It Happened One Night (1934)

• For this momentous post (it’s my 300th, dontcha know?) – I figured I ought to pick a momentous movie…and this seems to fit the bill perfectly. Not only was IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT the first comedy ever to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards – it was also the first film ever to win what’s referred to as “the Big Five”: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actor, AND Best Actress.

(In the Oscars’ 92-year history, such a feat has only happened 3 times – with this film in 1934, with ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST in 1975, and with THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS in 1991.)

And y’all…that’s pretty damn spectacular.

• This is (obviously) a re-watch. 

(Once, I got to see this on the big screen as a double feature paired with SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLE (1993). As you might can imagine…the evening was a total blast.)

• Directed by Frank Capra.

• Written by Robert Riskin, based on a short story by Samuel Hopkins Adams.

• Ellie (Andrews, played by Claudette Colbert) is such a badass. Papa Andrews (Walter Connolly) won’t let her off their yacht, as punishment for her eloping with King Westley (Jameson Thomas)? 

‘Fine,’ Ellie says, and just runaway-dives overboard, into the ocean.

‘Aw, peas,’ Papa Andrew declares. ‘She’s escaped again.’ (That’s paraphrased – but only slightly.)

• It’s honestly no surprise that people went wild for Clark Gable after this film came out. His charisma & swoonworthiness is off the fucking charts, from the get-go…the immediacy of which is actually quite remarkable, since when we first meet Peter at the bus depot, he’s being a totally slurry stumble-drunk.

And like…perhaps only Clark Gable could manage to concurrently pull off being 100% convincingly sloppy-drunk – while also being 100% endearingly suave.

*Shakes head.* What a goddamn legend.

• “Next time you drop in, bring your folks!” — Peter to Ellie after she accidentally falls into his lap as the bus starts to move.

(Also, related to the bus moving: Ahoy there, Ward Bond! (He plays the first bus driver, which was – fun fact – an officially uncredited role.))

• Gable isn’t the only one whose screen power & likability are instantly present, to a striking degree – Colbert infuses Ellie with an incredibly compelling combination of adorability & glamor.

• Ellie falling asleep on Peter’s shoulder at the back of the bus, and Peter not waking her up when they reach the Jacksonville station (& all of the other passengers disembark) is TOTALLY that Jim & Pam conference room scene from the early days of The Office.

I mean…y’all. HELLO.

• Gable & Colbert’s back-and-forth chemistry is both exquisite & electric from the ‘No, Ms. Andrews – the bus didn’t wait for you’ scene, on. The way Gable/Peter meets Colbert/Ellie’s slightly frantic buzziness with firm, quiet stillness is fantastic.

Man, could Clark Gable own an Intense Stare. 

• Baha! Roscoe Karns does such a good job at making Shapeley (Ellie’s seat-mate, very briefly) both annoying as fuck and bad-vibes creepy with so few lines & in such a short amount of time. (Partial credit for this goes to screenwriter Riskin, too, of course.)

• There’s a little bit of IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT in the foundation of ROMAN HOLIDAY (1953), huh? Don’t know that I’ve ever really thought about that before…but the ‘Runaway, Young-Woman Celebrity’ influence is definitely there, story-wise. 

• In the (first) Walls of Jericho scene, I think it’s interesting how the pair’s ‘still, silent stare’/’very chatty with lots of movement’ roles from the Jacksonville bus station have been reversed. Colbert/Ellie now stands & stares, while Gable/Peter does all of the slightly frenetically paced talking.

(Surprise, surprise – the ‘Chemistry in Contrast’ concept is still super effective, in reverse.)

• It’s hard to know what else to say about the initial Walls of Jericho scene…because its classic-ness is too immense. I think maybe the thing I most want to highlight is how tonally masterful Clark Gable is in it – and how that is what makes the scene as enduringly iconic as it is.

First – it’s a really, really tricky tone to nail: somehow, the character must portray unfamiliarity, comfort, flirtiness, sternness, and jokey-ness…kind of all at once. And like – I can’t imagine how an actor’d even begin to approach a blend like that. Tonally, the scene could’ve so easily veered off course – but in the hands of Gable, it succeeds – to an almost magical degree.

In this same vein, I think the payoff & overall effect of the scene hinges on Gable’s expression – unseen by Ellie – after the lights are off and it’s understood that Ellie is undressing on the other side of the Jericho blanket. The softness, sincerity, & gentility visible on Gable’s face, while he’s turned toward her side of the room…that is what makes the scene stick, as a whole. Without that look – sure, you’ve still got the edginess of the lighthearted, rapid-fire raunch-banter – but you’re missing the affective depth that truly makes the story what it is – and ultimately lands it in the Romantic Movie Hall of Fame.

• I love Peter’s reflexive-yet-gruff domesticity the next morning. He gets Ellie a toothbrush, tells her where to find the showers, lends her his bathrobe, and cooks her breakfast…but does it so curmudgeonishly. It’s like, ‘Peter, man – you can make yourself appear as growlishly annoyed as you want…but you still did all those things.’

You can’t hide your kind-hearted deeds from us, Mr. Growlypants!!!

• I also love the ‘Throw off the Visiting Detectives’/”QUIT BAWLING!!!” scene. I mean – everyone knows I’m a sucker for an acting performance within an acting performance – but this also serves as the first time that the Peter/Ellie characters are genuinely on the same side, working together – and the result is overwhelmingly endearing.

• The fun-times mood of glee carries over to the next leg of their (resumed) bus journey – and we get to have a blast, bonding right alongside them, with the brilliantly conceived “Flying Trapeze” Team-of-Bus-Strangers singalong. 

I use the phrase “brilliantly conceived,” because while yes, the sequence functions beautifully to increase our adoration of/connection to these two characters & their slow-blooming relationship with each other – in the background, it’s also setting up/moving forward the narrative framework of the film.

Now that this bus ride is rolling along again – how can we get them stopped & waylaid off-bus together again, quickly & in a way that feels different than last time? [Insert jovially singing (& negligently steering) bus driver here.] Now that Annoying Mr. Shapeley has emerged as Threat #1 to Ellie’s Identity Secret…how do we prevent him from reporting it immediately? [Insert anti-roadside-assistance line about them being “ten miles from the nearest town” here.] While they’re stopped/stranded in the middle of nowhere – how can we take Peter’s money away in a way that feels genuine? [Insert impoverished, crying Bus Youth here.]

It’s incredible to pause and try to map out the paths of the plot strings in a film like this – because what plays & reads in a very straightforward (& deceptively simple) way is, in actuality, significantly more layered & intricately constructed than you’re made to realize. And that, my friends, is the magic of well-written screenplay…and that is the magic of this particular screenplay.

• For me, the ‘Peter scares the shit out of Scheming Shapeley’ scene is the moment when you begin to realize how dynamic & truly great Clark Gable’s performance in this film is. He has all these little mini-performances – as the pea-brained, angry husband, as the tough-guy, Shapeley-scaring mobster – within an already very layered performance as his main, movie-spanning character. People who downplay Gable’s success as an actor – attributing his legacy & fame to his looks & charisma, rather than his acting talent – clearly haven’t seen (or – perhaps more accurately – haven’t paid attention to) all that he does in this film. Just because he fits into (& brings to life) the role of Peter in such a natural, effortless way doesn’t mean that it was easy – nor does it make the end result any less great.

• Peter & Ellie quarrel about the most ridiculous things (the proper donut-in-coffee dunking technique, Ellie’s definition & knowledge of piggyback rides, whether or not you can be hungry & scared at the same time)…and it’s adorable. 

Kudos, writers. Those are some stellar details.

• Oh, hooray – it’s Makeshift Hay-Bed time!

Ellie: “I’ll get my clothes all wrinkled.”

Peter: “Then take ’em off!”

Ellie: “What?”

Peter: “Alright, don’t take ’em off! Do whatever you please – but shut up about it!”

• And when he comes over to blanket her with his coat, in case she gets cold? Woof. That is some electricity, y’all.

The shot of Ellie/Colbert to close the scene – with the tiniest – but totally identifiable – glimmer of tears visible, functions in largely the same way as that shot during the “Walls of Jericho” scene of Gable’s suddenly un-joking facial expression. Without any words or comment, you are made aware of/made to understand the emotional undercurrent playing out within these characters…in a way that their onscreen/in-story partner is not allowed to see.

Magnificent.

• There’s really not much for me to say when it comes to the Hitchhiking Scene that hasn’t already been said by other people, hundreds of times over – it’s that original, that perfect, and that classic.

I do think it’s worth noting, though – that the ‘Triumphant Ellie’ result the sequence brings is necessary, balance-wise, following scene after scene of ‘Triumphant Peter’s’ day-saving moves…and it begins to shift the characters onto more even ground, power-dynamic-wise.

• One hour & nine minutes in…we at last meet the rich-ass smarm of an Ellie-husband that is King Westley.

“I don’t like you, I never have, and I never will,” Papa Andrews says to him as an introduction. 

Ha! Amen, Papa Andrews. My sentiments exactly.

• Claudette Colbert’s across-the-Jericho-blanket reactions to Peter’s Island Speech are flat-out exquisite.

• She also nails the crazy range of emotions necessary to pull off the scene between Ellie & Papa Andrews (once she’s returned home, thanks to Peter’s poorly executed, middle-of-the-night love-sprint to the city & back). Earlier, I mentioned the scene in which I think Gable earned his Oscar…well, guess what – Colbert earns hers in this one.

• Peter presenting Papa Andrews an itemized list of expenses that amounts to $39.60…instead of collecting the $10,000 reward money to which he’s technically entitled = a total Fist-to-the-Sky moment. (Plus – the way Walter Connolly plays Andrews’s reaction to it – with a mixture of bewilderment, incredulousness, & elation – is absolutely fantastic.)

Also – Clark Gable’s pissed-off bellowment of his “YES!!!” answer to Papa Andrews’s persistent, repeated “Do you love my daughter?” question, after much evasion, is perfection.

• I love everything about Papa Andrews’s walking-down-the-aisle mini-speech. I love that that is when & where that “conversation” happens – and that he has Ellie’s escape vehicle ready to go – and that no responses from Ellie are written/delivered (which of course prolongs our suspense, as audience members, jussst a little bit longer).

• “Don’t fall out of any windows!” Papa Andrews lightheartedly yell-instructs King Westley as a sign-off to their annulment-confirming phone call.

Hahahaha.

• And then, of course, regarding the Walls of Jericho:

“Let ’em topple.”

What a blissfully perfect way to end a blissfully perfect movie.