Did You Know?
The animated Thanksgiving sequence is a topical reference to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's failed attempt to change the date of the holiday.
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For the "drunk" dance, Fred Astaire had two drinks of bourbon before the first take and one before each succeeding take. The seventh (last) take was used in the film.
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The firecracker dance sequence required 3 days of rehearsal and took two days to film. Fred Astaire's shoes for the dance were auctioned off for $116,000 worth of war bonds.
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Irving Berlin got the idea for the film after writing the song "Easter Parade" for his 1933 show "As Thousands Cheer", and planned to write a play about American holidays, but it never materialized. He later pitched the idea to Mark Sandrich who got the ball rolling for this film.
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Some controversy surrounded the history of the song "White Christmas" when it was reported in a 1960 news item that Irving Berlin wrote the song in 1938, which would have made it ineligible for an Academy Award nomination. But a biography and modern sources agree it was written for this film, and the sheet music has a 1942 copyright date.
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The first public performance of the song "White Christmas" was by Bing Crosby on his NBC radio show "The Kraft Music Hall" on Christmas Day, 1941, during the middle of filming _Holiday Inn (1942)_, which was released seven months later. The song went on to become one of the biggest selling songs in the history of music. This was the first of three films to feature Crosby singing "White Christmas".
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When Irving Berlin won an Oscar for his song "White Christmas" from this movie, he became the first artist to present himself with an Academy Award.
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Until 1997, "White Christmas" was the best selling music single ever. It was passed at that time by "Goodbye, England's Rose", the Elton John rework of "Candle in the Wind" done for Princess Diana's funeral. These two songs still rank #1-2.
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The set of the Holiday Inn was reused by Paramount 12 years later for the musical White Christmas, also starring Bing Crosby and again with songs composed by Irving Berlin.
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Bing Crosby's original "Rhythm Boys" partner Harry Barris plays the orchestra leader in the nightclub scenes.
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One of over 700 Paramount Productions, filmed between 1929 and 1949, which were sold to MCA/Universal in 1958 for television distribution, and have been owned and controlled by Universal ever since.
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Bing Crosby sang "White Christmas" by Irving Berlin which went on to win an Academy Award for Best Song. Crosby sang four different Oscar winning songs in his films.
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Kemmons Wilson, who founded the "Holiday Inn" motel chain in 1952, named them after this movie.
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"The Screen Guild Theater" broadcast a 30 minute radio adaptation of the movie on January 11, 1943 with Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire reprising their film roles.
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Mary Martin stated in her autobiography that she had to turn down the role of Linda Mason in this film (which eventually led to the termination of her contract at Paramount) because she was pregnant.
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