It's a Great Feeling (1949)

A waitress at the Warner Bros. commissary is anxious to break into pictures. She thinks her big break may have arrived when two actors agree to help her.

Director:

David Butler

Writers:

Jack Rose (screenplay), Melville Shavelson (screenplay) (as Mel Shavelson)

Stars:

Doris Day, Dennis Morgan, Jack Carson

Nominated for 1 Oscar.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Dennis Morgan	...	Himself
Doris Day	...	Judy Adams
Jack Carson	...	Himself
Bill Goodwin	...	Arthur Trent
Irving Bacon	...	RR Information Clerk
Claire Carleton	...	Grace
Mazzone-Abbott Dancers	...	Dancers (as The Famous Mazzone-Abbott Dancers)

Storyline

A waitress at the Warner Bros. commissary is anxious to break into pictures. She thinks her big break may have arrived when two actors agree to help her.

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Plot Keywords:

waitress | hollywood | studio | spoof | assumed identity | 

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Taglines:

Guest stars galore!

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Genres:

Comedy | Music

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English French

Release Date:

1 August 1949 (USA)

Also Known As:

Two Guys and a Gal

Filming Locations:

Warner Brothers Burbank Studios - 4000 Warner Boulevard, Burbank, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Warner Bros.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

85 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The green-and-black striped gown Day wears in the scene where she poses as a French starlet recently signed by Warners had previously been worn by Janis Paige in Hollywood Canteen when she danced with Dane Clark, and by Eve Arden at Ann Blyth's birthday party in Mildred Pierce.

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Goofs

During Edward G. Robinson's brief cameo appearance, the hands of the clock change back and forth between shots.

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Quotes

Publicity man: Now, listen boys, send a couple of cameramen over to Pasadena. We want some cheesecake on Yvonne Amour. You know, 'I love America' with legs crossed.
Reporter: What do I tell them? They want a biography.
Publicity man: Yvonne Amour. Born in the shadow of the Eiffel tower.
Reporter: How to you know?
Publicity man: It's a big tower!
Publicity man: Her father. A colonel in the French Foreign Legion. Killed sixteen years ago in Northern Afghanistan. Let's see them check that!

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Connections

Spoofs Mademoiselle Fifi (1944)

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Soundtracks

Wiegenlied, Op. 49, No. 4
(uncredited)
aka "Brahms' Lullaby"
Music by Johannes Brahms
Played briefly during the scene in Dennis Morgan's dressing room

User Reviews

Minor Gem

How revealing when Joan Crawford goes into her "drama queen" act and then admits she does that in all her movies. Or when Edward G. Robinson does his tough guy routine after persuading the studio guard to please let him act tough or they'll all be out of work. Good for a laugh. But it's also a little unsettling to see these super-stars as just ordinary folks, after all.

I gather (from TMC) the production was rushed through to meet certain obligations. If so, they did a cracker-jack job. Sure, the plot is about as shopworn as they come—provincial girl (Day) breaking into show business, helped (or hindered) by two fast-talking smoothies (Morgan & Carson). But it's done up with great bounce and energy. The youthful Day sparkles with the kind of winning luster that made her a movie star perennial. Carson mugs it up in amusing Carson fashion, while his buddy Morgan sings and looks handsome.

Then, of course, there are the star cameos from the Warners 1940's stable, including a "yup- ified" Gary Cooper sipping a malted through a straw, of all things. (Note how the famously boozy Hollywood suddenly prefers malts and ice cream to scotch and water—perhaps the movie's most amusing fiction.) Personally, though, I like Bill Goodwin's discombobulated producer best. His shtick with Day is a good running gag and I kept hoping he wouldn't get his glasses fixed.

Anyway, the movie's full of amusing bits cleverly woven together, including a behind-the- scenes look at the studio (to save time instead of building sets—TMC). In my book, it's the kind of pleasure that comes as a reward to old movie buffs and should not be missed.