Arsenic and Old Lace (film)
Encyclopedia
Arsenic and Old Lace is a 1944 film
directed by Frank Capra
based on Joseph Kesselring
's play of the same name
. The script adaptation
was by twins Julius J. Epstein
and Philip G. Epstein
. Capra actually filmed the movie in 1941, but it was not released until 1944, after the original stage version had finished its run on Broadway
. The lead role of Mortimer Brewster was originally intended for Bob Hope
, but he couldn't be released from his contract with Paramount
.
Capra had also approached Jack Benny
and Ronald Reagan
before going with Cary Grant
. Boris Karloff
played Jonathan Brewster, who "looks like Karloff", on the Broadway stage, but he was unable to do the movie as well because he was still appearing in the play during filming, and Raymond Massey
took his place.
In addition to Grant as Mortimer Brewster, the film also starred Josephine Hull
and Jean Adair
as the Brewster sisters, Abby and Martha, respectively. Hull and Adair as well as John Alexander
(who played Teddy Roosevelt) were reprising their roles from the 1941 stage production. Hull and Adair both received an eight-week leave of absence from the stage production that was still running, but Karloff did not as he was an investor in the stage production and its main draw. The entire film was shot within those eight weeks. The film cost just over $1.2 million of a $2 million budget to produce.
) falls in love with Elaine Harper (Priscilla Lane), who grew up next door to him in Brooklyn
, and, on Halloween
day, they marry. Immediately after the wedding, Mortimer visits the eccentric but lovable relatives who raised him and who still live in his old family home: his elderly aunts Abby (Josephine Hull
) and Martha (Jean Adair
), and his brother Teddy (John Alexander
), who believes he is Theodore Roosevelt
. Each time Teddy goes upstairs, he yells "Charge!" and takes the stairs at a run, imitating Roosevelt's famous charge up San Juan Hill
.
Mortimer finds a corpse hidden in a window seat
and assumes that Teddy has committed murder under some delusion, but his aunts explain that they are responsible ("It's one of our charities"). They explain in the most innocent terms that they have developed what Mortimer calls the "very bad habit" of ending the presumed suffering of lonely old bachelors by serving them elderberry wine spiked with arsenic
, strychnine
and "just a pinch
of cyanide". The bodies are buried in the basement by Teddy, who believes he is digging locks for the Panama Canal
and burying yellow fever
victims.
To complicate matters further, Mortimer's brother Jonathan (Raymond Massey
) arrives with his alcoholic accomplice, plastic surgeon Dr. Herman Einstein (Peter Lorre
). Jonathan is a psychotic
murderer trying to escape the police and find a place to dispose of the corpse of his latest victim, a certain Mr. Spenalzo. Jonathan's face, as altered by Einstein while drunk, looks like Boris Karloff
's in his makeup as Frankenstein's monster
. This resemblance (originally a self-referential
joke due to Boris Karloff playing the character on the stage) is frequently noted, much to Jonathan's annoyance. Jonathan, upon finding out his aunts' secret, decides to bury Spenalzo in the cellar (to which Abby and Martha object vehemently, because their victims were all nice gentlemen while Mr. Spenalzo is a stranger) and soon declares his intention to kill Mortimer.
While Elaine waits at her family home next door for Mortimer to take her on their honeymoon, Mortimer makes increasingly frantic attempts to stay on top of the situation, including multiple efforts to alert the bumbling local cops to the threat Jonathan poses, as well as to get the paperwork filed that will have Teddy declared legally insane and committed to a mental asylum (giving him a safe explanation for the bodies should the cops find them, and preventing his aunts from creating any more victims because they will no longer have any place to bury the bodies). He also worries that he will go insane like the rest of the Brewster family. As he puts it, "Insanity runs in my family, practically gallops!". While explaining this to Elaine, he claims they've been crazy since the first Brewsters came to America as pilgrims
.
But eventually Jonathan is arrested, while Teddy is safely consigned to an asylum and the two aunts insist upon joining him. Finally, Abby and Martha inform Mortimer that he is not biologically related to the Brewsters after all: his real mother was the aunts' cook and his father had been a chef on a steamship. In the film's closing scene, after lustily kissing Elaine and before whisking her away to their honeymoon, he gleefully exclaims "I'm not a Brewster, I'm a son of a sea cook!" This is a Hollywood Production Code bowdlerization of the line in the play: "I'm a bastard!"
Veteran character actor Charles Lane
appears as a photographer at City Hall trying to get a picture of Mortimer Brewster getting a marriage license at the beginning of the film.
Twenty-four years after the film was released, Charles Higham
and Joel Greenberg wrote Hollywood in the Forties where they stated that "Frank Capra provided a rather overstated and strained version of Arsenic and Old Lace".
American Film Institute
recognition
with Boris Karloff and Eddie Albert
, and the January 25, 1948, broadcast of the Ford Theatre
.
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
directed by Frank Capra
Frank Capra
Frank Russell Capra was a Sicilian-born American film director. He emigrated to the U.S. when he was six, and eventually became a creative force behind major award-winning films during the 1930s and 1940s...
based on Joseph Kesselring
Joseph Kesselring
Joseph Otto Kesselring was an American writer and playwright known best for his play Arsenic and Old Lace, written in 1939 and originally entitled "Bodies in Our Cellar." He was born in New York City to Henry and Frances Kesselring. His father's parents were immigrants from Germany. His mother was...
's play of the same name
Arsenic and Old Lace (play)
Arsenic and Old Lace is a play by American playwright Joseph Kesselring, written in 1939. It has become best known through the film adaptation starring Cary Grant and directed by Frank Capra. The play was directed by Bretaigne Windust, and opened on January 10, 1941. On September 25, 1943, the...
. The script adaptation
Adaptation
An adaptation in biology is a trait with a current functional role in the life history of an organism that is maintained and evolved by means of natural selection. An adaptation refers to both the current state of being adapted and to the dynamic evolutionary process that leads to the adaptation....
was by twins Julius J. Epstein
Julius J. Epstein
Julius J. Epstein was an American screenwriter, who had a long career, best remembered for the adaptation - in partnership with his twin brother, Philip, and others - of the unproduced play Everybody Comes to Rick's that became the screenplay for the film Casablanca , for which its team of writers...
and Philip G. Epstein
Philip G. Epstein
Philip G. Epstein was an American screenwriter most known for his adaptation in partnership with his twin brother, Julius, and others, of the unproduced play Everybody Comes to Rick's which became the Academy Award-winning screenplay of the film Casablanca .Epstein was born in New York City and...
. Capra actually filmed the movie in 1941, but it was not released until 1944, after the original stage version had finished its run on Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
. The lead role of Mortimer Brewster was originally intended for Bob Hope
Bob Hope
Bob Hope, KBE, KCSG, KSS was a British-born American comedian and actor who appeared in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in radio, television and movies. He was also noted for his work with the US Armed Forces and his numerous USO shows entertaining American military personnel...
, but he couldn't be released from his contract with Paramount
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
.
Capra had also approached Jack Benny
Jack Benny
Jack Benny was an American comedian, vaudevillian, and actor for radio, television, and film...
and Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
before going with Cary Grant
Cary Grant
Archibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English actor who later took U.S. citizenship...
. Boris Karloff
Boris Karloff
William Henry Pratt , better known by his stage name Boris Karloff, was an English actor.Karloff is best remembered for his roles in horror films and his portrayal of Frankenstein's monster in Frankenstein , Bride of Frankenstein , and Son of Frankenstein...
played Jonathan Brewster, who "looks like Karloff", on the Broadway stage, but he was unable to do the movie as well because he was still appearing in the play during filming, and Raymond Massey
Raymond Massey
Raymond Hart Massey was a Canadian/American actor.-Early life:Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna , who was born in Illinois, and Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy owner of the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company. Massey's family could trace their ancestry back to the American...
took his place.
In addition to Grant as Mortimer Brewster, the film also starred Josephine Hull
Josephine Hull
Josephine Hull was an Academy Award winning American actress who also was a director of plays. She had a successful 50-year career on stage while taking some of her better known roles to film...
and Jean Adair
Jean Adair
Jean Adair was a Canadian actress.Born as Violet McNaughton, she worked primarily on stage but also made several film appearances late in her career, most notably as one of Cary Grant's dotty old aunts in Arsenic and Old Lace, a role she originated on Broadway...
as the Brewster sisters, Abby and Martha, respectively. Hull and Adair as well as John Alexander
John Alexander (actor)
John Alexander was an American stage and film actor.Perhaps his most memorable performance was as Teddy Brewster, a lunatic who thinks he is Theodore Roosevelt, in the 1944 classic film Arsenic and Old Lace opposite Cary Grant. He had previously portrayed that role in the 1941 Broadway play of the...
(who played Teddy Roosevelt) were reprising their roles from the 1941 stage production. Hull and Adair both received an eight-week leave of absence from the stage production that was still running, but Karloff did not as he was an investor in the stage production and its main draw. The entire film was shot within those eight weeks. The film cost just over $1.2 million of a $2 million budget to produce.
Plot
Despite having written several books describing marriage as an "old-fashioned superstition", Mortimer Brewster (Cary GrantCary Grant
Archibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English actor who later took U.S. citizenship...
) falls in love with Elaine Harper (Priscilla Lane), who grew up next door to him in Brooklyn
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
, and, on Halloween
Halloween
Hallowe'en , also known as Halloween or All Hallows' Eve, is a yearly holiday observed around the world on October 31, the night before All Saints' Day...
day, they marry. Immediately after the wedding, Mortimer visits the eccentric but lovable relatives who raised him and who still live in his old family home: his elderly aunts Abby (Josephine Hull
Josephine Hull
Josephine Hull was an Academy Award winning American actress who also was a director of plays. She had a successful 50-year career on stage while taking some of her better known roles to film...
) and Martha (Jean Adair
Jean Adair
Jean Adair was a Canadian actress.Born as Violet McNaughton, she worked primarily on stage but also made several film appearances late in her career, most notably as one of Cary Grant's dotty old aunts in Arsenic and Old Lace, a role she originated on Broadway...
), and his brother Teddy (John Alexander
John Alexander (actor)
John Alexander was an American stage and film actor.Perhaps his most memorable performance was as Teddy Brewster, a lunatic who thinks he is Theodore Roosevelt, in the 1944 classic film Arsenic and Old Lace opposite Cary Grant. He had previously portrayed that role in the 1941 Broadway play of the...
), who believes he is Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...
. Each time Teddy goes upstairs, he yells "Charge!" and takes the stairs at a run, imitating Roosevelt's famous charge up San Juan Hill
Battle of San Juan Hill
The Battle of San Juan Hill , also known as the battle for the San Juan Heights, was a decisive battle of the Spanish-American War. The San Juan heights was a north-south running elevation about two kilometers east of Santiago de Cuba. The names San Juan Hill and Kettle Hill were names given by the...
.
Mortimer finds a corpse hidden in a window seat
Window seat
A window seat is a miniature sofa without a back, intended to fill the recess of a window. In the latter part of the 18th century, when tall narrow sash windows were almost universal, the window seat was in high favor, and was no doubt in keeping with the formalism of Georgian interiors. It...
and assumes that Teddy has committed murder under some delusion, but his aunts explain that they are responsible ("It's one of our charities"). They explain in the most innocent terms that they have developed what Mortimer calls the "very bad habit" of ending the presumed suffering of lonely old bachelors by serving them elderberry wine spiked with arsenic
Arsenic
Arsenic is a chemical element with the symbol As, atomic number 33 and relative atomic mass 74.92. Arsenic occurs in many minerals, usually in conjunction with sulfur and metals, and also as a pure elemental crystal. It was first documented by Albertus Magnus in 1250.Arsenic is a metalloid...
, strychnine
Strychnine
Strychnine is a highly toxic , colorless crystalline alkaloid used as a pesticide, particularly for killing small vertebrates such as birds and rodents. Strychnine causes muscular convulsions and eventually death through asphyxia or sheer exhaustion...
and "just a pinch
Pinch (cooking)
A pinch in cooking is a very small amount of an ingredient, typically salt, sugar or spice. Traditionally it was defined as "an amount that can be taken between the thumb and forefinger". Historically the pinch was more precisely defined by some U.S...
of cyanide". The bodies are buried in the basement by Teddy, who believes he is digging locks for the Panama Canal
Panama Canal
The Panama Canal is a ship canal in Panama that joins the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean and is a key conduit for international maritime trade. Built from 1904 to 1914, the canal has seen annual traffic rise from about 1,000 ships early on to 14,702 vessels measuring a total of 309.6...
and burying yellow fever
Yellow fever
Yellow fever is an acute viral hemorrhagic disease. The virus is a 40 to 50 nm enveloped RNA virus with positive sense of the Flaviviridae family....
victims.
To complicate matters further, Mortimer's brother Jonathan (Raymond Massey
Raymond Massey
Raymond Hart Massey was a Canadian/American actor.-Early life:Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna , who was born in Illinois, and Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy owner of the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company. Massey's family could trace their ancestry back to the American...
) arrives with his alcoholic accomplice, plastic surgeon Dr. Herman Einstein (Peter Lorre
Peter Lorre
Peter Lorre was an Austrian-American actor frequently typecast as a sinister foreigner.He caused an international sensation in 1931 with his portrayal of a serial killer who preys on little girls in the German film M...
). Jonathan is a psychotic
Psychosis
Psychosis means abnormal condition of the mind, and is a generic psychiatric term for a mental state often described as involving a "loss of contact with reality"...
murderer trying to escape the police and find a place to dispose of the corpse of his latest victim, a certain Mr. Spenalzo. Jonathan's face, as altered by Einstein while drunk, looks like Boris Karloff
Boris Karloff
William Henry Pratt , better known by his stage name Boris Karloff, was an English actor.Karloff is best remembered for his roles in horror films and his portrayal of Frankenstein's monster in Frankenstein , Bride of Frankenstein , and Son of Frankenstein...
's in his makeup as Frankenstein's monster
Frankenstein
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel about a failed experiment that produced a monster, written by Mary Shelley, with inserts of poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley started writing the story when she was eighteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty-one. The first...
. This resemblance (originally a self-referential
Self-reference
Self-reference occurs in natural or formal languages when a sentence or formula refers to itself. The reference may be expressed either directly—through some intermediate sentence or formula—or by means of some encoding...
joke due to Boris Karloff playing the character on the stage) is frequently noted, much to Jonathan's annoyance. Jonathan, upon finding out his aunts' secret, decides to bury Spenalzo in the cellar (to which Abby and Martha object vehemently, because their victims were all nice gentlemen while Mr. Spenalzo is a stranger) and soon declares his intention to kill Mortimer.
While Elaine waits at her family home next door for Mortimer to take her on their honeymoon, Mortimer makes increasingly frantic attempts to stay on top of the situation, including multiple efforts to alert the bumbling local cops to the threat Jonathan poses, as well as to get the paperwork filed that will have Teddy declared legally insane and committed to a mental asylum (giving him a safe explanation for the bodies should the cops find them, and preventing his aunts from creating any more victims because they will no longer have any place to bury the bodies). He also worries that he will go insane like the rest of the Brewster family. As he puts it, "Insanity runs in my family, practically gallops!". While explaining this to Elaine, he claims they've been crazy since the first Brewsters came to America as pilgrims
William Brewster (Pilgrim)
Elder William Brewster was a Mayflower passenger and a Pilgrim colonist leader and preacher.-Origins:Brewster was probably born at Doncaster, Yorkshire, England, circa 1566/1567, although no birth records have been found, and died at Plymouth, Massachusetts on April 10, 1644 around 9- or 10pm...
.
But eventually Jonathan is arrested, while Teddy is safely consigned to an asylum and the two aunts insist upon joining him. Finally, Abby and Martha inform Mortimer that he is not biologically related to the Brewsters after all: his real mother was the aunts' cook and his father had been a chef on a steamship. In the film's closing scene, after lustily kissing Elaine and before whisking her away to their honeymoon, he gleefully exclaims "I'm not a Brewster, I'm a son of a sea cook!" This is a Hollywood Production Code bowdlerization of the line in the play: "I'm a bastard!"
Cast
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Cary Grant Cary Grant Archibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English actor who later took U.S. citizenship... |
Mortimer Brewster |
| Josephine Hull Josephine Hull Josephine Hull was an Academy Award winning American actress who also was a director of plays. She had a successful 50-year career on stage while taking some of her better known roles to film... |
Aunt Abby Brewster |
| Jean Adair Jean Adair Jean Adair was a Canadian actress.Born as Violet McNaughton, she worked primarily on stage but also made several film appearances late in her career, most notably as one of Cary Grant's dotty old aunts in Arsenic and Old Lace, a role she originated on Broadway... |
Aunt Martha Brewster |
| Raymond Massey Raymond Massey Raymond Hart Massey was a Canadian/American actor.-Early life:Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna , who was born in Illinois, and Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy owner of the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company. Massey's family could trace their ancestry back to the American... |
Jonathan Brewster |
| Peter Lorre Peter Lorre Peter Lorre was an Austrian-American actor frequently typecast as a sinister foreigner.He caused an international sensation in 1931 with his portrayal of a serial killer who preys on little girls in the German film M... |
Dr. Herman Einstein |
| Priscilla Lane | Elaine Harper Brewster |
| John Alexander John Alexander (actor) John Alexander was an American stage and film actor.Perhaps his most memorable performance was as Teddy Brewster, a lunatic who thinks he is Theodore Roosevelt, in the 1944 classic film Arsenic and Old Lace opposite Cary Grant. He had previously portrayed that role in the 1941 Broadway play of the... |
Teddy "Roosevelt" Brewster |
| Jack Carson Jack Carson John Elmer "Jack" Carson was a Canadian-born U.S.-based film actor.Jack Carson was one of the most popular character actors during the 'golden age of Hollywood', with a film career spanning the 1930s, '40s and '50s... |
Officer Patrick O'Hara |
| John Ridgely John Ridgely John Ridgely was an American film character actor with over 100 film credits. He appeared in the 1946 Humphrey Bogart film The Big Sleep as blackmailing gangster Eddie Mars and had a memorable role as a suffering heart patient in the film noir Nora Prentiss .The Chicago, Illinois-born actor... |
Officer Sanders |
| Edward McNamara Edward McNamara Edward James McNamara was a Broadway and Hollywood actor.-Biography:He was born on August 13, 1884 in Paterson, New Jersey. He sang while a police officer in Paterson, New Jersey. His Broadway career started in 1926, and his Hollywood career started in 1929. He died in 1944 shortly after filming... |
Police Sgt. Brophy |
| James Gleason James Gleason James Austin Gleason was an American actor born in New York City. He was also a playwright and screenwriter.-Career:... |
Police Lt. Rooney |
| Edward Everett Horton Edward Everett Horton Edward Everett Horton was an American character actor. He had a long career in film, theater, radio, television and voice work for animated cartoons. He is especially known for his work in the films of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.-Early life:Horton was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Isabella... |
Mr. Witherspoon |
Veteran character actor Charles Lane
Charles Lane (actor)
Charles Gerstle Levison , better known as Charles Lane, was an American character actor seen in many movies and TV shows, and at the time of his death may have been the oldest living professional American actor. Lane appeared in many Frank Capra films, including You Can't Take It With You , Mr...
appears as a photographer at City Hall trying to get a picture of Mortimer Brewster getting a marriage license at the beginning of the film.
Reviews
The contemporary critical reviews were uniformly positive. The New York Times critic summed up the majority view, "As a whole, Arsenic and Old Lace, the Warner picture which came to the Strand yesterday, is good macabre fun." Variety declared, "Capra's production, not elaborate, captures the color and spirit of the play, while the able writing team of Julius J. and Philip G. Epstein has turned in a very workable, tightly-compressed script. Capra's own intelligent direction rounds out."Twenty-four years after the film was released, Charles Higham
Charles Higham (biographer)
Charles Higham is an author, editor and poet. Higham is a recipient of the Prix des Créateurs of the Académie Française and the Poetry Society of London Prize.-Biography:...
and Joel Greenberg wrote Hollywood in the Forties where they stated that "Frank Capra provided a rather overstated and strained version of Arsenic and Old Lace".
American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
recognition
- 2000: AFI's 100 Years... 100 LaughsAFI's 100 Years... 100 LaughsPart of the AFI 100 Years… series, AFI's 100 Years…100 Laughs is a list of the top 100 funniest movies in American cinema. A wide variety of comedies were nominated for the distinction that included slapstick comedy, screwball comedy, romantic comedy, satire, black comedy, musical comedy, comedy of...
#30
Radio adaptation
Arsenic and Old Lace was adapted as a radio play for the November 25, 1946, broadcast of The Screen Guild TheaterThe Screen Guild Theater
The Screen Guild Theater was a popular radio anthology series during the Golden Age of Radio, broadcast from 1939 until 1952, with leading Hollywood actors performing in adaptations of popular motion pictures such as Going My Way and The Postman Always Rings Twice.The show had a long run, lasting...
with Boris Karloff and Eddie Albert
Eddie Albert
Edward Albert Heimberger , known professionally as Eddie Albert, was an American actor and activist. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1954 for his performance in Roman Holiday, and in 1973 for The Heartbreak Kid.Other well-known screen roles of his include Bing...
, and the January 25, 1948, broadcast of the Ford Theatre
Ford Theatre
Ford Theatre was a radio and television anthology series broadcast in the United States in the 1940s and 1950s. At various times the television series appeared on all three major television networks, while the radio version was broadcast on two separate networks and on two separate coasts...
.
See also
- Amy Archer-GilliganAmy Archer-Gilligan"Sister" Amy Duggan Archer-Gilligan was a Windsor, Connecticut nursing home proprietor and serial killer who systematically murdered at least five people by poison; one was her second husband, Michael Gilligan, and the rest were residents of her nursing home...
— nursing home owner accused of murdering elderly men in her care 1910-1917 - Black Widow murdersBlack Widow murdersOn April 18, 2008, Helen Golay of Santa Monica, California and Olga Rutterschmidt of Hollywood, California were convicted of the murders of two homeless men...
— a real murder case whose events were compared to the fictional murders in the film