Stage Door (1937)

Stage Door is an American film comedy-drama first released in 1937, directed by Gregory La Cava.  The film stars Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Adolphe Menjou, Gail Patrick and Constance Collier.  Our overall rating for this film is: excellent.


Against the wishes of her incredibly wealthy family, society gal Terry Randall is determined to make her way as an actress.  She has her baptism of fire when she moves into a cheap boarding house for aspiring actresses in New York.  All of the tenants are desperate for their big break on Broadway, but few have any chance of success.  With her superior airs and posh accent, Terry gets a cold reception, particularly from her cynical roommate Jean Maitland, who resents Terry’s privileged background.  Jean’s dislike for Terry turns to outright contempt when the latter manages to secure for herself a part in a play which fellow boarder Kay Hamilton has set her heart on.  On the night when fame and fortune beckon for Terry Randall, disaster strikes...

More than a decade before director Joseph L. Mankiewicz illuminated us on the uglier side of life on Broadway with All About Eve (1950), Gregory La Cava took us backstage and showed us the grim realities endured by budding theatrical types in this poignant, brilliantly observed comedy-drama.   Although Stage Door is credited as being based on a play of the same name by Edna Ferber and George S. Kaufman, it really has very little to do with the play, which was no more than a snobbish dig at Hollywood.  La Cava’s film is both a comic masterpiece and a pretty uncompromising account of life as it was experienced by many an actress during the Great Depression.  It also represents something of a landmark in feminist cinema, one of the first notable Hollywood offerings to depict women getting by on their own initiative, without being dependent on the male sex for their personal fulfilment and career success.  The film was both of its time and ahead of its time, a bold departure from the flimsy escapism that dominated Hollywood in the mid-1930s.

The main appeal of Stage Door has to be its legendary ensemble of female acting talent that fills the screen and positively effervesces with life, not as a haphazard collection of individuals but as a Gestalt entity moving with flawless synchronicity.  Heading the endlessly wisecracking brood are Katharine Hepburn and Ginger Rogers, both perfectly cast in the character types that would stay with them for many years - Hepburn the assured but slightly eccentric society girl who is most definitely not afraid to speak her mind, Rogers the independent-minded working class lass who spits barbed witticisms as effortlessly as she kicks dust from the dance floor.  Here, they complement one another superbly and form what has to be one of Hollywood’s most enjoyable double acts.

Constance Collier is another of the film’s delights, hilarious as the tragically faded ham actress of the old school who regards the theatrical profession as a painful duty, for both the actor and the spectator.  The bevy of beauties that make up the frolicsome chorus includes Lucille Ball, Eve Arden, Ann Miller and Andrea Leeds, the latter of whom was nominated for an Oscar for her touching portrayal of the poor thing who was fated to die for her art, albeit a little too melodramatically for today’s tastes.

The film’s director, Gregory La Cava, was no stickler for Hollywood conventions and his innovative flair is very much in evidence here.  He allowed his actresses to improvise and even tailored the script to their acting styles and natural speech rhythms.  As a result, the film has a vibrancy and immediacy which is exceedingly rare in Hollywood movies of this era.    Few films combined screwball-style comedy and melodrama as effectively as Stage Door, and whilst it is easily overlooked (on account of La Cava’s comparative obscurity today) it definitely deserves to be considered a classic.

© filmsdefrance.com 2011

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