''Nob Hill'' is a 1945
Technicolor
Technicolor is a series of Color motion picture film, color motion picture processes, the first version dating back to 1916, and followed by improved versions over several decades.
Definitive Technicolor movies using three black and white films ...
film about a
Barbary Coast, San Francisco, United States saloon keeper, starring
George Raft
George Raft (born George Ranft; September 26, 1901 – November 24, 1980) was an American film actor and dancer identified with portrayals of gangsters in crime melodramas of the 1930s and 1940s. A stylish leading man in dozens of movies, Raft is ...
and
Joan Bennett
Joan Geraldine Bennett (February 27, 1910 – December 7, 1990) was an American stage, film, and television actress. She came from a show-business family, one of three acting sisters. Beginning her career on the stage, Bennett appeared in more t ...
. Part
musical
Musical is the adjective of music.
Musical may also refer to:
* Musical theatre, a performance art that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance
* Musical film and television, a genre of film and television that incorporates into the narr ...
and part
drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been ...
, the movie was directed by
Henry Hathaway
Henry Hathaway (March 13, 1898 – February 11, 1985) was an American film director and producer. He is best known as a director of Westerns, especially starring Randolph Scott and John Wayne. He directed Gary Cooper in seven films.
Backgro ...
. It remains one of Raft's lesser known movies even though it was a big success, in part because it was a musical.
Plot
Sally Templeton sings at Tony Angelo's popular turn-of-the-century nightclub in San Francisco, which is called the Gold Coast. She is also in love with Tony.
One day, a young girl, Katie Flanagan, just off the boat from Ireland, arrives looking for her uncle. Informed that he has died, Katie is about to be sent back by Tony on the next ship until Sally persuades him to let the girl stay a while.
Tony falls for
Nob Hill
Nob Hill is a neighborhood of San Francisco, California, United States that is known for its numerous luxury hotels and historic mansions. Nob Hill has historically served as a center of San Francisco's upper class. Nob Hill is among the highes ...
socialite Harriet Carruthers and agrees to support her brother, Lash, who is a candidate for district attorney. Business acquaintances are upset because Lash might shut down clubs like theirs if elected DA. Sally objects to the attention he is paying Harriet and takes a job singing in another club. Katie misses her terribly.
After the election, Tony discovers that Harriet has no interest in a future with someone like him. He grows despondent and turns to drink. Sally reconciles with Tony, who is also heartened by Lash's acknowledgment that he intends to investigate only law-breaking operations, not Tony's, which is respectable. All is well until Katie runs away, but after a desperate search in Chinatown for the child, Tony and Sally finally find her.
Cast
*
George Raft
George Raft (born George Ranft; September 26, 1901 – November 24, 1980) was an American film actor and dancer identified with portrayals of gangsters in crime melodramas of the 1930s and 1940s. A stylish leading man in dozens of movies, Raft is ...
as Tony Angelo
*
Joan Bennett
Joan Geraldine Bennett (February 27, 1910 – December 7, 1990) was an American stage, film, and television actress. She came from a show-business family, one of three acting sisters. Beginning her career on the stage, Bennett appeared in more t ...
as Harriet Carruthers
*
Vivian Blaine
Vivian Blaine (born Vivian Stapleton; November 21, 1921 – December 9, 1995) was an American actress and singer, best known for originating the role of Miss Adelaide in the musical theater production of ''Guys and Dolls'', as well as appearin ...
as Sally Templeton
*
Peggy Ann Garner
Peggy Ann Garner (February 3, 1932 – October 16, 1984) was an American child actress.
As a child actress, Garner had her first film role in 1938. At the 18th Academy Awards, Garner won the Academy Juvenile Award, recognizing her body of c ...
as Katie Flanagan
*
Alan Reed
Alan Reed (born Herbert Theodore Bergman; August 20, 1907 – June 14, 1977) was an American actor, best known as the original voice of Fred Flintstone on ''The Flintstones'' and various spinoff series. He also appeared in many films, includin ...
as Dapper Jack Harrigan
*
B.S. Pully
B.S. Pully (born Murray Lerman; May 14, 1910 – January 6, 1972) was a New York nightclub comedian and stage actor who created the role of "Big Jule" in the musical ''Guys and Dolls''. He was noted for his blue humor and thick, gravelly voice.
...
as Joe the Bartender
*
Edgar Barrier
Edgar Barrier (March 4, 1907 – June 20, 1964) was an American actor who appeared on radio, stage, and screen. In the 1930s he was a member of Orson Welles' Mercury Theatre and was one of several actors who played Simon Templar on ''The Saint'' ...
as Lash Carruthers
Production
![Vivian Blaine-George Raft in Nob Hill](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/80/Vivian_Blaine-George_Raft_in_Nob_Hill.jpg)
In March 1943, producer
Harry Sherman
Harry "Pop" Sherman was an American film producer known for his work in the Western genre during the 1930s and 1940s. He introduced the character Hopalong Cassidy to the silver screen, and is the father of screenwriter Teddi Sherman.
Biograph ...
announced he had purchased an original screen story, ''Crocus Hill'' by
Eleanore Griffin
Eleanore Griffin (1904–1995) was an American screenwriter who worked in Hollywood. She is best known for co-writing the film '' Boys Town,'' which she won an Oscar for in 1938. Griffin worked on and wrote for over 20 different Hollywood fi ...
, about a ten-year-old Irish girl in 1860s San Francisco; she arrives to discover her uncle is dead and gets adopted by a gambler because she is good luck. Sherman was going to change the title to ''Nob Hill'' and film it for
United Artists
United Artists Corporation (UA), currently doing business as United Artists Digital Studios, is an American digital production company. Founded in 1919 by D. W. Griffith, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks, the studi ...
the following year.
20th Century Fox
20th Century Studios, Inc. (previously known as 20th Century Fox) is an American film production company headquartered at the Fox Studio Lot in the Century City area of Los Angeles. As of 2019, it serves as a film production arm of Walt Dis ...
had a lot of success making Technicolor musicals set during America's past, including ''
Coney Island
Coney Island is a peninsular neighborhood and entertainment area in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Brighton Beach and Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, Manhattan Beach to its east, L ...
'' (1943) and ''
Hello, Frisco, Hello
''Hello, Frisco, Hello'' is a 1943 American musical film directed by H. Bruce Humberstone and starring Alice Faye, John Payne, Lynn Bari, and Jack Oakie. The film was made in Technicolor and released by 20th Century-Fox. This was one of the last ...
'' (1943). Most were set in a saloon and revolved around a
love triangle
A love triangle or eternal triangle is a scenario or circumstance, usually depicted as a rivalry, in which two people are pursuing or involved in a romantic relationship with one person, or in which one person in a romantic relationship with so ...
. In October 1943 Fox announced they had purchased Sherman's interest in ''Nob Hill''.
Norman Reilly Raine
Norman Reilly Raine (23 June 1894 – 19 July 1971) was an American screenwriter, creator of "Tugboat Annie" and winner of an Oscar for the screenplay of ''The Life of Emile Zola'' (1937).
Early years
Raine was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvan ...
was going to write the script, Andre Daven would produce and the film would be a vehicle for
Peggy Ann Garner
Peggy Ann Garner (February 3, 1932 – October 16, 1984) was an American child actress.
As a child actress, Garner had her first film role in 1938. At the 18th Academy Awards, Garner won the Academy Juvenile Award, recognizing her body of c ...
, who had just impressed in ''
Jane Eyre
''Jane Eyre'' ( ; originally published as ''Jane Eyre: An Autobiography'') is a novel by the English writer Charlotte Brontë. It was published under her pen name "Currer Bell" on 19 October 1847 by Smith, Elder & Co. of London. The first ...
''. The original adult stars were to be
Michael O'Shea and
Jeanne Crain
Jeanne Elizabeth Crain (May 25, 1925 – December 14, 2003) was an American actress. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for her title role in '' Pinky'' (1949). She also starred in the films ''In the Meantime, Darling'' (1944 ...
. Eventually the male starring role was assigned to
Fred MacMurray
Frederick Martin MacMurray (August 30, 1908 – November 5, 1991) was an American actor. He appeared in more than one hundred films and a successful television series, in a career that spanned nearly a half-century. His career as a major film le ...
with
Gregory Ratoff
Gregory Ratoff (born Grigory Vasilyevich Ratner; russian: Григорий Васильевич Ратнер, tr. ; April 20, c. 1893 – December 14, 1960) was a Russian-born American film director, actor and producer. As an actor, he was bes ...
to direct and
Lynn Bari
Lynn Bari (born Marjorie Schuyler Fisher, December 18, 1919 – November 20, 1989) was a film actress who specialized in playing sultry, statuesque man-killers in roughly 150 films for 20th Century Fox, from the early 1930s through the 1940s.
...
and
Merle Oberon
Merle Oberon (born Estelle Merle O'Brien Thompson; 19 February 191123 November 1979) was a British actress who began her film career in British films as Anne Boleyn in ''The Private Life of Henry VIII'' (1933). After her success in ''The Scarle ...
to be the female leads along with Garner.
In May 1944 Ratoff dropped out and
Darryl F. Zanuck
Darryl Francis Zanuck (September 5, 1902December 22, 1979) was an American film producer and studio executive; he earlier contributed stories for films starting in the silent era. He played a major part in the Hollywood studio system as one of ...
offered the film to
Henry Hathaway
Henry Hathaway (March 13, 1898 – February 11, 1985) was an American film director and producer. He is best known as a director of Westerns, especially starring Randolph Scott and John Wayne. He directed Gary Cooper in seven films.
Backgro ...
, who turned it down because he was uncomfortable with directing a musical. Zanuck put Hathaway on suspension, and Hathaway agreed to make the film. Zanuck allowed Hathaway to make some key changes, including reducing the amount of musical interludes, and removing a sequence that made fun of a Chinese servant. (Hathaway later claimed ''Nob Hill'' was the only film "a studio ever handed me that I said I didn't want to make and I made it anyway.")
Fred MacMurray
Frederick Martin MacMurray (August 30, 1908 – November 5, 1991) was an American actor. He appeared in more than one hundred films and a successful television series, in a career that spanned nearly a half-century. His career as a major film le ...
proved unavailable due to delays on ''
Murder, He Says
''Murder, He Says'' is a 1945 American black comedy film directed by George Marshall and starring Fred MacMurray about a murderous rural family and the hapless pollster who becomes entangled in their hunt for a cache of money.
It was filmed in ...
'' and was replaced by George Raft. Raft had previously made a successful film set during this period for Zanuck, ''
The Bowery
The Bowery () is a street and neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. The street runs from Chatham Square at Park Row, Worth Street, and Mott Street in the south to Cooper Square at 4th Street in the north.Jackson, Kenneth L. "Bo ...
'' (1933). MacMurray instead went into ''
Where Do We Go From Here?''. Bari was then put in ''Where Do We Go From Here'' and Oberon dropped out; the female leads would be Vivian Blaine and Joan Bennett. Filming started in July 1944.
Reception
Box office
The film was one of the most popular releases at the US box office in 1945.
Critical
Bosley Crowther
Francis Bosley Crowther Jr. (July 13, 1905 – March 7, 1981) was an American journalist, writer, and film critic for ''The New York Times'' for 27 years. His work helped shape the careers of many actors, directors and screenwriters, though his ...
of ''
the New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' said the film was essentially a remake of ''
Hello, Frisco, Hello
''Hello, Frisco, Hello'' is a 1943 American musical film directed by H. Bruce Humberstone and starring Alice Faye, John Payne, Lynn Bari, and Jack Oakie. The film was made in Technicolor and released by 20th Century-Fox. This was one of the last ...
'', which was a remake of ''
Alexander's Ragtime Band
"Alexander's Ragtime Band" is a Tin Pan Alley song by American composer Irving Berlin released in 1911 and is often inaccurately cited as his first global hit. Despite its title, the song is a march as opposed to a rag and contains little sync ...
'', adding that "What's to be said about such wish-wash that hasn't been said before? Shall we say that the songs are presentable and that Vivian Blaine presents them all right? Shall we say that George Raft is rather silly... that Joan Bennett is even sillier... and that Peggy Ann Garner is badly wasted...? Or shall we just say that everything in it, including the whiskey (which flows freely), is corn—only this corn, unlike the whiskey, does not improve with age?"
References
External links
*
*
*
*
''Nob Hill''at ''NY Times''
Reviewat ''Variety''
{{Henry Hathaway
1945 films
Films directed by Henry Hathaway
Films set in San Francisco
Nob Hill, San Francisco
Barbary Coast, San Francisco
Films scored by David Buttolph
Films with screenplays by Wanda Tuchock
1940s historical musical films
American historical musical films
1940s English-language films
20th Century Fox films
1940s American films