“The Front Page” is one of my favorite plays although I have only seen it once and that was on TV so long ago I won’t tell you when. But I thought it was great–writing, directing, acting, the whole thing. It is, briefly, a comedy-drama with love, shouting, and cynicism, which takes place in Chicago(or it an unknown big city–depends on which critic you read–I think it should be Chicago)–but more on that later.

I noted in my “research” for this article that almost none of the contributors on line mention this TV production despite how unbelievably good it was. Actually, the original play has been remade several times if you include other TV shows(than what I just mentioned) and TV shows based vaguely upon it.

The original “Front Page” was written by Charles McArthur(husband of Helen Hayes for those who know who she was) and Ben Hecht, later of Hecht-Hill-Lancaster fame .It opened on Broadway in 1928 and ran into the following year. The original director, interestingly, was George S Kauffman who apparently learned some things about comedy. The language in it is ,well, frank, though not rougher than you might find in a lot of films today. Somewhat surprisingly, it apparently raised a few eyebrows on Broadway when it opened, eyebrows which usually just stayed put.

The first movie version was in 1931 and was directed by Lewis Milestone. It starred Adolphe Menjou and Pat O’Brien. Other than a little bit on TV retrospectives I have never seen it. From what I have read about it it sounds excellent and it was “pre-code” Hollywood so they didn’t worry about eyebrows too much.

I am going to restrict myself to this film and to it’s two remakes, “His Girl Friday”(1940) and another “Front Page,” original title, in 1974. I have little to say about the 1931 edition beyond what I’ve already said, but it sounds as if it followed the play quite closely likely including some of the cursing and other tough language(but not a great deal, I’d guess)

The story is about two newspaper guys, Walter Burns the editor of a fictional Chicago paper and Hildy Johnson, his top reporter. The city is abuzz with excitement and rumor about a pending execution of a cop killer, and a close political race and Walter is looking for a great story or two out of Hildy. But Hildy has other plans. He is going to marry his fiance, Peggy Grant, go to the east coast and involve himself in her wealthy family’s business.. He also plans to do this immediately and leave Walter to find somebody else to cover the big stories.

This story then moves, very quickly, as the condemned prisoner escapes, Hildy and Walter quarrel and the police department and the city press appear to be mutually destroying themselves and each other. This is all done with the guys in the press room at city hall looking and listening and commenting. They do so in quick, frantic and amazingly well-written dialogue, often tough, often sarcastic, rarely if ever sympathetic to anyone, & usually very funny. I will not go much further with the plot, but may add in a comment or two later. What I’m interested in is how this play was remade in three instances and how these compare.

I have nothing much to add regarding the first one. It appears, from what meager evidence I have, that it was pretty good and faithful to the play, but I can speak only based on second hand evidence. Certainly it seems to have retained the play’s background of cynical, wise-cracking fast talk against a sense of corruption and ambition. .

in 1940, Howard Hawks, one of the the giants(well, nearly so, at least)of early American film had a go at it. There was one rather significant change. Hildy was now a woman(Ros Russell)and editor Walter(Cary Grant) is her-ex-husband and ex-boss. The name didn’t need to be changed but the plot did–a little bit. Hildy was engaged to a rich but dull guy, Bruce Bellman(Ralph Bellamy). This whole engagement thing was a mistake, I think, because the Bellamy character is obviously too dull for Hildy, too lacking in charm or imagination or humor–lacking in everything but money. I find it impossible to imagine Hildy falling for him in any circumstances, not even as a way out of a hectic business–a business which, of course, she comes to discover she still loves as she does Walter

Some critics have spurned this film for allegedly going soft on the cynicism and the whole story and atmosphere. I don’t agree. In fact, one time I saw it not too long ago, I thought that it possibly could pass as the most cynical American film I’ve ever seen. Hawks sort of made it into a “screwball comedy” of the 1930’s style but it was already most of the way there and this was more a change of type than anything else. Grant and Russell (I suspect somewhat playing themselves or at least their favorite types)are great in their roles and once they’ve dumped the Bellamy character out of the script, the movie follows the play pretty closely. It is a hard nosed movie but in some weird and inexplicable(to me)way, a good natured one, at least from the audience point of view.

The plot unolds toward what a veteran of this story knows will be the ending but it never fails to stimulate and amuse, at least not with me. It is wonderful to see Gtant and Russell confront each other both as actors and as characters, too large (justifiably)egos, each trying to get their own way, but cooperating when it makes sense. What a team!

The film was remade in 1974 by Billy Wilder. He was one of the great mid-late 20th century American directors and his best film, the Oscar-winning “The Apartment,” is one of my favortie films. But he was somewhat inconsistent and occasionally lost it, and this is one of the losses. By the 1970’s the Hays code was gone and film makers could get away with a lot more than before in plot, language, sex scenes etc. Not ANYTHING, mind you, but a lot.

Wilder and co-writer I A L Diamond apparently decided that since the 1931 film, though pre-code was still done with restraint compared to this new time, they would simply make everything more shocking than before. There would be more profanity, more hostility, more sex talk and more cynicism. This was a disaster of an idea. The film, though following the plot closely, comes nowhere near the original play or “His Girl”(or, presumably the 1931 film)in drama, humor or any kind of entertainment

It is as if they simply thought that making the language a little dirtier and more hostile, the people a little more disgusting and the world it portrays more ugly and hostile, they were making progress or a statement. In my opinion they were making anything but. They were making a big mistake and they largely ruined a great piece of American writing.

In the earlier versions the reporters were cynical but with, well, not restraint, but seemingly within certain emotional bounds, impossible to define but also impossible to ignore. The story which saw the whole world and certainly the political/media world as hard, unforgiving and largely amoral was not a fairy tale, but it also was not hopelessly depressing. Once again, it’s hard to explain but has to do with attitude. Yes, the world is a mess but we’ll still do our jobs and even if they are not nice ones, we’ll chisel a little fun out of them and the world and maybe we’ll make some people laugh along the way. We will not depend on tough language turned into dirty language or cheerfully cynical attitudes turned into almost intentionally degrading ones.

This all worked wonderfully well in the original play and, with some, but not much, softening in “His Girl Friday.” The Wilder version of “Front Page” had a few laughs in it(you’d about have to with Matthau and Lemmon together there)and the ending has some of the frantic screwiness of the original–but not very much. Something was missing–I guess it was the substance.

The next time any of these is available on TV take a look and see what you think. I think you’ll find it interesting.