Main Cast: Adolphe Menjou, Pat O'Brien, Mary Brian, Edward Everett Horton, Walter Catlett
Release Year: 1931
Country: US
Run Time: 101 minutes
Plot
This first of four film versions of the Ben Hecht/Charlrd MacArthur Broadway hit stars Adolphe Menjou as explosive Chicago newspaper-editor Walter Burns and Pat O'Brien as his star reporter Hildy Johnson. Hildy is on the verge of getting married and retiring from Burns' dirty little tabloid, but he agrees to cover one last story: the politically motivated execution of convicted cop killer Earl Williams (George E. Stone). Thanks to the stupidity of the police, Williams manages to escape, and Johnson hides the wounded fugitive in a rolltop desk in the prison pressroom. Burns enters the scene, senses a swell story (and also a means of keeping Johnson on his payroll), and conspires with Johnson to keep Williams out of sight until they can secure an exclusive interview. Burns will do anything to keep Johnson on the scene, including having the reporter's future mother-in-law kidnapped. Complicating matters are Johnson's fiancée Peggy (Mary Brian), Williams' girlfriend Molly Malloy (Mae Clarke), and the corrupt mayor (James Gordon) and sheriff (Clarence C. Wilson), who have railroaded Williams to the death house in order to win votes and are now trying to suppress the news that the governor has commuted Williams' sentence. The Front Page was remade by Howard Hawks in 1939 as His Girl Friday, with the symbiotic relationship between Burns and Johnson changed to a sexual one by transforming Hildy Johnson into a woman (played by Rosalind Russell) with Cary Grant as her old flame Walter. It was again remade by Billy Wilder in 1974 with Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, Carol Burnett, and a young Susan Sarandon. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
Long unavailable due to a couple of highly successful remakes, the original screen version of Ben Hecht's and Charles MacArthur's 1928 Broadway hit remains perhaps the most faithful to it theatrical origins -- although, as an inside joke, several character names were altered to reflect the change in medium, e.g. "George Kid Cukor" and "Judge Mankiewicz." But Walter Burns (Adolphe Menjou) is still attempting to keep star reporter Hildy Johnson (Pat O'Brien) from leaving his place at the paper in favor of marrying the upwardly mobile Peggy Grant (Mary Brian). And poor Earl Williams (George E. Stone's), whose upcoming hanging drives the plot, is still more or less ignored while the tough reporters crack wise. The overlapping lines are much in evidence here and obviously not the invention of Howard Hawks, whose gender-switch remake His Girl Friday (1941) may be faster but not nearly as gritty. Menjou, who actually fits his bombastic role better than perhaps expected, was actually a last minute replacement when the original choice, Louis Wolheim, suddenly died. Menjou went on to win an Academy Award nomination for his efforts. Producer Howard Hughes drew mightily from the Warner Bros. stock company and every role, no matter how small, is filled with such notorious scene stealers as Edward Everett Horton as the prissy Bensinger; Clarence H. Wilson as the inane sheriff, and Mae Clarke as the self-sacrificing streetwalker Molly Malloy. In fact; Miss Clarke conveys the character's desperation skillfully. According to Mary Brian, The Front Page was this charming actress' favorite film. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
The film, considered a screwball comedy, centers on an investigative reporter (Pat O'Brien) and his editor (Adolphe Menjou), who hope to cash in on a big story involving an escaped accused murderer (Stone) and hide him in a rolltop desk while everybody else tries to find him.
