fannie Hurst. [3] The film was released by Warner Bros. on January 4, 1941. The Lane sisters appeared in all three films and also appeared together in the 1939 film Daughters Courageous .
In this final installment of Warner Brothers' Four Daughters series, the entire Lemp family loses its investment in son-in-law Ben Crowley's (Frank McHugh) out-of-state realty project when a hurricane destroys the development site. So Ben suggests they localize and develop their own property to sell, but no one in town will help finance the venture after the hurricane debacle. So in order to get their hands on some much-needed cash, the Lemp family patriarch, Adam (Claude Rains), sells the house in which he raised his daughters. To his shock, however, he learns the person who bought it is planning to raze the old structure to make way for an apartment building.
To do his part in bringing in more dollars for the family, son-in-law Felix (Jeffery Lynn) travels to Chicago for a job conducting an orchestra. Meanwhile, Kay (Rosemary Lane), the only Lemp daughter who is childless, is upset that husband Clint (Eddie Albert) spends more time at work than with her at home. Things get worse after his lab research leads him closer to the cause of Pneumoconiosis at the town's smelting plant. Eventually, Kay has had it. She too leaves for Chicago—to seek a job in radio. But for both Felix and Kay, the big city proves to hold no suitable alternative to either their financial or family woes. So they both return home.
After moving into an apartment with his sister Etta (May Robson), Adam is invited to conduct for the Beethoven Music Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. The whole family travels there to proudly watch him. They then return home for the opening of Lemp Acres, the new property Ben has started and developed for the family. Upon Adam's arrival, he finds he has regained the respect of the town—so much so that the townspeople financed the moving of his old house to Lemp Acres, and all is the same as it once was. In the end, as the four daughters hold one of their musical practice sessions, Kay realizes she is finally pregnant.
Four Daughters is a 1938 American romance film that tells the story of a happy musical family whose lives and loves are disrupted by the arrival of a charming young composer who interjects himself into the daughters' romantic lives. His cynical, bitter musician friend comes to help orchestrate his latest composition and complicates matters even more. The movie stars the Lane Sisters and Gale Page, and features Claude Rains, Jeffrey Lynn, John Garfield, and Dick Foran. The three Lanes were sisters and members of a family singing trio.
William Claude Rains was a British and American actor whose career spanned almost seven decades. After his American film debut as Dr. Jack Griffin in The Invisible Man (1933), he appeared in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), The Wolf Man (1941), Casablanca (1942), Kings Row (1942), Notorious (1946), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), and The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965).
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The Lane Sisters were a family of American singers and actresses. The sisters were Leota Lane, Lola Lane, Rosemary Lane and Priscilla Lane.
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Daughters Courageous is a 1939 American drama film starring John Garfield, Claude Rains, Jeffrey Lynn and featuring the Lane Sisters: Lola Lane, Rosemary Lane and Priscilla Lane. Based on the play Fly Away Home by Dorothy Bennett and Irving White, the film was directed by Michael Curtiz. It was released by Warner Bros. on June 23, 1939.
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Four Wives is a 1939 American drama film starring the Lane Sisters and Gale Page. The film was directed by Michael Curtiz and is based on the story "Sister Act" by Fannie Hurst. The supporting cast features Claude Rains, Jeffrey Lynn, Eddie Albert, Frank McHugh and Dick Foran. The picture is a sequel to Four Daughters (1938) and was followed by Four Mothers (1941). Four Wives was released by Warner Bros. on December 25, 1939.
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Rosemary Lane was an American actress and singer. She is known for her performances with Lola and Priscilla as the Lane Sisters and Fred Waring's Pennsylvanians in the 1930s, and for her film career in the 1930s to 1940s.
Priscilla Lane was an American actress, and the youngest sibling in the Lane Sisters' family of singers and actresses. She is best remembered for her roles in the films The Roaring Twenties (1939) co-starring with James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart; Saboteur (1942), an Alfred Hitchcock film in which she plays the heroine; and Arsenic and Old Lace (1944), in which she portrays Cary Grant's fiancée and bride.
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Lola Lane was an American actress and one of the Lane Sisters with her sisters Leota, Rosemary, and Priscilla Lane. She appeared on Broadway and in films from the 1920s to 1940s.