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Post by snsurone on Jun 5, 2020 17:16:00 GMT
During Hollywood's Golden Age, when the studio-system was in full force, it was a common practice for the heads to "loan out" their contract players to other studios, usually for a one-picture deal.
Some actors actually became stars while on loan, for example, Bette Davis in OF HUMAN BONDAGE and Rita Hayworth in BLOOD AND SAND.
Occasionally, the plan would backfire.
Darryl Zanuck lent Tyrone Power--then, Fox's biggest male star--to MGM to do MARIE ANTOINETTE with Norma Shearer.
Well, when Zanuck saw the finished film and how Ty was so overshadowed by the flamboyant female lead, he popped a cork and vowed to never lend out his top star again--a decision that cost Ty two plum roles: for KING'S ROW in the part that eventually went to Bob Cummings, and in GOLDEN BOY, which made a star of Bill Holden.
On the flip side, some actors asked, even begged their bosses to be lent out for good roles.
Perhaps the best example was Olivia de Havilland, who pleaded with Jack Warner to lend her to David Selznick to play Melanie in GWTW.
When Warner refused her request, Olivia prevailed on his wife, who, somehow, was able to persuade (nag?) her husband into changing his mind.
In the years after WW2, the studios gradually lost their powers as more and more actors opted to free-lance.
Eventually, the practice of loan-outs came to an end.
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Post by mattgarth on Jun 5, 2020 17:38:22 GMT
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT -- MGM studio head Louis B. Mayer wanted to punish troublesome contract player Clark Gable by shipping him over to lowly poverty row Columbia Pictures.
Gable showed up for work drunk, refused to even look at the script, and told director Frank Capra where he could stick it.
But after a week of shooting and warming up to the filmmaker's improvised style, Clark relaxed and got into the swing of things.
Oh yes -- and he even got an Oscar out of it.
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Post by snsurone on Jun 5, 2020 18:09:56 GMT
It was the same with Claudette Colbert, Matt.
She was under contract to Paramount, where Jesse Lasky found her a PITA, especially regarding her "good side".
So she, too, was loaned out to Columbia, and--SURPRISE!!
She won an Oscar, too!
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Post by mattgarth on Jun 5, 2020 18:44:39 GMT
Only Claudette, unlike Gable, never did enjoy the experience.
"I just finished the worst picture I ever made," she confided to a friend.
She was at LA's Union Station about to embark for New York on Oscar night when she was pulled off the train and rushed to the ceremony (winners were announced in advance back then).
She still holds the record for being the only Actress to accept an Academy Award wearing a travel suit instead of a glamorous gown.
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Post by Prime etc. on Jun 5, 2020 20:20:24 GMT
Warner Bros. loaning out Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck etc
Universal loaning out Woody Woodpecker
MGM loaning out Droopy
to Disney for Who Framed Roger Rabbit--it takes place in the Golden Age! (and in the film Disney had loaned out Dumbo and "half the cast of Fantasia" to RK Maroon--"they work for peanuts").
This was a case where apparently Spielberg was singularly important since Warner Bros had previously vowed they would never allow it.
Only the owners of the Casper and Tom and Jerry and Popeye characters said no.
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Post by teleadm on Jun 5, 2020 20:42:55 GMT
Robert Taylor became a star too on a loan-out, Magnificent Obsession 1935, to Universal.
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Post by snsurone on Jun 5, 2020 21:12:25 GMT
Only Claudette, unlike Gable, never did enjoy the experience. "I just finished the worst picture I ever made," she confided to a friend. She was at LA's Union Station about to embark for New York on Oscar night when she was pulled off the train and rushed to the ceremony (winners were announced in advance back then). She still s the record for being the only Actress to accept an Academy Award wearing a travel suit instead of a glamorous gown. Not exactly, Matt. At the Oscar ceremony for 1944 (held in 1945), the winners accepted their awards in ordinary daytime clothing. Reckon that the material for gowns and tuxes were better served as uniforms, parachutes and other wartime items. |
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Post by mattgarth on Jun 5, 2020 21:34:50 GMT
OK -- then adjusting that to Claudette being the first.
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jun 6, 2020 3:04:04 GMT
CASABLANCA"Paul Henreid was loaned to Warners for the role of Victor Lazlo by Selznick International Pictures against his will. He was concerned that playing a secondary character would ruin his career as a romantic lead." "Producer David O. Selznick, to whom Ingrid Bergman was under contract, at first did not want to loan her out for the movie. After he heard rumors that Sweden might become an ally of Germany, he was afraid that her career might be in danger because she was Swedish. He changed his mind and loaned her out before her image might get tainted." "Dooley Wilson was borrowed from Paramount at $500 a week."
 unconfirmed IMDb trivia
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Post by mattgarth on Jun 6, 2020 3:44:34 GMT
Henreid hated the scene where he rouses the patrons in Rick's to sing the Marseillaise. The band would not play until Bogie nodded his approval.
"I'm supposed to be this leader of a great movement -- and I can't get a stinking little band to follow my order?"
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jun 6, 2020 3:50:14 GMT
Henreid hated the scene where he rouses the patrons in Rick's to sing the Marseilles. The band would not play until Bogie nodded his approval. "I'm supposed to be this leader of a great movement -- and I can't get a stinking little band to follow my order?" and "During production, Humphrey Bogart was called to the studio to stand in the middle of the Rick's Cafe set and nod. He had no idea what the nod meant in the story--that he was giving his O.K. for the band in the cafe to play the "Marseillaise." " |
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Post by snsurone on Jun 6, 2020 10:26:21 GMT
Henreid hated the scene where he rouses the patrons in Rick's to sing the Marseillaise. The band would not play until Bogie nodded his approval. "I'm supposed to be this leader of a great movement -- and I can't get a stinking little band to follow my order?" And that's my favorite scene in the movie!  |
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Post by Isapop on Jun 6, 2020 17:27:52 GMT
Fred Astaire's film debut was on loan-out to MGM from RKO, playing himself in Dancing Lady.
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Post by snsurone on Jun 6, 2020 17:44:31 GMT
Fred Astaire's film debut was on loan-out to MGM from RKO, playing himself in Dancing Lady. He was signed by RKO to co-star in FLYING DOWN TO RIO (he was already an established star on Broadway), but when he arrived in Hollywood, the studio wasn't ready to begin filming. So, rather than let him collect a salary doing nothing, RKO lent him to Metro for a rather inauspicious debut.
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Post by snsurone on Jun 6, 2020 17:47:05 GMT
Henreid hated the scene where he rouses the patrons in Rick's to sing the Marseillaise. The band would not play until Bogie nodded his approval. "I'm supposed to be this leader of a great movement -- and I can't get a stinking little band to follow my order?" It's ironic that Henreid's two best films, CASABLANCA and NOW VOYAGER were made on loan-out to Warner's |
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jun 7, 2020 4:00:53 GMT
Samuel Goldwyn paid Paramount $133,500 to borrow Bob Hope for twelve weeks, during which time Hope made this film and The Princess and the Pirate (1944). Bob Hope was on loan from Paramount for the first of two films, in exchange for Gary Cooper''s appearance in Star Spangled Rhythm (1942).
Dorothy Lamour was borrowed from Paramount, and Marion Martin from RKO, for this film. |
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jun 7, 2020 21:59:29 GMT
Carl Laemmle Jr., Paramount and MGM bid for the rights to the play.THE AMAZING DR. CLITTERHOUSE. Laemmle bought them for over $50,000. He then turned them around and sold them to Warners in return for the loan of Paul Muni for "The Hunchback of Notre Dame", a film that never got made.
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jun 15, 2020 18:45:02 GMT
Dead Reckoning (1947)
Humphrey Bogart was borrowed from Warner Bros. for this film. This annoyed Bogart because in addition to his regular contract fee, Columbia paid Warner Bros. extra for the loan-out of one of its biggest stars.
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Post by hi224 on Jun 15, 2020 19:03:47 GMT
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT -- MGM studio head Louis B. Mayer wanted to punish troublesome contract player Clark Gable by shipping him over to lowly poverty row Columbia Pictures. Gable showed up for work drunk, refused to even look at the script, and told director Frank Capra where he could stick it. But after a week of shooting and warming up to the filmmaker's improvised style, Clark relaxed and got into the swing of things. Oh yes -- and he even got an Oscar out of it. I love reading about Gable seemed like he could play ball |
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Post by Doghouse6 on Jun 15, 2020 21:44:39 GMT
BATouttaheck / mattgarth / snsuroneThat IMDB trivia entry about Paul Henreid being under contract to Selznick appears to be in error. Neither of the two books I have on Selznick mention Henrieid as one of his "properties" along with Bergman, or others like Hitchcock, Dorothy McGuire, Gregory Peck and Jennifer Jones. The best info I can find is that Henreid's first contract in the U.S. was with RKO, for which he made only one film, Joan Of Paris, and that he moved to Warners' in 1942, beginning his stint there with Now, Voyager, and for which nine of his next ten pictures, including Casablanca, were made . It is true that he was generally dissatisfied with the serious, brooding roles in which he was cast at Warners, in the midst of which he was able to wangle a one-picture return to RKO by way of an unfulfilled commitment from that prior contract, for the kind of project he preferred: the rollicking Technicolor swashbuckler The Spanish Main (in which he has great support from tempestuous Maureen O'Hara, always-priceless Walter Slezak and scrappy Binnie Barnes). While not quite Burt Lancaster, Henreid does get to display a side seldom seen and, overall, it's a quite satisfying and fun pirate adventure.
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