in old movies they always dress up for dinner at home?

[BlueTrain]

Although I'm at a loss to think of a good example, I think there are things that show up in movies that are there simply because they are something current and not something done intentionally (or left out intentionally), without the slightest bit of propaganda. Smoking might be a good example, although in some movies, the hero was never shown smoking or drinking. There were references to the end of prohibition in a couple of Three Stooges shorts, which I'm sure were there to make possible a joke or two. Was there ever any propaganda involving the end of prohibition?

 

[LizzieMaine]

There was an absolute explosion of "beer garden" settings in movies, short comedies, and cartoons during 1933-34. FDR's legalization of 3.2 beer in early 1933 kicked off this wave, and an exhaustive list of instances where references were made, or reflected in the settings, would be impossible to present -- beer and beer imagery were *everywhere* in popular culture during 1933. This led directly to the wider "Gay Nineties" nostalgia craze of 1934, where beer gardens, singing waiters, handlebar moustaches, and all the rest were celebrated in movies, popular songs, comic strips, cartoons, and novelty items.

You could certainly call that propaganda if you were of a mind to. FDR legalized 3.2 not because he wanted to see the nation awash in cheap watery beer, but because it was seen as a source of economic stimulus that might give Depression America more of a kick than the low alcohol content in the actual beer. The whole "Drink Up, America!" spirit that had cartoon characters marching around on the screen holding foaming steins and Mr. and Mrs. America gleefully quaffing in magazine and newspaper ads certainly wasn't discouraged by the Administration, even though it alienated a lot of otherwise pro-New Deal people in the temperance movement. Even Joseph Ignatius Breen, arch-enemy of sex, miscegenation, and dirty pinko communism in the movies, made no move whatsoever, from 1934 onward, to stem the tide of movie booze.

 

[Stanley Doble]

In Never Give A Sucker An Even Break, W C Fields played a scene in an ice cream parlor, in an aside to the audience he said it was supposed to be in a saloon but the censors made him cut it out. 'But it will play just as well this way'.

Apparently he wasn't kidding. They did crack down on him because they thought there was too much drinking in his movies and too many scenes in bars.

 

[BlueTrain]

Although he was known for his drinking, the censors must have really had it in for W. C. Fields, given how saloons were regularly featured in the old cowboy movies, even if the hero never went inside. Likewise, the Thin Man series also had a lot of drinking.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Fields very nearly drank himself to death in 1936 -- he was hospitalized for much of the year, and efforts were made to "dry him out," but he remained a sick man for the better part of the next two years. Along with John Barrymore he was America's most public alcoholic in an era with only a dim, dawning understanding of what alcoholism really was. Studios were very wary of him after 1936 -- he was blackballed for much of 1937, and was forced to spend most of that year working in radio as a co-star with Charlie McCarthy. It was only his unexpected success there that caused the movies to take him back, but he was closely and carefully monitored for the rest of his film career to ensure that the drinking didn't get out of control.

Fields himself made no effort to hide his condition -- he was routinely the butt of on-air jokes from Charlie McCarthy about his alcoholism: "I'll stick a wick in your mouth and use you for an alcohol lamp! You weren't born, you were squeezed out of a bar rag! If my father was a gate-leg table, your father was under it! Pink elephants take aspirin to get rid of W. C. Fields!" But one can understand that the movie studios were a bit wary of this image, and wanted to play it down as much as possible on screen, especially in his films alongside Charlie McCarthy, who was, despite the adult nature of his comedy, seen as a character appealing strongly to children.

 

[Stanley Doble]

I wonder about Fields' reputation as a drinker. How much of it was put on as a comedy persona. I say this because I recently read that Fields never drank before 1916 when he went to work as a comedian in Zeigfeld's Follies. He was a juggler and took his art very seriously, he would not take a drink on any day when he was performing, or if he was performing the next day. He might take one or 2 drinks with friends if he was not working but that was his limit.

The comedy act he did for Zeigfeld did not require any juggling so it is possible he relaxed his rules about drinking.

Prohibition came in right after that. I can't see why a non drinker would suddenly start drinking when the stuff became hard to get, especially the stuff they called liquor during prohibition. But I can see a comedian making use of topical material, and drinking jokes were very topical at the time.

If Fields, who was born in 1880, never drank until he was 36 years old then he certainly turned into an alcoholic in a hurry. I'm not saying it's not possible just that I could easily believe his reputation for drinking was exaggerated.

Fields also employed a personal trainer named Bob Howard in the early forties. I have read that this cut way down on his drinking and helped him get in shape.

And yet in his last movies he looks bad with a puffy face and he died in 1946 aged 66. I would like to know the truth about his drinking and health problems but don't suppose I ever will.

 

[Stanley Doble]

For those who are curious about the postwar 52-20 club I recommend a movie called The Admiral Was A Lady starring Edmond O'Brien and Wanda Hendrix. It is the story of a group of navy fliers trying to adjust to civilian life while taking full advantage of their benefits and it is very funny.

 

[Stanley Doble]

No one's saying that "all veterans" reacted the same way. But enough had difficulty readjusting that it was probably the most-talked-about domestic problem of the 1946-48 period, even more so than Truman being a blockhead or the Commies hiding under the bed. "What are we going to do about the veterans?"

I remember a 1946 editorial cartoon satirizing this. It showed a veteran, in civilian clothes, looking at a newspaper. Scare headline, "Veteran Insults Mother In Law". Caption under the cartoon 'triple axe murder on page 17, no veterans involved'.

 

[BlueTrain]

Newspaper headlines, I understand, are not written by whoever wrote the article. Like the above mentioned headline, they might deserve a thread of their own. If they aren't written to be shocking, they sometimes seem to be written to be funny.

 

[Edward]

Yes, typically the headlines are written by a sub-editor, and they can often be misleading as to the content of the story. I often wodner how deliberate this may be, given that so many people can be presumed o skim the headline and the photo, if any, without really reading the story.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The legendary newsroom story about headline writing concerns "placeholder" headlines -- these are just descriptions slugged into a page as it's being composed to hold the space until the final head is written. In the late '70s a compositor put a placeholder headline over an editorial in the Boston Globe concerning a recent speech by President Carter -- and for some reason it ended up making onto the final layout. At least one edititon made it into print with the headline "MUSH FROM THE WIMP."

 

[Fading Fast]

The legendary newsroom story about headline writing concerns "placeholder" headlines -- these are just descriptions slugged into a page as it's being composed to hold the space until the final head is written. In the late '70s a compositor put a placeholder headline over an editorial in the Boston Globe concerning a recent speech by President Carter -- and for some reason it ended up making onto the final layout. At least one edititon made it into print with the headline "MUSH FROM THE WIMP."

⇧ That's freakin' wonderful.

It is pretty obvious that headlines aren't written by the reporter as, many times, they are "off" versus the actual story / have a different bias, tone, etc.

 

[LizzieMaine]

 

[Fading Fast]

Now that's good in a different way (sort of in an "X-ray of Dean's Head Reveals Nothing" way)?

 

[BlueTrain]

Winston Churchill, who supposedly became ill on a trip to the United States, reportedly insisted on attending the Kentucky Derby, just so the newspaper headlines could read "Churchill Up at Churchill Downs!"