Interestingly, I was just searching old time radio episodes today and saw a version of THE PALM BEACH STORY with Claudette Colbert and... Randolph Scott.

I haven't listened to it, but that's a fascinating casting switch.

....and, in addition, Ford gave Capra such headaches before, during, and after the shooting of POCKETFUL OF MIRACLES that Capra decided to retire.

I couldn't record everything so I hope some of these will show up again. I wonder though.

Regarding Ride the High Country: So this movie is the Casablanca of Westerns-not taken seriously at first by its studio but loved by the rest of the world and classic of its genre? Isn’t it fun watching cream rise to the top?

This movie has one flaw but it’s a big one: Ron Starr as Longtree. He simply has little talent or personality. Putting him next to stars like Scott and McCrea as well as great supporting players like R. G. Armstrong, Edgar Buchanan, James Drury, L. Q. Jones, John Chandler, John Anderson and Warren Oates makes it all the more glaring. I love the movie regardless as it presents us with Mariette Hartley, a gift that’s still giving. And whether we’re male or female don’t we all “want to enter our houses Justified?” I, too, find the music hauntingly beautiful.

As for The Tall Stranger, I am still in shock. Not only were writers and villains par excellence Leo Gordon and Michael Pate in the same movie but as “good guys” who are actually around at the end. It was a good story and well done even if the color was off a lot. One thing that surprised me was Virgina Mayo's character actually being portrayed as an unwed mother trying to make life better for her child. Her honestly with Bannon and her ability to carry her weight on the wagon train told us she was what the West needed. Imagine that, an "adult" adult Western. I don't know if Bannon was what she was looking for but have a feeling she turned that wagon around when he got to it.

Wells Fargo: You know how I feel about that one. It was well worth staying up for. I’ve no idea who Bob Burns was other than RO’s comments about his being a comedian of the times but I liked him. He was more subtle than Gabby Hayes, Walter Brennan or some of the other sidekicks and that made him blend in with the film while still being entertaining.

Fort Massacre is odd in that plays like a Shakespearian tragedy. McCrea lets himself play a likeable man done in by the hatred that he cannot overcome but maybe seeing him so full of mindless vile is what makes it all stay with us. It’s a sad irony that when John Russell’s character finally decides on something it has to be the ending.

Trooper Hook is the other side of the coin. Here’s a man who’s willing to take in a woman who’s been an “Indian” captive and a child to one of them. This is the Joel McCrea that we love and a great ending to the month. Did you have to keep me up all night though, showing all of my favorites at one time? Never mind; the alternative was not at all. I’m still alive.

Here's something I wrote almost 11 years ago as part of a review of Randolph Scott's career on the Western board at the IMDb:

To write of Ride the High Country is almost superfluous in this forum, few westerns appear to be as cherished and admired. This is one even non-Peckinpah fans speak well of as it emphasizes character, not violence. From its nominal beginnings, with producer Richard Lyons sending a story to Scott, certain it would not even be read, to the actor's enthusiasm so brimming that he passed it along to Joel McCrea, one can only wonder if this was fate. The script prepared by N.B. Stone did not meet with the approval of Lyons, and he suggested Sam Peckinpah, with only one previous feature, to rewrite and direct. The businessman in Scott had to look at Sam's Deadly Companions, and surely he saw the similarities to the Boetticher films, especially Ride Lonesome and Comanche Station - Brian Keith's hero was not that much different than the ones Scott had portrayed.

The question of billing was solved over lunch at the Brown Derby - a simple coin toss that Scott won. The concern was over which roles to play, and it took only one day of filming before the roles were swapped by mutual dissent, and immediate consent. The rest of the shoot went fine, according to McCrea, Peckinpah was "A very gifted writer...he was fine to work with. I hear he got tough later on, especially with crew, but with us he was fine, a real talent."

The budget was $800,000, and the filming was on a 24 day schedule, which is easier to accomplish with vets of Scott and McCrea's caliber, but Peckinpah also had relatively new performers such as Mariette Hartley (her debut at age 22) and Ron Starr to contend with. Others such as Edgar Buchanan, R.G Armstrong, L.Q. Jones and John Anderson were around long enough, and Warren Oates, James Drury and John Davis Chandler had some, if not much seasoning by this time.

The big problem came when the unit went back, and the post-production and editing were finished. Sol Siegel, who green-lighted the project was gone, and, as tends to happen in studio takeovers, the new administration had no good will towards a chancy project from the old administration. So, in the summer of 1962, Ride the High Country opened on the second half of double-bills, barely noticed by the public, but it received the kind of attention and reviews accorded to only the most prestigious productions:

Time: "Ride the High Country has a rare honesty of script, performance and theme - that goodness is not a gift, but a quest."

Newsweek: "In fact, everything about the picture has the ring of truth, from the unglamorized setting to the flavorful dialog and the natural acting."

The domestic failure went on to win First Prize at the Venice Film Festival, and the Grand Prize at the Brussels Film Festival, beating out 8 1/2. All over Europe, it became one of MGM's most financially successful releases, and its ending had to influence the closing scene between Bronson and Robards in Leone's Once Upon A Time in the West.

And thus ended the cinema saga of one of Hollywood's top cowboys, the acclaim came late, but it came in greater number than many ever get to experience. That it came at all must surely have surprised a man who was the first to say "I'm no actor."

As we discussed a year or so ago in the Westerns" forum the quote "...enter my house justified" was a quote Sam Peckinpah learned in his childhood from his father and remembered. Basically McCrea's character was Peckinpah's father incarnate. At a special screening for the cast and crew Sam invited his sister Fern Lea. When the film ended with McCrea's death scene and the lights came up everyone was on their feet cheering and applauding. But his sister ran to the ladies room crying. She had seen their father in every word and gesture of Joel McCrea's performance.
.RTHC had a budget of $800,000 and a shooting schedule of 24 days.As David Weddle put it in his book "MGM considered it "..strictly double bill fare for drive-ins in redneck country where a few dollars could still be rung out of the fading stars McCrea and Scott". The film opened on the bottom half of a double feature. The main movie was "The Tatars" with Orson Wells and Victor Mature. Big build up for the "Tatars" but nothing for "RTHC" The head of MGM announced the film a "bomb". THEN
Enter the New York critics.
"Daily News 4 stars..
Times raved and put it on their "Ten best" list..
The Herald Tribune, Life, the Hollywood Reporter loved it and named it one of the best films of the year..
In Mexico it won the "Silver Goddess award, the Paris critics award, in Sweden the "Silver Leaf Award' and at the Belgium International Film Festival it took the "Grand Prix" beating out all others including Fellini's "Eight and a Half"........
The day after the New York critics reviews came out the theater owners were on ladders reversing the billings......

Edited by: fredbaetz on May 31, 2012 2:37 PM

Edited by: fredbaetz on May 31, 2012 2:38 PM

Joel McCrea! Joel McCrea!
His star of the month ends today!

It has been a great month of McCrea films!
Thanks TCM!