In Hamilton McFadden's 1934 film "Stand Up and Cheer!," the unnamed off-screen president (actually Franklin D. Roosevelt) posits that the real reason for Great Depression was a sudden crisis of optimism. Additionally, wicked bankers were running amok and getting rich while the rest of the nation starved, leaving everyone nihilistic and horrified. The wasteful and corrupt Warren Harding administration followed by the Crash of '29 isn't mentioned, as McFadden's film sought to cheer people up, not make their depression — and the Depression — any worse. In "Stand Up and Cheer!," Fdr created a Department of Amusement and appoints a secretary (Warner Baxter) to oversee a feel-good, nationwide show to keep morale up.
The bulk of the 80-minute film is a series of auditions in the secretary's office wherein performers come in to sing and dance, effectively turning the movie into a revue. Modern audiences may bristle at some racist caricatures, notably actress...
The bulk of the 80-minute film is a series of auditions in the secretary's office wherein performers come in to sing and dance, effectively turning the movie into a revue. Modern audiences may bristle at some racist caricatures, notably actress...
- 4/17/2024
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
Exclusive: As they sort through offers on their three Sundance films Shirley, Some Kind of Heaven and Summertime, Los Angeles Media Fund principals Jeffrey Soros and Simon Horsman are broadening the company footprint with increasingly ambitious feature films, scripted and unscripted series, and Broadway productions.
They’ve just set Oscar-winner Jodie Foster to direct an untitled drama based on the Seymour Reit book The Day They Stole the Mona Lisa. The film is being fully financed by Lamf.
“This happened in 1911, and it was the thing that made the Mona Lisa so famous,” Soros told Deadline while in Park City. “It was developed by Phoenix, which is still involved, but we have got a whole new script that Bill Wheeler is writing for Jodie Foster to direct. This is in the mold of The Thomas Crown Affair, with The Sting also a plot device comp. It is a fun story,...
They’ve just set Oscar-winner Jodie Foster to direct an untitled drama based on the Seymour Reit book The Day They Stole the Mona Lisa. The film is being fully financed by Lamf.
“This happened in 1911, and it was the thing that made the Mona Lisa so famous,” Soros told Deadline while in Park City. “It was developed by Phoenix, which is still involved, but we have got a whole new script that Bill Wheeler is writing for Jodie Foster to direct. This is in the mold of The Thomas Crown Affair, with The Sting also a plot device comp. It is a fun story,...
- 1/29/2020
- by Mike Fleming Jr
- Deadline Film + TV
Charlie Matthau is developing a six-part television series on the 1920 presidential election and hopes to have it air during the home stretch of the 2020 election, Variety has learned exclusively.
“I was struck at how similar the 1920 election was and how it contained so many parallels to the current political environment,” Matthau told Variety.
Matthau, son of the late Walter Matthau, has optioned David Pietrusza’s book “1920: The Year of the Six Presidents” through his Matthau Company. He noted that the series would run concurrently with the 100-year anniversary of the 1920 election.
“1920 is considered the first modern election and one of the most dramatic,” Matthau said. “Six once and future presidents — Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Teddy Roosevelt and Franklin Delano Roosevelt — jockeyed for the White House. Amazing characters, amazing roles for actors.”
Harding, a Republican Senator from Ohio, defeated Democratic Governor James M. Cox of Ohio in the election,...
“I was struck at how similar the 1920 election was and how it contained so many parallels to the current political environment,” Matthau told Variety.
Matthau, son of the late Walter Matthau, has optioned David Pietrusza’s book “1920: The Year of the Six Presidents” through his Matthau Company. He noted that the series would run concurrently with the 100-year anniversary of the 1920 election.
“1920 is considered the first modern election and one of the most dramatic,” Matthau said. “Six once and future presidents — Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Teddy Roosevelt and Franklin Delano Roosevelt — jockeyed for the White House. Amazing characters, amazing roles for actors.”
Harding, a Republican Senator from Ohio, defeated Democratic Governor James M. Cox of Ohio in the election,...
- 7/16/2018
- by Dave McNary
- Variety Film + TV
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