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His Girl Friday

Sein Mädchen für besondere Fälle
Retrospective 2022
Source: Deutsche Kinemathek, image courtesy of Park Circus/Sony
Big city reporter Hildy has tendered her resignation and gotten a divorce from her editor Walter Burns. She plans to move to Albany and lead a quiet life with her fiancée, an insurance broker. But Walter manages to convince her to cover one last story for him; he sends her to interview an alleged cop killer in the hope that she can prove the convict’s innocence. A night of furious action ensues, with the prisoner escaping death row, her fiancée arrested three times, and the discovery of corruption in city government. Hildy changes her plans, not least of all due to Walter’s actions ... Rosalind Russell may not have been the producers’ first choice for the role of Hildy, but she was certainly the best. A lanky spitfire, she had the physical wherewithal to hold her own in this breakneck comedy filled with men incessantly talking over one another. Her natural moxie was buttressed by a gag writer hired secretly for $200 from her brother’s ad agency and, combined with the cigarettes obligatory for her screen roles, elevate her in His Girl Friday to a full-fledged member of the macho newspapermen’s club.
by Howard Hawks
with Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell, Ralph Bellamy, Gene Lockhart, Porter Hall, Ernest Truex, Cliff Edwards, Clarence Kolb, Roscoe Karns, Frank Jenks USA 1940 English 92’ Black/White Rating R12

With

  • Cary Grant
  • Rosalind Russell
  • Ralph Bellamy
  • Gene Lockhart
  • Porter Hall
  • Ernest Truex
  • Cliff Edwards
  • Clarence Kolb
  • Roscoe Karns
  • Frank Jenks

Crew

Director Howard Hawks
Screenplay Charles Lederer based on the play “The Front Page” (1928) by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur
Cinematography Joseph Walker
Editing Gene Havlick
Music M. W. Stoloff
Sound Lodge Cunningham
Art Director Lionel Banks
Costumes Kalloch
Producer Howard Hawks

Produced by

Columbia Pictures Corp.

Additional information

DCP: Park Circus, Glasgow