The Emergence of a Different Duke

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Steve (John Wayne): How'd you do last season?

Father Malone (Tom Tully): We showed up for every game.

Steve: I'd say that was raw courage.

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Most people probably think of westerns when they think of John Wayne. Or maybe war movies.

But "Trouble Along the Way," which premiered on this day in 1953, was neither.

I suppose you have to give credit for that to John Ford's "The Quiet Man," which premiered in 1952. That, I believe, was the first John Wayne movie that did not cast the Duke as a cowboy or a serviceman, and it opened up a whole new world for him, one on which movie production companies were only too happy to capitalize.

Ford didn't direct "Trouble Along the Way." Michael Curtiz (who directed "Casablanca") did. I don't often use the word heartwarming to describe a movie, but I could apply it to this one. I could also apply other words that are not as complimentary, but I think the writers may have realized that. To compensate, they loaded the script with dialogue that, in my opinion, was far wittier than most movies that were made in the late '40s and early '50s.

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For example, when Wayne and Father Burke (Charles Coburn) were talking about the football program at St. Anthony's College, Wayne asked, "What system do you use?"

"'Do unto others as you would have others do unto you,'" Burke replied. "But, usually, the others do it to us first."

In "Trouble Along the Way," Wayne played a recently divorced football coach (actually a college athletics instructor who was chronically unemployed because he was apparently incapable of getting along with the folks in charge). He needed to find a job to retain custody of his daughter.

Meanwhile the folks at St. Anthony's faced the prospect of having to shut down due to heavy debt, but Father Burke theorized that the school could get out of debt if it fielded a winning football team because that would attract the financial support of well–to‐do alumni.

To accomplish this, Wayne was hired to coach St. Anthony's football team.

(By the way, if you're a football fan, you probably believe the myth that Vince Lombardi was the first to say, "Winning isn't everything. It's the only thing." Lombardi did say it, but he wasn't the first; in fact, it was John Wayne in "Trouble Along the Way.")

I suppose it goes without saying that Wayne's character had some rough edges. Thus, to smooth out those edges, Donna Reed entered the picture as a social worker.

By the way, film buffs should look for James Dean in an uncredited appearance as a football spectator.

Not Exactly the Santa Fe Trail

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"I have given you fair warning. You can keep your heads or lose 'em as you wish."

John Brown (Raymond Massey)

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If you have never seen "Santa Fe Trail," which made its debut 75 years ago today, I guess it is important to know something before you do see it.

The movie has nothing whatsoever to do with the real Santa Fe Trail, which was a 19th–century transportation route that ran from Franklin in western Missouri to Santa Fe in northern New Mexico.

Rather, it was a pretty basic account of the events surrounding John Brown's raid at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia) — about 800 miles east of Franklin — less than two years before the start of the Civil War.

(Well, I suppose a rather tenuous connection could made from the fact that the trail started in Missouri and the railroad that would replace the Santa Fe Trail as a commercial route couldn't be built until Brown was driven from neighboring Kansas, an event that was re–created in "Santa Fe Trail," but making that mental connection would require the viewer to know certain details about American history that were never explored in "Santa Fe Trail" and a garden–variety moviegoer in 1940 was no more likely to know than one in 2015.)

It wasn't entirely literal history, by any stretch of the imagination, but it was a rousing good story, and it had a great cast.

It had Errol Flynn in it so audiences knew it would have lots of action and romance.

It had Olivia de Havilland in it so audiences knew they would be treated to a top–notch performance from an actress who, although her movie career was only a few years old at the time, was already regarded as being an actress in the classical mold.

It had Raymond Massey, who had been established as a classical actor for at least a decade and lent some of his personal credibility to the role of John Brown — even though, as I say, the movie is not the definitive word on the history of either the mid–19th century or John Brown.

And it had Ronald Reagan. No one knew at the time, of course, that Reagan would be elected president 40 years later. In the role of George Armstrong Custer, Reagan had a bit of a rivalry with Flynn's character, Jeb Stuart, that supposedly went back to their days at West Point.

I've been a student of American history most of my life. I will readily concede that I am not an authority on military history or military school history, and I don't know enough about Custer's individual relationships with his fellow cadets to pass judgment — but I do know that Custer had one of the worst personal conduct records in the school's history and was nearly expelled several times. Many of his demerits were received for pulling tricks on classmates so such a rivalry would not be inconceivable.

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But Jeb Stuart must have been a stand–in for all those who were pranked by Custer. Stuart and Custer were never classmates. Stuart was born six years before Custer and graduated three years before Custer enrolled at West Point.

For that matter, Stuart was a West Point classmate of several people who had noteworthy military careers, according to the movie, but it played fast and loose with the facts, just as it did in its account of John Brown.

If you believed the movie, Stuart was a classmate of James Longstreet, George Pickett, Phil Sheridan and John Bell "Sam" Hood as well as Custer, but Stuart was a teenager when Longstreet and Pickett graduated from West Point, and Stuart, as I say, had been gone for three years when Custer enrolled there. Stuart was at West Point when Sheridan and Hood were there, but they graduated a year before he did. I have seen no evidence that Stuart knew either one.

Also, I have heard nothing of a romance between Stuart and the woman known as Kit Carson Holliday, the name of de Havilland's character. Stuart was married to a woman named Flora and was reportedly devoted to her until his death during the Civil War.

The only Kit Carsons I ever heard of were men. I can only assume that Kit Carson Holliday was entirely fictional.

Another inconvenient fact. When you look at pictures of John Brown in history books, he always has a long beard, but he didn't grow his beard until after he left Kansas. Nevertheless, in "Santa Fe Trail," he is portrayed with a long beard.

But Hollywood never let the facts get in the way of a good story. (Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?)

And, as I say, it was a good story.

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It just wasn't literal history.

So if you are a student and you want to write a paper about John Brown or any of the other famous folks who were portrayed in "Santa Fe Trail," I implore you — don't use this movie as one of your sources.

Watch it and enjoy it. It's very entertaining.

But please don't treat it as a reputable factual source.

Watch For This Little-Known Christmas Movie

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"I'll say one thing about prison. You meet a better class of people."

Joseph (Humphrey Bogart)

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In only the most tenuous of ways, "We're No Angels" — I refer to the movie that made its debut 60 years ago today, not the one that was in the theaters in the late 1980s — was a Christmas movie.

But only just barely.

Nevertheless, it was probably my mother's favorite Christmas movie. She loved to quote her favorite lines from it (well, actually, that's the way she was about all the movies that she liked; she had her favorite lines and she kept them in reserve for use at the appropriate moments). There were many lines — and many scenes — in "We're No Angels" that my mother loved.

My earliest memories of her quoting that movie were long before I saw it — and only she and my father were in on the joke. I guess I was in college before I finally saw it, and, over the years, I have observed that it isn't a popular choice for TV schedulers. I think it should be, although I realize it will never be the holiday favorite that, say, "It's a Wonderful Life" has become.

As Christmas movies go, it is probably an acquired taste, like "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation."

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And I'll grant you it's a little difficult to warm up to a Christmas movie set on Devil's Island. But give it a try sometime. It's one of Humphrey Bogart's rare comedies — and it is a reminder of just how good he really was.

"We're No Angels" also reunited Bogart with the director of "Casablanca," Michael Curtiz.

Or you could watch it in the summer, as the original viewers did in 1955. Either way, it is very entertaining.

Besides, laughter seems to be in keeping with the joyous spirit of the Christmas season — unlike so many of the traditional seasonal songs and movies, which tend to be somber. Well, that's my take on it. If you haven't had the experience of seeing it yet, let me tell you a little bit about it.

I guess the first thing is to explain about Devil's Island. It was a notorious penal colony in French Guiana from the mid–19th to the mid–20th centuries. There were legitimate prisoners there, I suppose, but Devil's Island was primarily known as the place where political prisoners were kept.

The three stars of the movie — Bogart, Peter Ustinov, Aldo Ray — played traditional prisoners. I don't remember if their crimes were ever mentioned directly or if I just put two and two together, but it seems to me that Bogart was doing time for forgery, Ustinov was a safecracker who had murdered his wife and Ray had committed a sexual assault. The lessons each had learned from those experiences — both good and bad — were on display in the movie.

Just before Christmas, the three escaped from prison and made their way to a nearby town, where they found themselves at a store managed by a small family — the only shopkeepers willing to sell things on credit. The escapees offered to fix a hole in the roof and decided to stay until nightfall, when they would steal clothes and supplies and go on to a ship in the harbor, which would take them away from Devil's Island.

Well, that was the plan.

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But the longer they observed things from their perch on the roof, the more they came to realize that the family was in dire financial straits. The family — Leo G. Carroll, Joan Bennett and their daughter, Gloria Talbott — actually ran the store for its owner, their cousin Andre (Basil Rathbone), who measured everything in terms of cash value — and, as it turned out, cousin Andre showed up on Christmas Eve to evaluate things at the store. He had his nephew Paul (John Baer) with him, and they suspected the store's generous credit policy had caused considerable problems.

Isabel (Talbott) and Paul had had a summer fling, and Isabel was still infatuated with Paul. Paul, on the other hand, appeared to have moved on, having become engaged to another woman. Isabel was crushed when she learned the truth, and the escapees, having become quite fond of Isabel and her parents, decided to do something about the situation, but they weren't sure how to accomplish it.

The answer was, literally, in a box that Ray carried with him at all times. Inside the box was a poisonous viper named Adolphe — who was never seen but was mentioned frequently. In hilarious fashion, first Andre and then Paul took the box away, unable to see what was inside until it was too late. Apparently, Adolphe's poison acted quickly.

The humor of "We're No Angels" was often subtle. It wasn't a slapstick kind of movie. The viewer frequently had to think about what had just been said by one of the characters on the screen and look for the deeper meaning. It was a very clever script.

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Most people have to watch it two or three times because they miss some jokes when they're laughing at others.

It's worth it, though, especially at the end when the convicts decide to turn themselves in rather than face life in the real world, and, as they were walking away from the camera at the very end, halos appeared above each of their heads — and above Adolphe's cage, too.

Day's Dream

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Did you ever notice how much dreams figured in the career of Doris Day (who recently marked her 90th birthday)?

This isn't a joke. I'm serious.

Her second hit song was "My Dreams Are Getting Better All the Time."

She had a 10–inch LP called "I'll See You in My Dreams," which was the soundtrack for one of her movies, and she had two 12–inch LPs, "Day Dreams" and "I Have Dreamed" (which had seven songs that included the word dream in the title).

She appeared in two movies that had dream in the title and one TV short from the mid–1960s, "Every Girl's Dream."

Well, to be fair, I guess dreams do figure prominently in the existence of entertainers. In a sense, it is their business to sell dreams. I guess they aren't much different from sales people — except that they have to be entertaining. They're not selling a product; they're selling a mood, a state of mind. That's the key difference.

Most entertainers are not as obvious; they find synonyms (suitable ones for dream, for example, are "imagine/imagination," "fantasy," "thought," "reverie" and so on) to use.

But Doris Day was more direct with her fans, I suppose. And, to be fair, few entertainers have been as entitled to dream — even after it seemed their dreams came true — as Day.

At one time a frequent star of the big screen, Day hasn't been in a movie since the death of her husband/manager in 1968 left her penniless and deep in debt. She re–created herself for the small screen of television.

Initially, her dream was to be a dancer, but after she nearly died in a car crash, she refocused her attention on singing and acting.

In her mid–20s, she made her big–screen debut in a movie with Jack Carson, and a partnership of sorts was born. It may seem as if she made many more movies, but Day was in 39 — some with Carson, and, more widely remembered, some with Rock Hudson.

Her second movie, director Michael Curtiz's "My Dream Is Yours," which premiered 65 years ago today, also co–starred Carson.

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Like many of Day's movies, "My Dream Is Yours" was so light and airy it could have floated away on its own.

Carson played theatrical manager for Day, a widowed mom. He took her to Hollywood where she became a star. Her blossoming career, achieved in part at the expense of another performer for whom she has feelings, keeps them apart through most of the film — but not, apparently, off screen.

Suffice to say, the plot was not really the main attraction for the movie — nor is it today.

But, whereas Day was certainly an attraction for audiences in 1949, today the main attraction is to see an early example of a truly Roger Rabbitesque touch.

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Day and Carson, dressed in bunny suits, did a live action/animation sequence with Bugs Bunny and Tweety Bird (voices supplied by the late Mel Blanc) to "Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2" by Franz Liszt.

Now that was a dream sequence.