In His Gal Friday, an unscrupulous newspaper editor (Cary Grant) uses every dirty trick in the book to stop his ace reporter/ex-wife (Rosalind Russell) from remarrying and moving to Albany. Directed by Howard Hawks.
His Girl Friday (1940), starring Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell, Ralph Bellamy, Gene Lockhart
Editorial review of His Girl Friday courtesy of Amazon.com
The Front Page, Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur’s classic 1928 newspaper play, has had three official film versions and contributed structural DNA to half the movies ever made about professional camaraderie and fierce love-hate friendships. Lewis Milestone’s 1931 movie is well respected (Billy Wilder’s 1974 version isn’t), but this is one case where the remake towers brilliantined head and blocked shoulders above the original.
Howard Hawks had the inspired notion of making Hildy Johnson–the ace newsman whom demonic editor Walter Burns is trying to keep from quitting and getting married–a she instead of a he. What’s more, she’s not only Walter’s star reporter but also his ex-wife. When Hildy (Rosalind Russell) comes to tell Walter (Cary Grant) she’s leaving the newspaper business, he bamboozles her into carrying out one last assignment–a death-row interview with a little nebbish (John Qualen) convicted of killing a policeman. It sounds like a snap, but before you can say screwball comedy, the press room of the Criminal Courts Building has become ground zero for all the lunacy a jailbreak, a shooting, an impromptu suicide, a corrupt city administration, and the most Machiavellian “hero” in the American cinema can supply.
Dialogue comedy
His Girl Friday is one of the, oh, five greatest dialogue comedies ever made; Hawks had his cast play it at breakneck speed, and audiences hyperventilate trying to finish with one laugh so they can do justice to the four that have accumulated in the meantime. Russell, not Hawks’s first choice to play Hildy, is triumphant in the part, holding her own as “one of the guys” and creating an enduring feminist icon. Grant is a force of nature, giving a performance of such concentrated frenzy and diamond brilliance that you owe it to yourself to devote at least one viewing of the movie to watching him alone.
But then you have to go back (lucky you) and watch it again for the sake of the press-room gang–Roscoe Karns, Porter Hall, Cliff Edwards, Regis Toomey, Frank Jenks, and others–the kind of ensemble work that gets character actors onto Parnassus. –Richard T. Jameson
Cast of characters
- Cary Grant (Topper) … Walter Burns
- Rosalind Russell (Never Wave at a WAC) … Hildy Johnson
- Ralph Bellamy (Dance, Girl, Dance) … Bruce Baldwin
- Gene Lockhart (Blondie!) … Sheriff Hartwell
- Porter Hall (The Thin Man) … Murphy
- Ernest Truex (Private Buckaroo) … Bensinger
- Cliff Edwards (Pinocchio) … Endicott
- Clarence Kolb (The Amazing Mr. Williams) … Mayor
- Roscoe Karns (Alibi Ike) … McCue
- Frank Jenks Christmas in Connecticut … Wilson
- Regis Toomey (The Bishop’s Wife) … Sanders
- Abner Biberman (Another Thin Man) … Louie
- Frank Orth (The Great Rupert) … Duffy
- John Qualen (Blondie on a Budget) … Earl Williams
- Helen Mack (She) … Mollie Malloy
- Alma Kruger (You’ll Find Out) … Mrs Baldwin
- Billy Gilbert (The Music Box) … Joe Pettibone
- Pat West (Only Angels Have Wings) … Warden Cooley
- Edwin Maxwell (Holy Matrimony) … Dr. Egelhoffer
Additional cast
- Irving Bacon (Blondie: Footlight Glamour) … Gus (uncredited)
- Wade Boteler (The Green Hornet Serial) … Mike (uncredited)
- Harry C. Bradley … Insurance Doctor (uncredited)
- Wheaton Chambers (Big Town) … Elevator Passenger (uncredited)
- Edmund Cobb (The Amazing Colossal Man) … Cop (uncredited)
- Ann Doran (You Can’t Take It With You) … Newspaper Office Worker (uncredited)
- Ralph Dunn (Big Town) … Plainclothesman (uncredited)
- Earl Dwire (The Rogues Tavern) … Pete Davis (uncredited)
- Pat Flaherty (My Man Godfrey) … Frank – Policeman (uncredited)
- Jack Gardner … Elevator Passenger (uncredited)
- Eddie Hart (Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round) … Carl – Plainclothesman (uncredited)
- Marion Martin (They Got Me Covered) … Evangeline (uncredited)
- Frank McLure … Newsman (uncredited)
- James Millican (Mister 880) … Tim (uncredited)
- Gene Morgan (Alibi Ike) … Gene (uncredited)
- Delmar Watson … Skinny (uncredited)
- Katherine Yorke … Newspaper Office Worker (uncredited)