Remembering It's a Wonderful Life: The Stories Behind the Frank Capra Classic Part 1

Copyright (c) 2012 Stephen Schochet

In a 1946 interview, Capra described It's a Wonderful Life's theme as "the individual's belief in himself," and that he made it to "combat a modern trend toward atheism."

It's a Wonderful Life (1946) began as a short story called The Greatest Gift. Pennsylvania-born writer Philip Van Doren Stern, who said that the heartwarming tale had come to him in a dream, was unable to sell it to a publisher, so he sent the story out as a long Christmas card to friends. His agent subsequently sold the fable to RKO pictures, where it went through several transformations. In one version a losing political candidate contemplated suicide, only to have an angel convince him to stick around and do good works. Finally it fell into the hands of director Frank Capra who said it was the story he had been looking for all his life, and purchased it to be the first project for his new venture, Liberty Films (started by Capra in 1945 along with Producer Samuel J. Briskin, and directors William Wyler and George Stevens). With movie attendance booming during the Second World War II a new Independent film company for big name directors seemed like a can't miss idea.

Capra had long been an admirer of Amadeo Pietro Giannini, the founder of the Bank of Italy in 1904, renamed the Bank of America in 1928. Giannini earned a reputation for lending money to people other financial institutions had considered bad risks, including immigrants whose property had been destroyed by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. A. P. only required a handshake and was proud to say later that he was always paid back. Giannini also believed strongly in the hopes and dreams of some of the street merchants who gravitated into the fledgling film industry, and put his bank's money behind their ventures. Based on Giannini, Capra's 1932 drama, American Madness, told the story of a bank President (Walter Huston) who makes lending decisions based more on character than collateral, which causes his board of directors to try and ruin him. The moneyman is bailed by his less well-to-do friends, who personally benefited from his past generosity. A movie about a bank run had proved too topical to be a big hit in 1932; now, fourteen years later, It's a Wonderful Life would allow Capra to once again tackle a similar theme.

To play the unassuming savings and loan clerk in Wonderful Life, Capra wanted Jimmy Stewart who he had previously worked with him in You Can't Take It With You (1938) and Mr. Smith Goes To Washington (1939). Coming back from World War II, the thirty-seven year old Stewart was no longer the easy going man-about-town he had been in the thirties. The former Academy Award winner for The Philadelphia Story (1940) had led a thousand men on bombing missions in the European theater in hard-to-maneuver B-24s. The loud plane engines damaged Jim's hearing, in later years when people would greet him in public he would sometimes fail to respond; some would mistake his partial deafness for a cold personality. (Stewart had displayed a great sense of humor when he'd first been inducted into the army; his salary had dropped from the hefty $1500 a week he was being paid by MGM Studios to twenty-one dollars a month; he earned his keep as a Buck Private whose duties included peeling potatoes. Upon receiving his first payment Jim immediately sent a check for $2.10 to his agent.) The actor was uncertain after five years away from the screen if he still wanted to be in the movies; his life in the military at times made him feel like his old profession was insignificant. In 1943, when Stewart had tried to stay in one the best hotels in Madrid, he was turned away because he was an actor. Jim returned back to the military base, changed into his Lieutenant Colonel's uniform, returned to the resort and was allowed to stay.

"Frank called me one day and said, 'I have an idea for a movie, why don't you come over and I'll tell you. So I went over and we sat down and he said, 'This picture starts in heaven'. That shook me." James Stewart

When he returned to Southern California in 1945 Stewart took things easy. He refused to re-sign with MGM, despite tearful requests to do so from Metro's hammy head honcho Louis B. Mayer. Like many World War II veterans Jim had trouble sleeping and would instinctively duck down whenever a plane would fly overhead. He was content to spend time flying kites, building model planes and going bobcat hunting with Henry Fonda. (Fonda had also been up for the George Bailey role; the two war veterans remained lifelong friends despite political differences which had once caused a fistfight between them in 1947; the liberal Fonda and conservative Stewart had promised, and kept their word, never to discuss politics again.) When Frank Capra made his pitch Stewart looked bored, out of it, which caused the director to lose confidence. "Well Jim, it's about a savings and loan clerk who wants to commit suicide. There's an angel named Clarence who shows him what life would have been like without him . . . aw forget it, it's a stupid idea." Capra was turning to leave when Stewart put his hand on his shoulder. "Frank, if you want me, I'm your man." At least that's how the film's publicists told it.

"I can remember when nobody believed an actor and didn't care what he believed." -- Lionel Barrymore

Stewart was at times morose and insecure as filming began. Since he went off to serve, Hollywood had found new leading men, such as Kirk Douglas and Gregory Peck, who both were seven years younger than he was. Some of Wonderful Life's early scenes called for the now graying Stewart to still be in high school. He felt ridiculous and considered plastic surgery, then thought better of it. But Jim was helped greatly by his co-star Donna Reed. (Jean Arthur, Olivia de Havilland, and Ginger Rogers were among several actresses considered for the role of Mary Baily). Before the romantic scene where George and Mary tearfully and sensuously declare their love for each other in Reed encouraged her leading man to do it in only one unrehearsed take, Capra later joked that Stewart was so nervous during the tender sequence he was forced to wrap a phone chord around the celluloid couple so Jim wouldn't run away.

Jim was also helped by the actor who played the film's villain, the wheelchair bound Lionel Barrymore, who reminded him that movies had the power to make people happy around the world. The old man's pep talks helped Jim to regain his confidence in his acting chops and Capra gave the Indiana, Pennsylvania born Stewart great latitude in playing the role of the small town resident whose big dreams would never be fulfilled. Just before filming the sequence where the Bailey's Bedford Falls neighbors came to take their money out of the building and loan, Capra advised the future grandma on TV's The Waltons, Ellen Corby, to ask Stewart for $17.50, half the amount that the script called for. The leading man responded by staying in character and impulsively kissing Corby on the cheek. In one of the films darker moments Stewart, who during the war was no stranger to nearly overpowering fear and had often prayed for the safe return of himself and his men before bombing missions, started sobbing on camera when he turned to God for help. As the show continued, some of Stewart's cast mates, who at first were questioning the rusty movie star's professionalism, became convinced that he and George Bailey were one and the same; Jim went on to deliver an Oscar-nominated performance.

(A brief aside: The sixty-six-year-old Barrymore, who for years famously played Ebenezer Scrooge on the radio and suffered from crippling arthritis, showed no sign of his legendary ferocious temper on the Wonderful Life set. A few years earlier Lionel had been directing a movie in which the actors kept blowing their lines, which resulted in several retakes; Barrymore had felt an explosion coming on. Still smiling, the enraged filmmaker excused himself, went upstairs to the sound control room and let loose a barrage of foul language; None of the cast members were spared his wrath. When he finished he felt better and calmly returned to the set. To Lionel?s delighted surprise, his performers excelled for the rest of the day. Later a jubilant Barrymore told a crewmember that patience always wins. The man replied, "That little broadcast from behind the glass booth didn't hurt any either.")

To be continued.

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