Michael Curtiz was a Hungarian-American film director, recognized as one of the most prolific directors in history. He directed classic films from the silent era and numerous others during Hollywood's Golden Age, when the studio system was prevalent.
Life with Father is a 1939 play by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, adapted from a humorous autobiographical book of stories compiled in 1935 by Clarence Day. The Broadway production ran for 3,224 performances over 401 weeks to become the longest-running non-musical play on Broadway, a record that it still holds. The play was adapted into a 1947 feature film and a television series.
George Randolph Scott was an American film actor, whose Hollywood career spanned from 1928 to 1962. As a leading man for all but the first three years of his cinematic career, Scott appeared in dramas, comedies, musicals, adventures, war, horror and fantasy films, and Westerns. Out of his more than 100 film appearances, more than 60 of them were Westerns.
Irene Dunne was an American actress who appeared in films during the Golden Age of Hollywood. She is best known for her comedic roles, though she performed in films of other genres.
Edmund Gwenn was an English actor. On film, he is best remembered for his role as Kris Kringle in the Christmas film Miracle on 34th Street (1947), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and the corresponding Golden Globe Award. He received a second Golden Globe and another Academy Award nomination for the comedy film Mister 880 (1950). He is also remembered for his appearances in four films directed by Alfred Hitchcock.
Clarence Shepard Day Jr. was an American author and cartoonist, best known for his 1935 work Life with Father.
William Joseph Patrick O'Brien was an American film actor with more than 100 screen credits. Of Irish descent, he often played Irish and Irish-American characters and was referred to as "Hollywood's Irishman in Residence" in the press. One of the best-known screen actors of the 1930s and 1940s, he played priests, cops, military figures, pilots, and reporters. He is especially well-remembered for his roles in Knute Rockne, All American (1940), Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), and Some Like It Hot (1959). He was frequently paired onscreen with Hollywood star James Cagney. O'Brien also appeared on stage and television.
The Count of Monte Cristo is a 1934 American adventure film directed by Rowland V. Lee and starring Robert Donat and Elissa Landi. Based on the 1844 novel The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, the story concerns a man who is unjustly imprisoned for 20 years for innocently delivering a letter entrusted to him. When he finally escapes, he seeks revenge against the greedy men who conspired to put him in prison.
Four's a Crowd is a 1938 American romantic comedy film directed by Michael Curtiz, starring Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Rosalind Russell and Patric Knowles. The picture was written by Casey Robinson and Sig Herzig from a story by Wallace Sullivan. This was the fourth of nine films in which Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland appeared.
I'll See You in My Dreams is a 1951 musical film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Doris Day and Danny Thomas.
James Joseph Lydon was an American actor and television producer whose career in the entertainment industry began as a teenager during the 1930s.
Female is a 1933 Warner Bros. pre-Code film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Ruth Chatterton and George Brent. It is based on the 1933 novel of the same name by Donald Henderson Clarke.
William Horatio Powell was an American actor, known primarily for his film career. Under contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he was paired with Myrna Loy in 14 films, including the Thin Man series based on the Nick and Nora Charles characters created by Dashiell Hammett. Powell was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor three times: for The Thin Man (1934), My Man Godfrey (1936), and Life with Father (1947).
Romance on the High Seas is a 1948 American musical romantic comedy film directed by Michael Curtiz, and starred Jack Carson, Janis Paige, Don DeFore and Doris Day in her film debut. Busby Berkeley was the choreographer. The film was nominated for two Academy Awards, for Original Song for "It's Magic", and Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture.
Roughly Speaking is a 1945 American comedy-drama film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Rosalind Russell and Jack Carson. The plot involves a strong-minded mother keeping her family afloat through World War I and the Great Depression. The film was based on the autobiography of the same name, published in 1943, by Louise Randall Pierson.
Gold Diggers of 1937 is a Warner Bros. movie musical directed by Lloyd Bacon with musical numbers created and directed by Busby Berkeley. The film stars Dick Powell and Joan Blondell, who were married at the time, with Glenda Farrell and Victor Moore.
The Story of Will Rogers is a 1952 American Comedy Western film biography of humorist and movie star Will Rogers, directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Will Rogers Jr. as his father. The supporting cast features and Jane Wyman. The film's screenplay was based on the true short story "Uncle Clem's Boy" by Rogers' widow Betty Blake, which was published in The Saturday Evening Post in 1940.
Nothing But the Truth is a 1929 American pre-Code sound comedy film starring Richard Dix, loosely adapted from the play by James Montgomery and the 1914 novel of the same title by Frederic S. Isham. The play was adapted again as Nothing But the Truth (1941) starring Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard.
Heather Wilde is an English actress who was active in stage and screen productions in both England and the United States between the late 1930s and 1950s. In films she was often cast in small uncredited roles. Wilde is perhaps best known today for her performances as a supporting character in two popular, critically acclaimed American comedies: as the primping little actress Miss Plupp in The Bank Dick (1940) starring W. C. Fields and as the anxious housemaid Annie in Life with Father (1947) starring William Powell and Irene Dunne.
Naughty but Nice is a 1939 Warner Bros. musical comedy film directed by Ray Enright and starring Dick Powell, Ann Sheridan, Gale Page, Ronald Reagan and Helen Broderick. The original story and screenplay were written by Richard Macaulay and Jerry Wald, and the film includes songs with music by Harry Warren and lyrics by Johnny Mercer, as well as music adapted from Bach, Beethoven, Liszt, Mozart, Schumann and Wagner. Sheridan's original voice is heard in most of her songs, but for the song "In a Moment of Weakness", her voice was dubbed by Vera Van.
