Themes: Pygmalion Stories, Members of the Press, Class Differences
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 Guide
Review
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 Guide
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
A corrupt tycoon brings his showgirl mistress with him to Washington when he tries to buy a Congressman. He hires a journalist to educate his girlfriend, and in the process, she learns just how corrupt her boyfriend is.
Uncouth tycoon Harry Brock (Broderick Crawford) goes to Washington, D.C. with his brassy mistress, Emma 'Billie' Dawn (Judy Holliday), and his crooked lawyer, Jim Devery (Howard St. John), to "influence" a politician or two. The lawyer also presses Harry to marry Billie on the grounds that a wife cannot testify against her husband.
Harry becomes disgusted with Billie's ignorance and lack of manners (though he himself is much worse) and hires a tutor for her, journalist Paul Verrall (William Holden). Blossoming under Paul's encouragement, Billie turns out to be much smarter than anybody knew and begins thinking for herself. The two fall in love.
Meanwhile, Devery had persuaded Harry to sign over many of his assets to Billie to hide them from the government. When Harry needs to get them back, he comes into conflict with Billie's new-found independence. She and Paul use her leverage to escape from Harry's domination; she promises to give him back his property little by little as long as he leaves them alone. Billie and Paul marry.
The British film magazine Picturegoer awarded the film its Seal of Merit, but warned its readers that Holliday's character is "from New York's East Side, and speaks in a baby Bronx voice that is like the tinkling of many tiny, tuneless cymbals." The magazine admired Holliday's performance and spoke of her in the same breath as Carole Lombard.
