Working Together Again

When the old studio system was thriving, particularly during the Golden Age, it was common practice to put contract players together in movies over and over again.  After all, if a coupling seemed to work in one film, why not do another and another?  Arguably this happened at Warner Brothers more than any other studio.  We're not talking about teams (Martin and Lewis) or those who played the same characters over and over (Powell and Loy in The Thin Man).  But at Warners it seemed as though the same five people worked together frequently.  Let's see who they are...

At Warners we could be talking about Cagney, Raft, Davis, Robinson, Bogart, De Havilland, all heavyweights, but we're not.  We're speaking of Ann Sheridan, Dennis Morgan, Alexis Smith, Jack Carson and Jane Wyman.  In one grouping or another, these actors (and friends) made a whopping 27 movies together.

College Rhythm (1934)

Directed by Norman Taurog

Featuring the screen debuts of radio comedian Joe Penner and singer Lanny Ross, the lightweight story concerns football heroes-rivals in love with the same girl.  If you don't blink, you might spot Sheridan and Wyman as chorus girls.

Rumba (1935)

Directed by Marion Gering

George Raft and Carole Lombard were the stars in a story about a bored society girl who sets her sights on a dancer in a Broadway show.  Once again Wyman and Sheridan (both unbilled) play chorus girls.

Honeymoon for Three (1941)

Directed by Lloyd Bacon

Sheridan stars with George Brent (whom she would marry the following year and divorce the year after that) as a secretary and her boss at odds over his friendship with another woman.   Wyman has an even smaller role as a friend.  Sheridan looks gorgeous and her famous barbs are in full evidence.

Ann Sheridan

Bad Men of Missouri (1941)

Directed by Ray Enright

Westerns weren't the best venue for either Morgan or Wyman as I see it.  But here they are in a highly fictionalized bio of the famous outlaws, the Younger brothers.

Navy Blues (1941)

Directed by Lloyd Bacon

A musical comedy concerning Naval silliness about seaman with too much time on their hands.  Jack Carson, Jack Haley, Jack Oakie and Jackie Gleason provide all the jack and Sheridan and Martha Raye provide the distractions.

Affectionately Yours (1941)

Directed by Lloyd Bacon

A decent comedy about a philandering husband who gets upset when he hears his wife is seeing another man.  It has its moments.  Morgan is the husband.  It's interesting that WB brought in two outside actresses for the leading female roles, Merle Oberon and Rita Hayworth.  Smith was assigned a smaller role.

Wings for the Eagle (1942) 

Directed by Lloyd Bacon

Sheridan, Morgan and Carson are involved in a love triangle as aircraft workers during WWII.  Carson and Sheridan are unhappily married and Carson's friend Morgan comes to stay with them for awhile with unhappy results.  Carson replaced Ronald Reagan in the role.

(Reagan, who was married to Wyman throughout the 40s was always included in this group of good buddies.  He also starred in movies with most of them.  These folks socialized outside of work, too.  No wonder they didn't mind working with one another again and again.)

Gentleman Jim (1942)

Directed by Raoul Walsh

Highly popular but fanciful bio of Jim Corbett who brought manners and some respect to 1880s boxing in San Francisco.  This period piece is well-done with Errol Flynn perfection in the title role and Smith gorgeous as his lady love and Carson as a friend.

Jane Wyman

Larceny Inc. (1942)       

Directed by Lloyd Bacon

The comic tale of three crooks who buy a luggage store so they can tunnel into a bank they intend to rob stars Edward Robinson in a rare comedy role.  Wyman is the female lead and Carson, Anthony Quinn and Broderick Crawford costar.                                                                                               

Thank Your Lucky Stars (1943)

Directed by David Butler

Yes, another of those all-star spectacles with Morgan, Sheridan, Carson, Smith and a glossary of WB stars but not Wyman.  Eddie Cantor and Joan Leslie star in a silly story about a wartime charity show.  Cantor was not a performer I much cared for.

The Hard Way (1943)

Directed by Vincent Sherman

For my money, here's the best of the films outlined here.  Ida Lupino and Joan Leslie are sisters with the former trying to push the latter into a singing career.  Morgan and Carson love Leslie at different times in the story.

Princess O'Rourke (1943)

Directed by Norman Krasna

A precursor of sorts to Roman Holiday.  A pilot falls in love with a woman he believes is starting a job as a maid but instead is a princess on the lam.  Olivia de Havilland and Robert Cummings are the leads and Wyman and Carson are married friends.  Not bad at all.  Cummings was the third choice for the role.  I wish there'd been a fourth.

(de Havilland did not want to make Princess O'Rourke and she had a tussle with Warners over doing it.  She was so angry with them that she took them to court because when she said she wouldn't do it, they would, as always suspend her and add the time that it took for the film to be made to her contract.  She claimed that was unfair and the courts agreed that no extra time could be added to contracts due suspensions.)  

Shine on Harvest Moon (1944)

Directed by David Butler

In their second outing, Sheridan and Morgan play real-life, late 1800s Broadway musical stars Nora Bayes and Jack Norworth to perfection.  Carson is along to handle the comedy and the sarcasm.  Lots of fun tunes with Morgan, as always, in fine voice.

(Of their three films together, Harvest Moon was surely the most popular for Morgan and Sheridan.  Both were popular with the public and the WB biggies loved them both, particularly him.)

Make Your Own Bed (1944)

Directed by Peter Godfrey

Carson and Wyman are at their comic best as a romantic couple who hire on as servants for an important man who doesn't seem to be able to keep staff.  His secret life unfolds to a comedy potpourri.  This film is largely unknown and that's too bad.

Alexis Smith

Hollywood Canteen (1944)

Directed by Delmer Daves

Carson, Morgan, Smith and Wyman are among the many WB stars (though Sheridan was missing) in this musical-romance about the Hollywood nitery where stars entertained soldiers during WWII.  Stars all over Hollywood, from all studios, worked at the canteen but since WB was making the film, only their stars are featured.  The romantic piece surrounds Joan Leslie, playing herself, and a young soldier (Robert Hutton) who adores her.

The Doughgirls (1944)

Directed by James V. Kern

Sheridan, Carson, Smith and Wyman (sans Morgan) are joined by Eve Arden, Charlie Ruggles, Irene Manning and Craig Stevens in a screwball comedy about trying to get a New York hotel room during WWII and a gaggle of folks who wind up in one room, violating hotel policy.  It's not perfect but it has its comic moments and I've always had a soft spot for it.  

(Alexis Smith and Craig Stevens were married shortly after the film's release and would remain so for 51 years.  In The Doughgirls they were planning to be married.)

One More Tomorrow (1946)

Directed by Peter Godfrey

All five of them... Sheridan, Morgan, Carson, Smith and Wyman star in this film and this is the only one in which all five starred.  The brief synopsis is that it's the story of a rich guy (Morgan) who marries the wrong woman (Smith) instead of the woman he loves (Sheridan), who turned him down.  Untangling his mess is at the heart of the tale.  Sheridan works as a magazine reporter and Wyman is her photographer.  Carson plays Morgan's caustic butler/friend.  Carson and Smith are terrific. 

Night and Day (1946)

Directed by Michael Curtiz

Here is a popular but rather strange biography of tunesmith Cole Porter and his wife Linda with Smith and Cary Grant in the roles.  It's hard to not like the movie although it certainly knew how to circumvent the truth.  Most importantly not mentioning that the Porters were both gay was too bad but Grant and Smith were both inspired choices for the roles.  Wyman is along as a singer.   Of course, glorious Porter tunes are a highlight.

Two Guys from Milwaukee (1946)

Directed by David Butler

Here is a comedy with Morgan as a Balkan prince who wants to visit New York City to observe ordinary life (an odd choice... was Peoria boarded up?) and he befriends Carson and tries to steal his girlfriend.  Leslie and Janis Paige are along for the romance.

The Time, the Place and the Girl (1947)

Directed by David Butler

The boys, Morgan and Carson, are back with another lightweight musical-comedy romance that has them as nightclub owners whose neighbors want to close them down.  No matter what these two appeared in, the public loved how they played off one another.  Paige was back again and would spend much of her WB career in movies with Carson.

Dennis Morgan

Cheyenne (1947)

Directed by Raoul Walsh

I guess the studio saw something financially rewarding to reteam Morgan and Wyman in another western.  He is helping a sheriff find a notorious stagecoach robber and while on a coach heading for Cheyenne, he meets two women (Wyman and yes again, Paige) that may prove valuable in his quest.

(In 1948 Wyman would win an Oscar for Johnny Belinda and after her WB contract expired at the end of the decade, she would cease  doing silly comedies for some time.  She would no longer do movies with her four buddies, no more chorus girls, westerns or fifth billing.)

Always Together (1947)

Directed by Frederick De Cordova

It is a little B flick that WB was hoping would make Robert Hutton and Joyce Reynolds into big stars.  Unfortunately it never happened.  They play a young married couple who come into a considerable amount of money and she fantasizes that her life is like in a movie.  Again, a goodly number of WB stars appeared including Morgan, Carson and Smith.

Two Guys from Texas (1947)

Directed by David Butler

Morgan and Carson play a song and dance team who get stranded in the vicinity of a Texas dude ranch and since Morgan falls for ranch owner Dorothy Malone, they decided to stay on.  Sounds like it might have been more suitable for any other comedy team but Morgan and Carson had certainly perfected their screen work.  Fluff.

Flight Angels (1949)

Directed by Lewis Seiler

Not a very notable film about commercial pilots and the women who love them.  Yawn.  Morgan is the male star and Wyman has a smaller role.  

(Part of the charm of the Morgan-Carson movie friendship was certainly based on their real-life friendship.  BFFs they were.  They knew how to play off one another with precision.  WB saw it and cast them in film after film.)

Jack Carson

It's A Great Feeling (1949)

Directed by David Butler

In 1948 the movies discovered Doris Day and WB signed her to a contract.  In her first three films she was paired with Carson.  Here she is a waitress in the WB commissary who wants to be a movie star.  Carson and Morgan, playing themselves, agree to help her.  Wyman has a cameo as herself.

The Lady Takes a Sailor (1949)

Directed by Michael Curtiz

A little romantic-comedy not worthy of the people working in it, especially, perhaps, its most accomplished director.  Wyman, after all these years, finally received top billing.  Thanks, Oscar.  Morgan is the man.

(Thus ends the casting of these good buddies at Warner Bros.  Most of them were soon leaving the studio for other adventures.  But two of them ended up at Paramount working for the great Frank Capra.)

Here Comes the Groom (1951)

Directed by Frank Capra

Bing Crosby plays a man who has just adopted two orphans but will lose them if he doesn't marry within five days.  He tries to re-woo his ex-fiance, played by Wyman, but she is planning to marry Franchot Tone, who has just been divorced by Smith.  Wyman proved herself to be quite a good singer and Smith was more beautiful than ever.  I found it to be a fun film which also featured that year's Oscar-winning best song, In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening.

Next posting:

a tale of treachery