What Price Hollywood? (1932)

Director:

George Cukor

Writers:

Gene Fowler (writer) and
Rowland Brown (writer) ...

Release Date:

24 June 1932 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Plot:

The career of a waitress takes off when she meets an amiable drunken Hollywood producer.

Plot Keywords:

Waitress | Hollywood | Producer | Director | Drunkenness

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar.

Cast

Constance Bennett	...	Mary Evans
Lowell Sherman	...	Maximillan 'Max' Carey
Neil Hamilton	...	Lonny Borden
Gregory Ratoff	...	Julius Saxe
Brooks Benedict	...	Muto, Diner Who Will Put Mary in Pictures
Louise Beavers	...	Bonita, Mary's Maid
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
George Reed	...	Undetermined Role (scenes deleted)

Also Known As:

Hollywood Madness (USA) (working title)
Hollywood Merry-Go-Round (USA) (working title)
The Truth About Hollywood (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

88 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Photophone System)

Certification:

USA:Approved

Filming Locations:

First United Methodist Church - 6817 Franklin Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

RKO Pathé Pictures

Trivia:

Max Carey was modelled after Lowell Sherman himself, who was known to be an alcoholic, as well as silent film director Marshall Neilan and actor John Barrymore (who was Sherman's brother-in-law at the time).

Quotes:

[first lines]
[Mary Evans is admiring a magazine photo of Clark Gable]
Mary Evans: Hmmmm. Oh, boy!
[Mary places the magazine photo against her face and pretends Gable is her lover. She speaks in an exaggerated voice]
Mary Evans: Daaahling, how I love you my daaahling, I love you I do.
[she puts the magazine down and returns to her normal voice]
Mary Evans: It's getting late and I must scram.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Making of a Legend: Gone with the Wind (1988) (TV)

Soundtrack:

The Wedding March

First rate pre-code brilliance.

A terrific picture and new to me. I think I had heard of it, perhaps showing at a pre-code festival at the Film Forum here in New York. Maybe not. Anyway caught it by accident on TCM today and what a find. Early George Cukor "woman's picture" I guess and has to be one of the earliest (1932) Hollywood pix about Hollywood. Brilliant, witty script with lots of stuff which would've been censored after the Code went into effect a couple of yrs. later. Great performances by Constance Bennett and Lowell Sherman, both of whose work I had very little knowledge of. I had never even heard of Lowell Sherman and he is just amazing in the role of a director with a drinking problem. Oh and that's Gregory Ratoff as foreign-born producer. I think he reprised that role a few times, of course most notably as Max Fabian in All About Eve, which was on the tube over the weekend and is hard to tune away from once you start watching...and listening, like this was. I could go on--but just catch it if you can!