Great Balls of Fire! (Barbara Stanwyck Meets Gary Cooper. and Sparks Fly)

There’s something about a patriotic holiday like 4^th of July that makes me want to go back in time, at least when it comes to my movie-viewing. (It’s easy, on the day of our nation’s birth, to settle on the perfect audio choice: the classic—and still hilarious—1961 comedy album, Stan Freberg Presents The United States of America: The Early Years. But I digress.) This past weekend, when it came to picking a movie, I settled for a screwball comedy with a title that sounds like a fireworks display: 1941’s Ball of Fire. Frankly, this title has nothing to do with the story that unfolds onscreen. But it suggests a blaze of romantic fireworks, which this movie delivers in spades.

 Ball of Fire has quite a pedigree. It was written by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, just before the latter decided it was time to start directing his own screenplays, resulting in such masterworks as Double Indemnity and The Lost Weekend. It was directed by Howard Hawks, coming off the sparkling His Girl Friday and the patriotic Sergeant York. On Sergeant York, the true-life story of a soft-spoken country boy who became a World War I hero, the leading role was played by Gary Cooper, who won an Oscar for his iconic strong-silent-type performance. In Ball of Fire, he would pivot to the comedic role of a naïve academic, Professor Bertram Potts. Also in 1941 the always-memorable Barbara Stanwyck was having a banner year, appearing in five films, including The Lady Eve and Meet John Doe, along with her sexy role as Sugarpuss O’Shea in Ball of Fire. With all this talent, plus a boat-load of memorable character actors like S.Z. Sakall and Oskar Homolka, the film proved to be a hit with both critics and the public. It was nominated for four Oscars (one for Stanwyck’s performance), and in 2016 was chosen for the National Film Registry.

 So what’s this slight but very funny film all about? It’s part of a time-honored Hollywood genre in which a good-hearted but naïve young man is transformed through his interaction with a woman of the world. How curious! We know Hollywood (both then and now) to be a place where the sharks are predominantly male, and innocent young ladies proceed at their own risk. Still, viewers in the 1940s seemed to love movies (whether romantic comedy or film noir) in which the man is an innocent, someone who faces and succumbs to the dangers posed by a predatory dame. A comedy classic of this ilk is Preston Sturges’ The Lady Eve, in which it’s Henry Fonda, not Gary Cooper, who’s  an unworldly academic falling prey to Stanwyck’s charms. The Lady Eve is a far more complicated movie than Ball of Fire, with a more ambiguous ending, and a film buff of my acquaintance vastly prefers it. Double Indemnity carries the same trope into  darker territory, with patsy Fred MacMurray lured by Stanwyck (now a blonde bombshell) into a deadly scheme for which he’ll ultimately take the fall. Clearly Stanwyck is a lady who shouldn’t be trusted . . . but Ball of Fire also hints at her softer side.

 It’s said that one of the major influences on Ball of Fire is Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Cooper’s character, you see, is a grammarian who – along with seven crochety scholars from various fields – is working on a ground-breaking new encyclopedia. All unmarried, they live together in a big house, pursuing their arcane research. Then Sugarpuss shows up and teaches them to dance the conga—and hilarity ensues.

 

The Pixilated Mr. Deeds

Today, when the integrity of the news media is constantly being challenged, and when a man from Vermont is admired by many for his “pixilated” horse sense, it seems a fine time to look back on one of screenwriter Robert Riskin’s best collaborations with Frank Capra, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town. Riskin’s daughter Victoria writes of this 1936 feature, “Of all his films, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town was my father’s favorite. It’s my favorite too, blending romance, humanity, and decency into the distinctive Riskin view of the world. Film historians call it the quintessentially American movie of the Golden Age of Hollywood.” One sign of Riskin’s own affection for this film: he gave the name of its hero to his  beloved dachshund, whom he trained to fetch his newspaper each morning.

Speaking of newspapers, they don’t come off well—at least initially—in Mr. Deeds Goes to Town. In the height of the Great Depression, a millionaire has died, leaving his entire fortune to a relative living in the cozy hamlet of Mandrake Falls. Longfellow Deeds, played by Gary Cooper, is a laid-back chap who writes greeting-card poetry, plays tuba in the local band, and can never resist chasing fire engines. To claim his inheritance, he is willingly transplanted to a New York City mansion.  There he enjoys fine clothes, the services of a butler, and the fun of sliding down the bannisters of his palatial home. But he is quickly skeptical of the lawyer who’s conniving to get his power of attorney, and he’s smart enough to sense that a good many people view him as a curiosity and an overgrown child. The one person he doesn’t see through is a pretty young woman named Mary (Jean Arthur in her first big role).  She tells him she’s faint from pounding the pavements all day, looking for work. What he’s slow to realize is that “Mary” is actually Louise “Babe” Bennett, a hard-boiled newspaper gal who plans to scoop the competition by publishing insider stories of the eccentric new millionaire she  mockingly labels “Cinderella Man.” 

Of course the plot thickens, particularly after Deeds decides to give away his new fortune by dividing it into farm plots for worthy out-of-work family men. Inevitably, the film climaxes in a sanity hearing where the greedy lawyer and some conniving distant relatives scheme to have him declared incompetent. You can probably guess who comes to his rescue. And of course there’s a happy ending in which the “little man” triumphs over the powers that be. I’m glad to say that the newspaper editor who was so eager for headline stories disparaging Longfellow Deeds ultimately becomes one of his biggest supporters.

The outcome of this film, though charming, is thoroughly predictable. For me the big surprise was the talent shown by Gary Cooper for screwball comedy. Coop, who played uncredited roles in early silent movies, was usually cast as a cowboy. When, at the end of the 1920s, he finally landed leading roles, he continued to play men of action: cowpokes, soldiers, French legionnaires. He won his first Oscar as a heroic World War I soldier in Sergeant York and his second as a  courageous lawman facing down a passel of bad guys in High Noon. Wonderful performances, but none of this prepared me for the charm he displays as Mr. Deeds. His Deeds is a wondrous creation: whimsical, impetuous, childlike but never childish. He may lack sophistication, but he’s brimming over in common sense.  If he’s accused in the courtroom of being “pixilated,” this seems a very good thing to be.