The Show-Off (1934 film)

The Show-Off
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Directed by	Charles Reisner
Written by	Herman J. Mankiewicz
Based on	The Show-Off by George Kelly
Produced by	Lucien Hubbard
Starring	Spencer Tracy Madge Evans Henry Wadsworth
Cinematography	James Wong Howe
Edited by	William S. Gray
Production company	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date	March 9, 1934 (1934-03-09)
Running time	77 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$162,000 [1] [2]
Box office	$397,000 [1] [2]

The Show-Off is a 1934 American comedy film directed by Charles Reisner and starring Spencer Tracy, Madge Evans and Henry Wadsworth. It is notable for being the first movie Tracy made for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer; he was on loan-out from Fox at the time and later moved to MGM.

Based on the hit play of the same title by George Kelly, it made a profit of $78,000. ^[1] Previously filmed twice by Paramount Pictures in 1926 and 1930, under the title Men Are Like That , and MGM remade the film in 1946, starring Red Skelton and Marilyn Maxwell.

Plot

Out sailing one day, J. Aubrey Piper saves a man from drowning. He overhears an impressed Amy Fisher's remark and looks her up in New Jersey, irritating her family with his constant bragging but winning Amy, who marries him.

A humble railroad clerk, Aubrey keeps pretending to be a more important man. He spends lavishly, piling up so much debt that he and Amy must move in with her parents. He gets fired by his boss Preston for making a wild offer on a piece of land, overstepping his authority by far.

Amy is fed up and intends to leave him. Aubrey runs into her brother Joe, an inventor whose rust-prevention idea has received a firm offer of $5,000. Aubrey goes to the firm and demands Joe get $100,000 plus a 50% ownership interest. The company rescinds its offer entirely.

Everybody's fed up with Aubrey, but suddenly Joe rushes home to say the company's changed its mind, offering him $50,000 plus 20%. And the railroad property paid off, too, so Aubrey's offered his old job back, with a raise. He knows how lucky he's been and that he should just shut up, but he just can't.

Cast

• Spencer Tracy as Aubrey Piper
• Madge Evans as Amy Fisher Piper
• Henry Wadsworth as Joe Fisher
• Lois Wilson as Clara Harling
• Grant Mitchell as Mr. 'Pa' Fisher
• Clara Blandick as Mrs. 'Ma' Fisher
• Alan Edwards as Frank Harling
• Claude Gillingwater as J.B. Preston

Radio adaptation

The Show-Off was adapted twice for radio by the Lux Radio Theatre . The first one-hour broadcast was on December 9, 1935, starring Joe E. Brown; ^[3] the second was on February 1, 1943, starring Harold Peary. ^[4]

References

1. James Curtis, Spencer Tracy: A Biography, Alfred Knopf, 2011 p231
2. The Eddie Mannix Ledger, Los Angeles: Margaret Herrick Library, Center for Motion Picture Study.
3. "Radio Day by Day". The Reading Eagle. 1935-12-09. p. 16. Retrieved 2020-12-19.
4. "Cavalcade Will Feature 1st Marines in Tripoli". Youngstown Vindicator (Ohio). 1943-02-01. p. 19. Retrieved 2020-12-19.

External links

• The Show Off at IMDb
• The Show Off at TCMDB