Movies:
Born Yesterday
DVD Release
- Release Date: 2000
- Audio: English [mono]
- Subtitles: English, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Korean, Thai
- Digitally mastered audio and video
- Production notes
- Interactive menus
- Vintage advertising
- Talent files
- Theatrical trailer
- Bonus trailers
- Scene selections
- Rating:
- Genre: Comedy
- Movie Type: Romantic Comedy, Comedy of Manners
- Themes: Pygmalion Stories, Members of the Press, Class Differences
- Director: George Cukor
- Main Cast: Broderick Crawford, Judy Holliday, William Holden, Howard St. John, Frank Otto
- Release Year: 1950
- Country: US
- Run Time: 103 minutes
- MPAA Rating: NR
Plot
Garson Kanin's Broadway hit was transferred to the screen with only a few passing nods to the stricter censorship required by films. Judy Holliday won an Oscar for her portrayal of Billie Dawn, a strident, dim-bulbed ex-chorus girl who is the mistress of millionaire junk tycoon Harry Brock (Broderick Crawford). In Washington to put a few senators and congressmen in his pocket (the better to lay the groundwork for an illegal cartel), the rude-and-crude Brock realizes that the unrefined Billie will prove an embarrassment. Thus he hires idealistic but impoverished Paul Verrell (William Holden) to pump some intelligence and "class" into Billie. Paul does his job too well; by awakening Billie's social and political consciousness, he turns the girl into Brock's most formidable foe in his efforts to buy influence in DC. Along the way Paul and Billie fall in love. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie GuideReview
Born Yesterday is remembered today primarily for Judy Holliday's Oscar-winning comic performance. At its release, though, it was considerably more controversial, generating protests that proclaimed the film Communist-sympathizing for suggesting that American politics could be corrupt. The core of the story is largely borrowed from George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, with Broderick Crawford as the authority figure who hires William Holden to tutor the coarse but good-natured Holliday. The film's emphasis is humor, not politics, with Crawford's character intended primarily as Holliday's foil rather than as any sort of serious social commentary. Certainly, crooked politicians were nothing new to motion pictures, but the film was released into an era of Anti-Communism when even the smallest criticism of the U.S. government was perceived as serving the Communist cause. So strong was this mood that Holliday was investigated by the FBI -- and cleared via a personal message from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to studio chief Harry Cohn. Audiences today will likely wonder what all the fuss was about, particularly the reaction of gossip columnist Hedda Hopper, who thought Holliday's Best Actress Oscar was an immoral disgrace. ~ Richard Gilliam, All Movie GuideCast
- Broderick Crawford - Harry Brock
- Judy Holliday - Billie Dawn
- William Holden - Paul Verrall
- Howard St. John - Jim Devery
- Frank Otto - Eddie
Larry Oliver - Norval Hedges; Barbara Brown - Mrs. Hedges; Grandon Rhodes - Sanborn; Claire Carleton - Helen; Charles Cane - Policeman; Helen Eby-Rock - Manicurist; Mike Mahoney - Elevator Operator; Paul Marion - Interpreter; David Pardon - Barber; Ram Singh - Native; Smoki Whitfield - Bootblack; John Morley - Native
