TCM Schedule for Thursday, August 25, 2016 -- Summer Under The Stars - Van Johnson

Today's Star is Van Johnson, a second tier musical actor who moved to the forefront during WWII. He was always the blond-haired boy-next-door, whose career continued after the war, in musical and dramatic roles. Enjoy!



6:00 AM -- THE BRIDE GOES WILD (1948)
A womanizing author of children's books borrows a son to woo his illustrator.
Dir: Norman Taurog
Cast: Van Johnson, June Allyson, Butch Jenkins
BW-98 mins, CC,

Fourth of six movies that paired June Allyson and Van Johnson.


8:00 AM -- HIGH BARBAREE (1947)
A downed pilot looks back on his life as he awaits rescue in the South Pacific.
Dir: Jack Conway
Cast: Van Johnson, June Allyson, Thomas Mitchell
BW-91 mins, CC,

The original ending for the film had Van Johnson hearing over his radio that the ship on which his lady-love, June Allyson, was serving had been sunk. Johnson then died and the picture ended. The New York Times reported on November 17, 1946 that 40 percent of the audience opinion cards handed out at a preview of the film in Los Angeles demanded that Johnson's character live. MGM spent $50,000 to shoot scenes for a new ending, which also had Allyson's character surviving as well.


10:00 AM -- DUCHESS OF IDAHO (1950)
During a Sun Valley vacation, a woman tries to solve her roommate's romantic problems only to get caught in a love triangle of her own.
Dir: Robert Z. Leonard
Cast: Esther Williams, Van Johnson, John Lund
C-98 mins, CC,

Eleanor Powell's last film.


12:00 PM -- IN THE GOOD OLD SUMMERTIME (1949)
In this musical remake of The Shop Around the Corner, feuding co-workers in a small music shop do not realize they are secret romantic pen pals.
Dir: Robert Z. Leonard
Cast: Judy Garland, Van Johnson, S. Z. "Cuddles" Sakall
C-103 mins, CC,

Buster Keaton was working as a gag writer at MGM when this movie was made. The filmmakers approached him to devise a way for a violin to get broken that would be both comic and plausible. Keaton came up with an appropriate fall, and the filmmakers then realized he was the only one who would be able to execute it properly, so they cast him in the film. Keaton also devised the sequence in which Van Johnson inadvertently wrecks Judy Garland's hat, and coached Johnson intensively in how to perform the scene. This was the first MGM film Keaton appeared in since being fired from the studio in 1933.


1:45 PM -- THIRTY SECONDS OVER TOKYO (1944)
General Jimmy Doolittle trains American troops for the first airborne attacks on Japan.
Dir: Mervyn LeRoy
Cast: Van Johnson, Robert Walker, Tim Murdock
BW-138 mins, CC,

Won an Oscar for Best Effects, Special Effects -- A. Arnold Gillespie (photographic), Donald Jahraus (photographic), Warren Newcombe (photographic) and Douglas Shearer (sound)

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Robert Surtees and Harold Rosson

When Lawson's plane arrives in "Tokyo" and sees the fire and smoke from the previous bomber, Davy Jones, we are not looking at a special effect. During the making of the film, there was a fuel-oil fire in Oakland, near the filming location. The quick-thinking filmmakers scrambled to fly their camera plane and B-25 through the area, capturing some very real footage for the movie.


4:15 PM -- THE LAST TIME I SAW PARIS (1954)
A writer recalls his turbulent marriage to an expatriate heiress.
Dir: Richard Brooks
Cast: Elizabeth Taylor, Van Johnson, Walter Pidgeon
C-116 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Independent producer Lester Cowan bought F. Scott Fitzgerald's film adaptation of his short story "Babylon Revisited," which the author had retitled "Cosmopolitan" for the screen, for a bargain price and hired Fitzgerald's services as screenwriter. Cowan was frustrated in his attempts to make the film and eventually sold it to MGM, who updated it from the Twenties.


6:15 PM -- SCENE OF THE CRIME (1949)
A detective tries to solve a policeman's murder.
Dir: Roy Rowland
Cast: Van Johnson, Arlene Dahl, Gloria De Haven
BW-94 mins, CC,

Based on the story Smashing the Bookie Gang Marauders by John Bartlow Martin.



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: SUMMER UNDER THE STARS: VAN JOHNSON



8:00 PM -- BATTLEGROUND (1949)
American soldiers in France fight to survive a Nazi siege just before the Battle of the Bulge.
Dir: William Wellman
Cast: Van Johnson, John Hodiak, Ricardo Montalban
BW-119 mins, CC,

Won Oscars for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay -- Robert Pirosh, and Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Paul Vogel

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actor in a Supporting Role -- James Whitmore, Best Director -- William A. Wellman, Best Film Editing -- John D. Dunning, and Best Picture

Screenwriter Robert Pirosh based this story on his experiences as an infantryman during the Battle of the Bulge. Pirosh did not serve with the 101st Airborne and wanted to create a script that was faithful to their experiences. He used his first-hand knowledge of the battle to write the script. This was done with the blessing of Gen. Anthony McAuliffe, who was commanding the 101st during the siege of Bastogne. Consequently, many of the incidents in the film--such as Pvt. Kippton's habit of always losing his false teeth, or the Mexican-American soldier from Los Angeles who had never seen snow until he got to Belgium--that have always been derided as "typical Hollywood phony baloney" actually happened.


10:15 PM -- MIRACLE IN THE RAIN (1956)
When a lonely woman's wartime lover dies, her loneliness threatens her life.
Dir: Rudolph Maté
Cast: Jane Wyman, Van Johnson, Peggie Castle
BW-107 mins, CC,

One of many of Van Johnson's movies where he is in the military. Some have branded him a draft dodger for WWII but after a car crash in 1943 where he sustained such a serious head injury that he had a plate put in his skull he was made 4F. He had scars that were covered for movies by heavy makeup but he didn't for "The Cain Mutiny". Van Johnson felt that showing scars gave more credence to his Naval character.


12:15 AM -- TWO GIRLS AND A SAILOR (1944)
Singing sisters create a World War II canteen and become rivals for the same man.
Dir: Richard Thorpe
Cast: June Allyson, Gloria DeHaven, Van Johnson
BW-124 mins, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Writing, Original Screenplay -- Richard Connell and Gladys Lehman

June Allyson'e future husband Dick Powell suggested that the actress switch roles with co-star Gloria DeHaven and play the plain sister while DeHaven play the glamorous one. DeHaven remarked in 1989, "Maybe she knows something I don't; but that doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense. I wish they had reversed it - hers was the better role."


2:30 AM -- THE ROMANCE OF ROSY RIDGE (1947)
A farmer's daughter falls in love with a man who fought against her family in the Civil War.
Dir: Roy Rowland
Cast: Van Johnson, Thomas Mitchell, Janet Leigh
BW-106 mins, CC,

It is said on TCM that Van Johnson was responsible for Janet Leigh's stage name. He suggested she shorten her first name from Jeanette to Janet; and he though that since the film they were doing was a civil war drama; Lee would go well, in place of her real last name Morrison. But then he suggested she spell it Leigh. She was concerned there might a problem with confusion with Vivian Leigh; but then Van Johnson reminded her of Van Heflin. He said "there's two Van's and it hasn't hurt either of us".


4:30 AM -- INVITATION (1952)
A millionaire tries to buy his dying daughter a husband.
Dir: Gottfried Reinhardt
Cast: Van Johnson, Dorothy McGuire, Ruth Roman
BW-85 mins, CC,

The haunting theme music by Bronislau Kaper was actually introduced two years earlier in MGM's A Life of Her Own (1950), but became a jazz standard under the title Invitation, especially associated with tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson.