His Girl Friday

An editor tries to keep his ace reporter from remarrying in a rewrite of 1931’s “The Front Page.”, Newspaper reporter Hildy Johnson is all set to leave her job and move to Albany to marry her staid new fiance Bruce, but not if her boss, and ex-husband, Walter Burns has anything to do with it. When he puts her on the scene of a jailbreak exclusive, her reporter’s instincts kick in and soon Bruce is the last thing on her mind., Rewrite of the Ben Hecht-Charles MacArthur play “The Front Page” is about a newspaper editor who goes to extraordinary lengths to keep his best reporter (who is also his ex-wife) from remarrying in a desperate attempt to win her back., A wonderful 1940 Howard Hawks comedy starring Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell based on the Front Page scenario – a ruthless and manipulative editor uses an execution to boost circulation. Possibly Cary Grant’s best role ever., A re-make of the 1931 classic The Front Page. Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell add the spin by her not only being his ace reporter leaving the paper for a rival but also his ex-wife due to re-marry. The plot, based around an up-coming wrongful hanging is just a device for the two leads to swap some of the most crackingly funny lines ever heard (they were encouraged to ad-lib by director Howard Hawks) and the result is a comedic masterpiece., A reporter helps a condemned man escape, as she knows his execution is planned as a vote-getting measure. Starring Cary Grant., Reporter helps a condemned man escape, as she knows his execution is planned as vote-getting measure., The second screen version of the Ben Hecht/Charles MacArthur play +The Front Page, His Girl Friday changed hard-driving newspaper reporter Hildy Johnson from a man to a woman, transforming the story into a scintillating battle of the sexes. Rosalind Russell plays Hildy, about to foresake journalism for marriage to cloddish Bruce Baldwin (Ralph Bellamy). Cary Grant plays Walter Burns, Hildy’s editor and ex-husband, who feigns happiness about her impending marriage as a ploy to win her back. The ace up Walter’s sleeve is a late-breaking news story concerning the impending execution of anarchist Earl Williams (John Qualen), a blatant example of political chicanery that Hildy can’t pass up. The story gets hotter when Williams escapes and is hidden from the cops by Hildy and Walter–right in the prison pressroom. His Girl Friday may well be the fastest comedy of the 1930s, with kaleidoscope action, instantaneous plot twists, and overlapping dialogue. And if you listen closely, you’ll hear a couple of “in” jokes, one concerning Cary Grant’s real name (Archie Leach), and another poking fun at Ralph Bellamy’s patented “poor sap” screen image. Subsequent versions of The Front Page included Billy Wilder’s 1974 adaptation, which restored Hildy Johnson’s manhood in the form of Jack Lemmon, and 1988’s Switching Channels, which cast Burt Reynolds in the Walter Burns role and Kathleen Turner as the Hildy Johnson counterpart., A Newspaper journalist assists an innocent condemned man to escape jail and the death sentence.