Hello, Frisco, Hello (1943)

Toronto Film Society presented Hello, Frisco, Hello (1943) on Monday, January 22, 1979 in a double bill with Poor Little Rich Girl as part of the Season 31 Monday Evening Film Buff Series, Programme 5.

Production Company: 20th Century Fox.  Producer: Milton Sperling.  Director: Bruce Humberstone.  Screenplay: Robert Ellis, Helen Logan, Richard Macauley.  New Song by: Mack Gordon and Harry Warren.  Dances Staged by: Hermes Pan, Val Raset.  Costumes: Helen Rose, supervised by Fanchon.  Photography: Charles Clarke, Allen Davey.  Technicolor consultant: Natalie Kalmus.  Associate: Henri Jaffa.  Art Direction: James Basevi, Boris Leven.  Set Decoration: Thomas Little, Paul S. Fox.  Editor: Barbara McLean.  Makeup: Guy Pearce.  Special Photographic effects: Fred Sersen.  Sound: Joseph E. Aiken, Roger Heman.  Musical Direction: Charles Henderson, Emil Newman.

Cast:  Alice Faye (Trudy Evans), John Payne (Johnnie Cornell), Jack Oakie (Dan Daley), Lynn Bari (Bernice), Laird Cregar (Sam Weaver), June Havoc (Beulah), Ward Bond (Sharkey), Aubrey Mather (Cochran), John Archer (Ned), George Barbier (Colonel Weatherby), Esther Dale (Aunt Harriet), Frank Darien (Missionary), Harry Hayden (Burkham), Mary Field (Cockney Maid), Frank Orth (Lous, the Bartender), George Lloyd (Proprietor), Eddie Dunn (Foreman), Charles Cane (O’Reilly), Frank Thomas (Auctioneer), Edward Earle (Stage Manager), James Flavin (Headwaiter), John Sinclair, Jack Stoney (Drunks), Ed Mundy (Preacher), Kirby Grant (Specialty Singer), Fortunio Bonanova, Gino Corrado, Adia Kuznetzoff (Opera Singers), James Sills, Marie Brown (Roller Skating Specialty), Jackie Averill, Jimmie Clemens, Jr. (Child Dancers).

Songs:  “Hello, Frisco, Hello”, by Louis A. Hirsh and Gene Buck (Chorus); “Lindy” by Irving Berlin, and “Hello, Frisco, Hello” (Faye, Payne, Oakie, Havoc); “You’ll Never Know” by Mack Gordon and Harry Wrren (Faye); “Ragtime Cowboy Joe” by Grant Clarke, Maurice Abrahams and Lewis F. Muir (Faye, Oakie, Payne); “Sweet Cider Time”, by percy Wenrich and Joseph McCarthy (Faye); “The Grizzly Bear”, by George Botsford and Irving Berlin (Oakie, Faye and chorus); “It’s Tulip Time in Holland”, by Richard A. Whiting and Dave Radford (Kirby Grant and chorus); “Why Do They Always Pick on Me?”, by Harry von Tilzer and Stanley Murphy (Faye); “Has Anybody Here Seen Kelly?”, by Charles Moore, C.W. urphy and William J. Mckenna (Faye, Oakie); “By the Light of the Silvery Moon”, by Gus Edwards and Ed Madden (Faye and chorus); “Gee, but It’s Great to Meet a Friend From Your Home Town”, by james McGavish, Fred Fisher and William G. Tracey (Oakie, Havoc); “I Got a Girl in Every Port”, composer unknown (Oakie, Havoc); “By the Wtermelon Vine, Lindy Lou”, by T.S. Allen; “Hello, Ma Baby”, by Joe E. Howard and Ida Emerson; “San Francisco” by Bronislaw Kaper, Walter Jurmann and Gus Kahn; “Strike Up the Band, Here Comes a Sailor”, by Andrew B. Sterling and Charles B. Ward (Oakie and chorus); “When You Wore a Tulip, and I Wore a Big Red Rose”, by Jack Mahoney, Percy Wenrich; “Bedelia”, by Jean Schwartz and William Jerome.  Released March 26, 1943

Note:  “I Gotta Have You”, sung by Havoc, deleted before release.

*This is a COLOUR film but, unfortunately, tonight’s print is in black and white.  The 16mm distributor, Bellevue/Fox, lists the film as colour in its catalogue, and TFS had no way of knowing that it was black and white until we received the print.