THE FRONT PAGE (1931) Adolphe Menjou, Pat O'Brien & Mary Brian | Comedy, Crime, Drama | B&W

The Front Page is a 1931 American pre-Code screwball comedy-drama film directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Adolphe Menjou and Pat O'Brien. Based on the 1928 Broadway play of the same name by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, the film was produced by Howard Hughes, written by Bartlett Cormack and Charles Lederer, and distributed by United Artists. The supporting cast includes Mary Brian, Edward Everett Horton, Walter Catlett, George E. Stone, Mae Clarke, Slim Summerville, and Matt Moore. At the 4th Academy Awards, the film was nominated for Best Picture, Milestone for Best Director, and Menjou for Best Actor.

SYNOPSIS
A crusading newspaper editor tricks his retiring star reporter into covering one last case.

In an unnamed large city with multiple daily newspapers, star reporter Hildebrand "Hildy" Johnson and his Morning Post editor, Walter Burns, hope to cash in on a big story involving an escaped convicted murderer, Earl Williams. Williams is scheduled to go to the gallows at 7 o'clock the following morning for an anarchist-related murder of a black policeman. Esteemed newspaperman Johnson is about to quit the journalism trade and is on his way to marry his sweetheart Peggy Grant and relocate to New York City where an advertising job awaits him. Not surprisingly, his unscrupulous boss Burns does not want him to quit. He wants Johnson to remain on his staff so he can cover the major news story for the Morning Post.

CAST & CREW
Adolphe Menjou as Walter Burns
Pat O'Brien as Hildebrand "Hildy" Johnson
Mary Brian as Peggy Grant
Edward Everett Horton as Roy V. Bensinger
Walter Catlett as Jimmy Murphy
George E. Stone as Earl Williams
Mae Clarke as Molly Malloy
Slim Summerville as Irving Pincus
Matt Moore as Ernie Kruger
Frank McHugh as "Mac" McCue
Clarence Wilson as Sheriff Peter B. "Pinky" Hartman
Fred Howard as Schwartz
Phil Tead as Wilson
Eugene Strong as Endicott
Spencer Charters as Woodenshoes
Maurice Black as Diamond Louie
Effie Ellsler as Mrs Grant
Dorothea Wolbert as Jenny
James Gordon as Fred, the Mayor

Directed by Lewis Milestone
Screenplay by Bartlett Cormack, Charles Lederer
Based on The Front Page by Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur
Produced by Lewis Milestone, Howard Hughes
Cinematography Glen MacWilliams
Edited by W. Duncan Mansfield
Production company The Caddo Company
Distributed by United Artists
Release date April 4, 1931
Running time 101 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Box office $700,000

NOTES
In addition to this film, the play has been adapted on several other occasions. CBS radio turned it into a one-hour June 28, 1937 episode of Lux Radio Theatre with Walter Winchell and James Gleason, and a half-hour June 22, 1946 episode of Academy Award Theater with O'Brien and Menjou reprising their original roles. NBC radio ran a one-hour May 9, 1948 episode of the Ford Theater starring Ed Begley and Everett Sloane.

The story was adapted for Howard Hawks's comedy His Girl Friday (1940), in which Hildy was recast as a woman played by Rosalind Russell, the ex-wife of Walter (Cary Grant), giving the story a romantic spin. There was also a 1974 remake of The Front Page starring Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau; and another version was made as Switching Channels (1988) with Burt Reynolds, Kathleen Turner and Christopher Reeve.

The Front Page was preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2016.

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