It Isn't Done | |
---|---|
Directed by | Ken G. Hall |
Written by | Frank Harvey Carl Dudley |
Based on | original story by Cecil Kellaway |
Produced by | Ken G. Hall |
Starring | Cecil Kellaway Shirley Ann Richards |
Cinematography | George Heath |
Edited by | William Shepherd |
Music by | Hamilton Webber |
Production company | |
Distributed by | British Empire Films (Aust) MGM (UK) |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 90 minutes (Australia) 77 mins (UK) [1] |
Country | Australia |
Language | English |
Budget | £15,000 [2] or £21,000 [3] |
It Isn't Done is a 1937 Australian comedy film about a grazier (Cecil Kellaway) who inherits a barony in England.
Hubert Blaydon, an Australian farmer, inherits a baronial estate and moves to England with his wife and daughter Patricia, a university student, to collect it. He finds it difficult to adapt to upper class customs and faces snobbishness from Lord Denvee and difficulties with his butler Jarms. Patricia falls for a writer, Peter Ashton, who is next in line for the title and the estate.
Hubert misses Australia. He eventually contrives evidence that Peter is the legal heir and bonds with Lord Denvee over the fact that both their sons died on the same day in World War I. Hubert and his wife return to Australia with Jarms while Patricia and Peter are married.
The film was based on an original story by Cecil Kellaway which he had written in between acts while performing in White Horse Inn on stage. Hall liked the basic idea but said Kellaway was unable to put it down to paper. [6]
Hall originally imported American writer Carl Dudley from Los Angeles to adapt it into a feature film script. [7] Dudley intended to stay in Australia for 12 months. [8]
Hall had the script worked on by playwright and actor Frank Harvey, who had recently joined Cinesound as a dialogue director. [9] Hall later said "Harvey and I got together and worked it [Kellaway's idea] into a script, retaining all his basic ideas, and the basic theme, because the original idea appealed to both of us. Harvey was very English, educated at Winchester where ‘Manners maketh the man’ was the motto, you know. Very English." [6] Harvey went on to write all of Ken G. Hall's films for Cinesound. Hall says he had considerable input to the film as well. [10]
"If anything, the English will get more knocks than the Australians", said Hall at the time. "But there will be hits at both sides-nothing malicious; just a good-humoured conflict of ideas." [11] He later elaborated, "Gently rubbishing the British. Gently rubbishing Australians too. That’s why the film succeeded in both England and Australia. There was no dirt thrown at any time. It was a ‘sling off‘, as we say in the vernacular, but it was still pro-British in sentiment. Don’t forget that the Australian people were tremendously British-oriented round that time." [6]
Cecil Kellaway later claimed the lead character was based on a real grazier from New South Wales:
I've enjoyed portraying this role, because I know him so thoroughly. I've stayed on his property, I've studied his mannerisms. He is the jovial, lovable person who is symbolic of the democratic carefree spirit of a sunny land.... To me, he is typical of so many of our countrymen. In many of his scenes I have endeavoured to give something that hopes for a laugh and faintly suggests a tear. I sincerely hope I have succeeded. [12]
At one stage the film was called Something in Common. [13] [14] The title was changed to It Isn't Done just before filming. [15]
The film marked the feature debut of Shirley Ann Richards who was a graduate of Cinesound's Talent School, run by Harvey and George Parker. Although she was not very experienced, she proved a natural and was enormously popular. She was signed to a long-term contract with Cinesound and went on to appear in several of their films. [16] [17]
Although mostly set in England, the film was entirely shot in Australia, at Cinesound's Bondi studios and Camden. Shooting started October 26, 1936. [18]
Hall used rear projection equipment to show English backgrounds. The backgrounds were filmed for Cinesound by British International Pictures. [19]
Sets were designed by Eric Thompson, who had returned to Australia after several years working in Hollywood. [20]
Reviews were positive [21]
The Motion Picture Herald wrote:
With every new picture, Cinesound is showing a more assured knowledge of production technique. Bearing in mind the pathetically weak Australian pictures of the earlier days of Australian production, the audience that witnessed the preview of "It Isn't Done" found it hard to imagine that the picture they were looking at had been actually made in the Commonwealth. Here, indeed, is a film for which this country need make no apologies. In that respect it is epoch-making. [22]
Variety wrote:
Pic carries no marquee names for abroad but, despite this, the entertainment value is solid.' And the names are okay for Australia and New Zealand. Film breaks away from the 'horse opera' group and portrays a simple,, yet in parts, highly touching story. It is a comedy — not the slapstock type of earlier efforts, but gentle fun. Ken Hall's direction is very smooth and the picture moves along at a nice tempo. Over here 'Done' should experience no difficulty in clicking up a good b.o. take. For England it is also a natural, and American audiences would find pleasure in it, too, if the market is opened to it. Film is not strong enough to stand alone in America, but on a dual it would be quite able to hold its own. [23]
The film was a big hit at the box office, being released in the US and UK. [24]
Everyone's called it "easily the finest film an Australian company has made." [25]
A representative from RKO in Hollywood saw the film and offered Kellaway a long-term contract, which he accepted. [26] Kellaway did return to Australia for one more film, Mr. Chedworth Steps Out , but spent the rest of his career in America.
After completing the film, John Longden returned to England after spending four years in Australia. He left Sydney in November, accompanied by Carl Dudley. [27] Dudley later helped Shirley Ann Richards when that actress moved to Los Angeles. [28]
In the film, Shirley Ann Richards plays a woman whose brother was killed in World War I. Richards' brother in real life died in a Japanese POW camp during World War II. [29]
Kenneth George Hall was an Australian film producer and director, considered one of the most important figures in the history of the Australian film industry. He was the first Australian to win an Academy Award.
Cinesound Productions Pty Ltd was an Australian feature film production company. Established in June 1931, Cinesound developed out of a group of companies centred on Greater Union Theatres that covered all facets of the film process, from production to distribution and exhibition. Cinesound Productions established a film studio as a subsidiary of Greater Union Theatres Pty Ltd based on the Hollywood model. The first production was On Our Selection (1932), which was an enormous financial success.
Shirley Ann Richards was an Australian actress and author who achieved notability in a series of 1930s Australian films for Ken G. Hall before moving to the United States, where she continued her career as a film actress, mainly as a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer starlet. Her best known performances were in It Isn't Done (1937), Dad and Dave Come to Town (1938), An American Romance (1944), and Sorry, Wrong Number (1948). In the 1930s, she was the only Australian actor under a long-term contract to a film studio, Cinesound Productions. She subsequently became a lecturer and poet.
Cecil Lauriston Kellaway was a South African character actor. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor twice, for The Luck of the Irish (1948) and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967).
Dad and Dave Come to Town is a 1938 Australian comedy film directed by Ken G. Hall, the third in the 'Dad and Dave' comedy series starring Bert Bailey. It was the feature film debut of Peter Finch and is one of the best known Australian films of the 1930s.
Mr. Chedworth Steps Out is a 1939 Australian comedy film directed by Ken G. Hall starring Cecil Kellaway. Kellaway returned to Australia from Hollywood to make the film, which features an early screen appearance by Peter Finch.
The Broken Melody is a 1938 Australian drama film directed by Ken G. Hall and starring Lloyd Hughes, based on a best-selling novel by F. J. Thwaites. Hall later said in 1974 that "This was a film that I’m particularly keen about still."
Frank Harvey was a British-born actor, producer, and writer, best known for his work in Australia.
Thoroughbred is a 1936 Australian race-horse drama film directed by Ken G. Hall, partly based on the life and career of Phar Lap. Hollywood star Helen Twelvetrees was imported to Australia to appear in the film. The film also stars Frank Leighton and John Longden.
Orphan of the Wilderness is a 1936 Australian feature film from director Ken G. Hall about the adventures of a boxing kangaroo. It starred Brian Abbot who disappeared at sea not long after filming completed.
Lovers and Luggers is a 1937 Australian film directed by Ken G. Hall. It is an adventure melodrama about a pianist who goes to Thursday Island to retrieve a valuable pearl.
Tall Timbers is a 1937 action melodrama set in the timber industry directed by Ken G. Hall and starring Frank Leighton and Shirley Ann Richards.
Let George Do It is a 1938 comedy starring popular stage comedian George Wallace. It was the first of two films Wallace made for Ken G. Hall at Cinesound Productions, the other one being Gone to the Dogs (1939). Hall later called Wallace "in my opinion, easily the best comedian that this country has produced."
Gone to the Dogs is a 1939 musical comedy vehicle starring George Wallace. It was the second of two films he made for director Ken G. Hall, the first being Let George Do It (1938).
Dad Rudd, M.P. is a 1940 comedy that was the last of four films made by Ken G. Hall starring Bert Bailey as Dad Rudd. It was the last feature film directed by Hall prior to the war and the last made by Cinesound Productions, Bert Bailey and Frank Harvey.
Come Up Smiling is a 1939 Australian comedy film starring popular American stage comedian Will Mahoney and his wife Evie Hayes. It was the only feature from Cinesound Productions not directed by Ken G. Hall.
The Hayseeds is a 1933 Australian musical comedy from Beaumont Smith. It centres on the rural family, the Hayseeds, about whom Smith had previously made six silent films, starting with Our Friends, the Hayseeds (1917). He retired from directing in 1925 but decided to revive the series in the wake of the box office success of On Our Selection (1932). It was the first starring role in a movie for stage actor Cecil Kellaway.
Typhoon Treasure is a 1938 Australian adventure film directed by Noel Monkman and starring Campbell Copelin, Gwen Munro, and Joe Valli. It is set in New Guinea although shot on the Great Barrier Reef and the Queensland coast. It was Monkman's first dramatic feature film after several years making documentaries.
Alec Kellaway was a South African–born actor best known for his work in Australian theatre and film, notably playing a number of character roles for director Ken G. Hall. He was the brother of Cecil Kellaway. He also worked as a producer in vaudeville and helped run the Talent School at Cinesound Productions.
Jean Hatton was an Australian singer and actor who was under contract to Cinesound Productions in the 1930s. She was discovered in a Deanna Durbin talent quest and cast as Cecil Kellaway's daughter in Mr. Chedworth Steps Out (1939), singing several songs. She was subsequently cast in Come Up Smiling (1939). During filming she fell down two flights of stairs and was injured, causing filming to be delayed, but she recovered. She later performed in concerts and radio and was generally advertised as "Australia's Deanna Durbin".