On This Day... Notorious (1946)

 On this day in 1946, Notorious, Cary Grant's 49th full length feature film, was released.

Summary: 

It is 1946 and while World War II might be over, Nazis still loyal to the Third Reich can be found. Alicia Huberman's (Ingrid Bergman's) father was such a man, and he has just been convicted of treason in the U.S. Ms. Huberman did not share her father's views, but has gained notoriety as the daughter of a convicted traitor. U.S. Intelligence, in the form of Mr. Devlin (Cary Grant), see this notoriety as an opportunity, recruiting her to infiltrate a group of Nazis living in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

 The group is lead by Alexander Sebastian (Claude Rains), an ex-flame of Alicia. Alicia manages to infiltrate the group, but her previous relationship with Sebastian complicates things, as does her developing relationship with Devlin.

Cast:

Cary Grant... Devlin

Ingrid Bergman...Alicia Huberman

Claude Rains...Alexander Sebastian

Louis Calhern...Paul Prescott

Leopoldine Konstantin...Mme. Sebastian (as Madame Konstantin)

Reinhold Schünzel...Dr. Anderson' (as Reinhold Schunzel)

Moroni Olsen...Walter Beardsley

Ivan Triesault...Eric Mathis

Alexis Minotis...Joseph (as Alex Minotis)

Wally Brown...Mr. Hopkins

Charles Mendl...Commodore (as Sir Charles Mendl)

Ricardo Costa...Dr. Barbosa

E.A. Krumschmidt...Hupka (as Eberhard Krumschmidt)

Fay Baker...Ethel

Did You Know?

After filming had ended, Cary Grant kept the famous UNICA key. A few years later he gave the key to his great friend and co-star Ingrid Bergman, saying that the key had given him luck and hoped it would do the same for her. Many years later, at a tribute to director Sir Alfred Hitchcock, Bergman went off-script and presented the key to him, to his surprise and delight.

Director Sir Alfred Hitchcock and screenwriter Ben Hecht consulted Nobel Prize winner Dr. Robert Millikan on how to make an atomic bomb. He refused to answer, but confirmed that the principal ingredient, uranium, could fit in a wine bottle.

Sir Alfred Hitchcock got the shot where Ingrid Bergman is in the background and the coffee cup is in the foreground, with both in focus, by using a giant coffee cup placed farther away than it appears.

Sir Alfred Hitchcock claimed that the F.B.I. had him under surveillance for three months because this movie dealt with uranium.

The kissing scene on the balcony was largely improvised. Sir Alfred Hitchcock told Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman to just speak as lovers would.

This is the second adaptation of the story "The Song of the Dragon" by John Taintor Foote. The first being the silent movie, Convoy (1927).

While filming one shot, Cary Grant carped that he was supposed to open the door with his right hand, but he was holding his hat in that hand. "Have you considered the possibility of transferring the hat to the other hand?" Sir Alfred Hitchcock replied.

The movie Mission Impossible II, directed by John Woo and written by Bruce Geller and Ronald D. Moore seems a virtual remake of Notorious, in plot, characters, story line and some sequences are almost scene by scene.

When Alicia and Devlin are flying to South America, the movement of the clouds makes it appear that the plane is flying backwards.

Quotes:

Alicia: This is a very strange love affair.

Devlin: Why?

Alicia: Maybe the fact that you don't love me.

Devlin: A man doesn't tell a woman what to do. She tells herself.

Alicia: You're sore because you've fallen for a little drunk you tamed in Miami and you don't like it. It makes you sick all over, doesn't it? People will laugh at you, the invincible Devlin, in love with someone who isn't worth even wasting the words on.

Madame Sebastian: Wouldn't it be a little too much if we both grinned at her like idiots.

Alicia: I'm terrified.

Devlin: Just pretend you're a janitor. Janitors are never terrified.

Alicia: I have a feeling they're very slow.

Alicia: Dev, is that you? I am glad you are late. This chicken took longer than I expected... what did they say? Hope it isn't done too - too much. Of course, i-it caught fire once... I think it's better if I cut it up out here, unless you want a half of one for yourself. We're going to have knives and forks, after all, I've decided we're going to eat in style. Marriage must be wonderful with this sort of thing going on everyday.

Alicia: This fog gets me.

Devlin: That's your hair in your eyes.

Ethel: Where are you going?

Mr. Hopkins: Fishing.

Ethel: At this time of night? You're mad.

Mr. Hopkins: What's the difference? There's no fish, day or night.

Lobby Cards and Posters:

Directed and Produced by Alfred Hitchcock.

Distributed by RKO Radio.

Running Time: 103 minutes.

Artwork by Rebekah Hawley at Studio36.

On This Day...Cary Grant Marries His Fourth Wife: Dyan Cannon.

On July 22, 1965, Cannon married actor Cary Grant, who was 33 years her senior. 

The two actors had been dating for a few years before they tied the knot in 1965, when Grant was 61 and Cannon was 28. But the age difference didn’t matter to the young actress – she was smitten with Grant and was ready to do anything to make him happy.

"[Catering to Cary] was the most important thing in my life - more important than working, more important than anything. That was the big flaw. I pushed aside everything that I'd desired to make him happy." - Dyan Cannon

They had one daughter, Jennifer (born February 26, 1966), who also is an actress.  They were divorced on March 21, 1968.

On This Day... That Touch Of Mink (1962)

 Released today back in 1962, That Touch of Mink was Cary Grant's 69th full length feature film.

Summary:

Cathy Timberlake (Doris Day) is an old-fashioned country girl who meets the man of her dreams, Philip Shayne (Cary Grant), after his Rolls Royce splashes her with mud on her way to a job interview. Philip is a romantic businessman who is taken by Cathy's honest heart. There's one problem, he's not interested in marriage while Cathy has never thought of anything else.

Cast:

Cary Grant..Philip Shayne

Doris Day...Cathy Timberlake

Gig Young...Roger

Audrey Meadows...Connie Emerson

John Astin...Mr. Everett Beasley

Dick Sargent...Young Man (Harry Clark) (as Richard Sargent)

Joey Faye...Short Man

Laurie Mitchell...Showgirl

John Fiedler...Mr. Smith

Willard Sage...Tom Hodges

Jack Livesey...Doctor Richardson

Did You Know?

When Cary Grant noticed an ad for a raincoat that he thought would be appropriate for Doris Day to wear in the picture, he called the owner of the company who made it. After explaining who he was and what he wanted the coat for, he was given the brush-off by the manufacturer, Norman Zeiler, who later recalled that he didn't believe it was Grant. "So I told him if he wanted to see our collection, he'd have to come up himself. And he did." The much-imitated Grant, who usually made all his own calls and answered his home phone himself, often had that problem. People just couldn't believe it was really Cary Grant they were talking to.

Doris Day was 39 when this film was made, although her character was supposed to be in her twenties.

Rock Hudson had expected to be cast as Philip, but director Delbert Mann wanted Cary Grant.

In her autobiography, Doris Day wrote: "Of all the people I performed with, I got to know Cary Grant least of all. He is a completely private person, totally reserved, and there is no way into him. Our relationship on That Touch of Mink (1962) was amicable but devoid of give-and-take...Not that he wasn't friendly and polite - he certainly was. But distant. Very distant. But very professional - maybe the most professional, exacting actor I ever worked with. In the scenes we played, he concerned himself with every little detail: clothes, sets, production values, the works. Cary even got involved in helping to choose the kind of mink I was slated to wear in the film."

Cary Grant involved himself in many details of the production. For a scene that took place in his character's library, he arrived to work with boxes of items from the library in his own house and placed them about the set. According to Doris Day, this served not only to make the set more attractive but also made him feel more relaxed and at home, giving his performance "that peculiarly natural, suave quality that is the hallmark of his pictures."

The movie was filmed on location in New York. Some sources claim it was also shot in Bermuda, but others state that the scenes of the Bermuda resort were actually shot at the Fairmont Miramar Hotel in Santa Monica.

Cary Grant was a huge fan of the New York Yankees, which likely made it easier for the producers to get Yogi Berra, Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris to appear in the film.

Quotes:

Cathy Timberlake: [very drunk] Do you like the way I walk?

Philip Shayne: Poetry in motion.

Cathy Timberlake: I learned when I was a baby, been walking for years.

Philip Shayne: The Four Horsemen now have a riding companion. There's War, Famine, Death, Pestilence, and Miss Timberlake!

Cathy Timberlake: Look, he doesn't love me. He just feels sorry for me.

Roger: Doesn't love you? He's compared you to the plague!

Cathy Timberlake: How would you feel? Here I am, he practically runs me down and then drives right away! And doesn't have the decency to apologise himself. Furthermore I have a job interview and have to go like this. He doesn't care.

On set.

Roger: Ohhh...

Cathy Timberlake: You know what I'd like to do?

Roger: Throw the money in his face?

Cathy Timberlake: Exactly! I'd like to throw that money right in his face.

Roger: Would you?

Cathy Timberlake: Yes, I would.

Roger: I've waited seven years for this moment. You come with me!

Philip Shayne: That's it, Roger. Now you have plenty of friends. Find her a husband. A simple, dull, unimaginative man who'll smile tolerantly when he comes home from work and learns she's misplaced the children.

Cathy Timberlake: [Cathy is rushing off to meet Philip, over Connie's objections] Connie, this is terribly important to me. I've got to *prove* to him that I'm a woman!

Connie Emerson: [calls after her] Well, there are easier ways to do it. Send him your birth certificate!

Cathy Timberlake: And I'm unstable. What kind of mother would I make for our children?

Philip Shayne: Well we'll try three or four if that doesn't work out, we'll breed poodles.

Lobby Cards:

Directed by Delbert Mann

Distributed by Universal-International

Produced by Granley Company-Arwin Productions.

Running time: 99 minutes. 

Artwork by Rebekah Hawley at Studio36.

On This Day... North By Northwest (1959)

North by Northwest was Cary Grant's 66th full length feature film and was released this day in 1959.  

Summary:

Madison Avenue advertising man, Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant), finds himself thrust into a world of espionage when mistaken for another man. When Thornhill tries to make sense of the case, he is framed for murder. On the run from the police, he boards the 20th Century Limited train bound for Chicago where he meets a beautiful blonde, Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint), who helps him to evade the authorities....but is Eve the innocent bystander he thought she was? 

Cast:

Cary Grant...Roger Thornhill

Eva Marie Saint...Eve Kendall

James Mason...Phillip Vandamm

Jessie Royce Landis...Clara Thornhill

Leo G. Carroll ...The Professor

Josephine Hutchinson...Mrs. Townsend

Philip Ober...Lester Townsend

Martin Landau...Leonard

Adam Williams...Valerian

Edward Platt...Victor Larrabee

Robert Ellenstein...Licht

Les Tremayne...Auctioneer

Philip Coolidge...Dr. Cross

Patrick McVey...Sergeant Flamm

Edward Binns...Captain Junket

Ken Lynch...Charley

Did You Know?

While filming Vertigo (1958), Sir Alfred Hitchcock described some of the plot of this project to frequent Hitchcock leading man and "Vertigo" star James Stewart, who naturally assumed that Hitchcock meant to cast him in the Roger Thornhill role, and was eager to play it. Actually, Hitchcock wanted Cary Grant to play the role. By the time Hitchcock realized the misunderstanding, Stewart was so anxious to play Thornhill that rejecting him would have caused a great deal of disappointment. So Hitchcock delayed production on this movie until Stewart was already safely committed to filming Otto Preminger's "Anatomy of a Murder (1959)" before "officially" offering him the role in this movie. Stewart had no choice but to turn down the offer, allowing Hitchcock to cast Grant, the actor he had wanted all along.

Vandamm remarks in the Rapid City, South Dakota house scene that the plane taking them out of the country should touch down in "ten minutes". It is exactly ten minutes in real-time when they see the plane landing on the landing strip.

Cary Grant found the screenplay baffling, and midway through filming told Sir Alfred Hitchcock, "It's a terrible script. We've already done a third of the picture and I still can't make head nor tail of it!" Hitchcock knew this confusion would only help the movie; after all, Grant's character had no idea what was going on either. Grant thought the movie would be a flop right up until its premiere, where it was rapturously received.

Sir Alfred Hitchcock filmed Cary Grant's entrance into the United Nations building from across the street with a hidden camera. When he gets to the top of the stairs, a man about to walk down does a double take upon seeing the movie star.

The scene where the crop duster is chasing and shooting at Thornhill was filmed with a real airplane while the shot where the plane crashes into the fuel truck was done using large models of both truck and plane.

It was journalist Otis L. Guernsey, Jr. who suggested to Sir Alfred Hitchcock the premise of a man mistaken for a nonexistent secret agent. He was inspired, he said, by a real-life case during World War II, known as Operation Mincemeat, in which British intelligence hoped to lure Italian and German forces away from Sicily, a planned invasion site. A cadaver was selected and given an identity and phony papers referring to invasions of Sardinia and Greece. The Man Who Never Was (1956) recounted the operation.

In a Turner Classic Movies interview, according to screenwriter Ernest Lehman (who worked in close collaboration with Sir Alfred Hitchcock), the working title was "In A Northwesterly Direction". The head of the story department at MGM said "Why don't you call it 'North by Northwest'?" Lehman says that he and Hitchcock adopted that as the new working title, always assuming that they'd come up with something better. Hitchcock also jokingly wanted to call it "The Man in Lincoln's Nose", but claimed the idea was vetoed by the Park Commissioner. Other working titles included "Breathless", "In a North West Direction", and "The C.I.A. Story". So the creators thought the title was a meaningless placeholder. However, in fact Thornhill flew north from Chicago to South Dakota on Northwest Airlines, or "north by Northwest."

The footage of Park Avenue in Manhattan, which appears as a reflection in the facade of an office building under Saul Bass' opening credits, is an approximately 12-seconds-long "loop" which plays four times. The "splice" in the loop is covered by a 2-second lap dissolve each time.

If the fictional Thornhill had plans, as he stated, to attend the Winter Garden Theatre when the movie opened in the U.S. in July of 1959 (when he was kidnapped from the Oak Room), his tickets would have been for "West Side Story."

Thornhill orders a Gibson on the train. This is composed of gin and dry vermouth, as in a traditional martini, but with cocktail onions instead of olives.

Originally cast and crew were staying at the Palms Motel in McFarland, CA for the crop dusting scene. However, the first night staying there they realized the bar closed at 10:30pm each evening. So they moved their accommodations for the remaining stay of the crop dusting scene to Bakersfield, CA.

In 2006, a panel of GQ Magazine fashion experts said the gray suit worn by Cary Grant throughout almost the entire movie was the best suit in movie history. It was also the most influential on men's style, stating that it has since been copied for Tom Cruise's character in Collateral (2004) and Ben Affleck's character in Paycheck (2003). This sentiment has been echoed by writer Todd McEwen, who called it "gorgeous", and wrote a short story "Cary Grant's Suit", which recounted this movie's plot from the viewpoint of the suit.

(See blog: Well He's A Well Tailored One )

Quotes:

[Thornhill is wearing sunglasses to hide his identity]

Ticket Seller: Something wrong with your eyes?

Roger Thornhill: Yes, they're sensitive to questions.

Roger Thornhill: Now you listen to me, I'm an advertising man, not a red herring. I've got a job, a secretary, a mother, two ex-wives and several bartenders that depend upon me, and I don't intend to disappoint them all by getting myself "slightly" killed.

Roger Thornhill: No. No, Mother, I have not been drinking. No. No. These two men, they poured a whole bottle of bourbon into me. No, they didn't give me a chaser.

Eve Kendall: Roger O. Thornhill. What does the O stand for?

Roger Thornhill: Nothing.

Man at Prairie Crossing: That's funny, that plane's dustin' crops where there ain't no crops.

Eve Kendall: [Hanging by their fingers from Mount Rushmore] What happened with your first two marriages?

Roger Thornhill: My wives divorced me.

Eve Kendall: Why?

Roger Thornhill: They said I led too dull a life.

Roger Thornhill: You're police, aren't you? Or is it FBI?

The Professor: FBI, CIA, ONI... we're all in the same alphabet soup.

Posters and Lobby Cards:

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

Distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Running time: 136 minutes.

Artwork by Rebekah Hawley at Studio 36.