Nick and Nora, Minnie and Bill: America’s Favorite (Never-Married) “Husband and Wife”
PLEASE NOTE: I WILL BE TEACHING AN 8-WEEK COURSE ON NICK & NORA AT FLORIDA ATLANTIC UNIVERSITY - BOTH BOCA RATON AND JUPITER CAMPUSES BEGINNING IN EARLY FEBRUARY NEXT YEAR AND EXTENDING INTO EARLY MAY. THE BOCA COUSE IS DIVIDED INTO TWO 4-WEEK INSALLMENTS AND YOU CAN VIEW THE CLASS ON VIDEO CAPUTURE AS WELL AS BEING IN ATTENDANCE. IF YOU ARE INTERESTED GO TO THE LIFELONG LEARNING WEBSITE
Nick and Nora, along with Asta (AKA “Skippy”)
Nearly 6 years ago I posted a Tales From Hollywood & Vine blog titled Cinematic Chemistry: That Certain Something. In the opening paragraph I wrote about how, from the earliest days of moving pictures, “ . . . producers (originally called “presenters”) have been on the lookout for cinematic couples who possessed that indescribable something called "chemistry.” That earl post included such long-forgotten couples as John Bunny and Flora Finch, Harold Lockwood and May Allison, Charles Farrell and Janet Gaynor as well as Charles Chaplin’s most frequent costar, Edna Purviance, with whom hhe made 30 silent films over just an 8-year period.
Hollywood’s “Golden Age” continued the trend with such favorite teams as Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers (who made 10 pictures together from 1933-1949); Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald, "America’s Singing Sweethearts” (who sang their way through 8 splashy MGM musicals in the 1930s and '40s) and of course, Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn who made 9 films together from 1942 to 1967. Spence and Kate were believed by most outsiders to have carried on a torrid affair throughout all those years; many within “the neighborhood” were aware that theirs was a classic “lavender romance” in which their public partnership was, in reality, a cover for their true private lives. But this is a topic for another posting . . . perhaps.
Over the years, some of the busiest, best and most profitable cinematic “pairings” were comic teams:
Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy who over the same of 30 years (1921 to 1951), made and costarred in an amazing 79 shorts and 27 feature length films including Sons of the Desert (1933), March of the Wooden Soldiers (1934), The Flying Deuces (1939) and A Chump at Oxford (1940). In real life, they were the best of friends, with Laurel (who came to America as Charles Chaplin’s understudy) being the creative “brains” of the team.
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello: starting in radio, moving on to Broadway and eventually to Hollywood, Abbott and Costello were one of the most popular comic duos of their time, ranking among the top ten box office stars for most of the 1940s. Their “Who’s on First?” routine is considered one of the greatest comedy bits of all time. From 1940-1956 they made an amazing 36 films.
Bob Hope and Bing Crosby: The obvious friendship between the comedian and the crooner transferred seamlessly to the big screen. Over 22 years (1940-1962) they made 17 films, many beginning with the words “The Road to . . .” What made their pictures such audience pleasers was that in virtually every one, they had fun parodying films of the day and poking fun at both themselves and other actors.
Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney: They became lifelong friends as teens on the set of the 1937 film Thoroughbreds Don’t Cry, and then went on to costar in 3 of Roony’s popular “Andy Hardy” films. But the two are perhaps best remembered for their series of “backyard musicals,” the most famous of which was Babes in Arms.
Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor: Theirs was a romance that began on screen: 1963’s colossal cinematic bomb Cleopatra, and then continued through 9 more films between 1963 and 1972. In 13 year’s time, they would become one of the most famous couples in the world, marry and divorce twice, and star alongside each other in ten films, including Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, for which Taylor won a Best Actress Oscar.
One could go on and on with such pairs as stoners Cheech and Chong (12 films from 1978-2013), Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau (11 films from 1966-1998), Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland (9 films from 1935-1942) and of course, “Bogie and Baby”, husband and wife Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, who made 5 incredibly literate films in 4 years including 1944’s To Have and Have Not (from a novel by Ernest Hemmingway and a screenplay by William Faulkner) 1946’s The Big Sleep (from a novel by Raymond Chandler and a screenplay by, once again, William Faulkner), and 1948’s Key Largo (based on a play by Maxwell Anderson with a screenplay by both John Huston and Richard Brooks).
For my money (and that of many, many others), the greatest team of ‘em all was Myrna Loy and William Powell who, over a span of 13 years (1934-1947) played husband and wife so often - and so very convincingly well - that most of the film-going public actually believed they were married to one another . . . both on-screen (i.e. “reel”) and real life. Beyond the obvious chemistry they shared with one another, Minnie (Myrna’s nickname in Hollywood) and Bill made married life look so much fun and frenzy. And whether they were portraying Nick & Nora Charles in the 6 "Thin Man” films; Jim & Eleanor Wade in 1934’s "Manhattan Melodrama,” headlined by Clark Gable; Florenz Ziegfeld & Billie Burke in the 1936 biopic "The Great Ziegfeld, which captured the Oscar for "Best Film”; or Steve & Susan Ireland in 1941’s romantic comedy “Love Crazy,” they managed to never hit a false note . . . they were just made for each other.
20-year old William Powell
Off screen, they were great friends and true admirers of one another’s acting talents. It really isn’t all that surprising that a romance never developed because, as Loy put it many years later, the two were far too alike, and their wisdom in not pursuing a relationship likely contributed to the ease and joy they felt in working together. Unquestionably, we, the many generations of movie audiences over the past 90 years, are the beneficiaries of that joy.
William Horatio Powell (1892-1984) was born in Pittsburgh and early in life decided that he wanted to be an actor. Borrowing $700.00 from a wealthy aunt, he headed up to New York and enrolled as a student at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, which had been founded by a Harvard professor in 1884. Leaving before his graduation with the class of 1913, he went out on the road, touring with traveling road companies for the next several years. Throughout these years, he played in dozens upon dozens of comedies, melodramas and classics. Although he eventually made the cast of no less than 5 relatively inconsequential, long forgotten Broadway plays between 1917 and 1928, he earned much of his living in Silent Films . . . first in New York and then Hollywood.
In his first film, 1922’s Sherlock Holmes, starring the immortal John Barrymore, Powell had a small feature role. From 1922-1928 he was featured in nearly 35 silents, playing mostly in historic costume dramas or crime flicks, where he was regularly portrayed as a cad, rogue or downright villain. The coming of sound was his salvation. With his mellifluous voice and aristocratic diction, he was a cut above his fellow movie actors. His first talking film, 1929’s The Canary Murder Case, in which he played detective Philo Vance to the exotic Louise Brooks’ "Canary,” made him a star. 5 years later he would be paired with Minnie . . .
Myrna as “Nubi", a Hungarian Gypsy in “The Squall” (1925)
Myrna Adele Williams Loy (1905-1993) was born in Helena, Montana where her father, David was the youngest person ever elected to that state’s legislature. She spent the first 13 years of her life either on her family’s cattle ranch or in a middle-class neighborhood in Helena, the state capital. A couple of blocks away lived the British-born Supreme Court Justice Charles Henry Cooper who had two sons: Arthur and Frank James, who was 4 years older than Myrna Williams. Years later, Frank’s first name would be changed to Gary (Cooper) and he, like his young neighbor, would become one of the most popular movie stars in the world.
Following her father’s death in the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918, Myrna, her mother and the rest of the family moved to Los Angeles, where young Myrna attended the Westlake School for Girls and caught the acting bug. Dropping out of Venice High School before she was 17, Myrna got a job working for a brother-and-sister team called Fanchon and Marco, who were hired to create a prologue at Sid Grauman’s for Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments.
In the ‘20s movie prologues were elaborately staged theater productions that would either provide a literal preview of the action in the movie that was to follow or provide a sense of the atmosphere to give the audience members an impression of the movie’s time, place and characters. One night, while dancing at Grauman’s Chinese, Mrs. Rudolph Valantino (Natacha Rambova, nee Winifred Kimball Shaughnessy) took a fancy to the barely 18-year old Myrna and pulled strings so she could get some extra work in Hollywood. Over the next several years Myrna (now named Loy) got bit parts, playing mostly vamps and young vixens and gypsies, like “Nubi” in the 1925 film The Squall. She had small, uncredited parts in Ben Hur (1925), Don Juan. the first film with sound effects (1926), and The Jazz Singer (1927), mistakenly referred to as “the first talking picture,” and Noah’s Ark (1928), one of the silent era’s greatest spectacles. Finally, in 1933, after appearing in some 75 pictures, Loy got a break, costarring with Walter Huston and professional boxers Max Baer, Jack Dempsey and Primo Carnera in The Prizefighter and the Lady. Despite its unpromising title, the film was well-received by both critics and movie-going public alike. The next year, 1934, she costarred with Clark Gable and William Powell in Manhattan Melodrama . . . a couple was born.
In this, teiir first pairing Myrna and Bill joined Clark Gable and the then 14-year old Mickey Rooney in a story about 2 childhood friends who go in opposite directions – one becomes first a D.A. and is then elected governor (Powell), the other a crook and murderer (Gable, playing the memorably-named “Blackie Gallagher"). Originally Blackie’s girl, Loy (Eleanor) leaves him when D.A. Powell (Jim Wade) arrests his childhood friend for murder. Jim and Eleanor eventually fall in love and marry, as Blackie goes to the chair. Written by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and directed by W.S. Van Dyke (who would direct most of their “Thin Man” films), Manhattan Melodrama drew immediate worldwide attention. This was the movie that bank robber John Dillinger (“Public Enemy #1”) had just seen before he was gunned down in front of Chicago’s Biograph Theater on July 22, 1934. It turned out to be a press agent’s dream. It certainly did not hurt that the vast majority of critics found the pairing of Minnie and Bill to be nothing short of inspired.
Ironically, on May 25, 1934, two months before Dillinger was shot to death in Chicago, The Thin Man was released in the United States. It was that most hoped for of all Hollywood prayers: both a commercial and critical smash hit. Completed in an amazing 2 weeks with a scant B-movie budget of $226,000, it ended up grossing $1.4 million worldwide and was nominated for 4 Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay (the husband/wife team of Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett. This was the year It Happened One Night took home awards for nearly everything in sight, including:
Best Picture
Best Actor (Clark Gable),
Best Actress (Claudette Colbert in a role originally offered to Myrna Loy),
Best Director (Frank Capra) and
Best Adapted Screenplay (the husband-wife team of Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett).
The critics were absolutely besotted. Take but one review, that of Seton Margrave, movie critic for the Daily Mail, who wrote: “The most attractive feature of “The Thin Man” to me is the charm of the husband and wife as played by William Powell and Myrna Loy. These two people have a glorious time. They are completely in love with each other and with life. They share a marvelous sense of humor.” The anonymous reviewer for The New Republic noted that “The playing of Powell and Miss Loy rates the highest superlatives. It is a dead heat for first honors.” Louella Parsons called it “. . . the greatest entertainment, the most fun and the best mystery-drama of the year.”
From that point on, Minnie and Bill would make 12 more films together, including 5 more in the Thin Man franchise. The public simply could never get enough of Nick and Nora’s witty, urbane, gin-swilling husband-and-wife crime solving duo . . . always surrounded by audacious Runyonesque characters, their wire-haired terrier Asta (real name, “Skippy”) and their son Nickie, Jr., played first by 7-year old Richard Hall in 1941’s Shadow of Thin Man), and last by 11-year-old Dean Stockwell in 1947’s Song of the Thin Man, the final outing for Nick and Nora. The Thin Man oeuvre consists of:
.The Thin Man (1934): Newly married Nick and Nora drink their way through a case involving the disappearance of an inventor. Costarring Maureen O’Sullivan, Nat Pendelton and Cesar Romero.
After the Thin Man (1936): Back home in San Francisco for New Years, Nick and Nora (along with Asta and “Mrs.” Asta) reluctantly hunt for the murderer of Nora’s cousin’s husband. Co-starring James Stewart in one of his earliest films.
Another Thin Man (1939): Back in New York with Asta and son Nickie, Jr., the couple seeks to find out who killed Nora’s late father’s business partner. With C. Aubrey Smith.
Shadow of the Thin Man (1941): While at a local racetrack hoping for a pleasant afternoon, a jockey is killed. Nick and Nora are enlisted to look for the murderer by their friend, police Lt. Abrams (Sam Levene).
The Thin Man Goes Home (1945): While on a visit to Nick’s hometown, the local criminals assume he’s there on a case. When a corpse shows up on Nick’s father’s doorstep, the Charles’ vacation turns into yet another case.
Song of the Thin Man (1947): Nick and Nora are on a gambling ship where a murder occurs. 2 leading suspects come to them for help. The couple turns them over to the police and then looks for the real murderer.
One of the best things about the series was all the crackling, witty dialogue. Frequently being in their cups, Nick and Nora were capable of some of the most crackling, witty banter ever heard on screen:
Nick: I’m a hero. I was shot twice in the Tribune.
Nora: I read you were shot 5 times in the tabloids.
Nick: It’s not true. He didn’t come anywhere near my tabloids. (The Thin Man)
Nora: I love to watch you sleep. You look so cute. Nicky, have you any pictures of yourself taken as a baby?
Nick: No.
Nora: Aww, that’s a shame. I want to see what you looked like.
Nick: I’ll have some taken in the morning. (After the Thin Man)
Nick: I tell you what; you go home, cold cream that lovely face, slip into an exciting negligee.
Nora: Yes.
Nick: And I’ll see you in the morning. (Shadow of the Thin Man)
Nora: Nicky, do you really like cider?
Nick: Like it? I love it. Just the pure, natural juices of trhe apple. What could be better, for instance?
Nora: A dry martini, for instance.
Nick: That’s horrible stuff. It almost took the lining off my stomach.
Nora: Why do you care? It didn’t show. (The Thin Man Goes Home)
Minnie and Bill made 7 other films together, one of which, 1936’s The Great Ziegfeld was sui generis; it was a non-comedy, their only drama with music biopic; and the only movie they costarred in that captured the Oscar for Best Picture. Powell stars as the legendary Florenz Ziegfeld who went from being a sideshow barker to theater entrepreneur extraordinaire and became known as the man who “glorified the American girl.” After being married to the Jewish French revue star Anna Held (played by Luise Rainer who won the Academy Award for Best Actress) the non-Jewish Ziegfeld married the famous Broadway star (and future “Glinda, the Good Witch” in The Wizard of Oz), the role played to perfection by Loy. Of Powell’s Ziegfeld and Loy’s Burke, the New York Times’ Frank Nugent wrote: Mr. Powell's portrayal is no less attractive than it is flattering to the original. Miss Loy is a stately Billie Burke, and somewhat lacking, we fear, in Miss Burke's effervescence and gayety.
The rest of their filmography consists of films well within their comfort zone; roles the film-going public ate up:
Evelyn Prentice (1934) in which Powell plays John Prentice, a high-profile New York attorney married to Evelyn (Loy). Evelyn feels neglected by John, who has taken up with one of his clients (played by 27-year-old newcomer Rosalind Russell) and out of boredom, becomes involved with an unscrupulous womanizing poet essayed by the dependable character actor Harvey Stephens. Evelyn eventually finds herself a victim of blackmail and becomes involved in the poet’s murder. She begs her husband to defend her. They fall back in love. Show over. Evelyn Prentice is best known today as a courtroom mystery . . . a far cry from Nick and Nora. Nonetheless, Minnie and Bill play off one another with a dramatic dexterity that, in the end, steals the movie.
Libeled Lady (1936): A “screwball” comedy in which Warren Haggerty (Spencer Tracy) is the chief editor of the New York Evening Star. He keeps on delaying his marriage with Gladys (Jean Harlow) because of problems his newspapers must face. When a 5 million dollar lawsuit is filed by Connie Allenbury (Loy) for falsely printing she is a marriage-breaker, he plans a marriage in words only between Gladys and the Don Juan Bill Chandler (Powell). The goal is to catch Connie alone with a married man. In real (as opposed to “reel”) life, at the time this film was in production, Powell and Harlow were contemplating marriage. Regrettably, Harlow would die the following year at age 26. Powell paid for her $30,000 funeral, and after the coffin was dug up and held for ransom, Powell paid to have it found and then made sure that tons upon tons of concrete covered her burial site.
Double Wedding (1937): A screwball comedy like none other, Powell plays Charlie Lodge, a bohemian artist who lives in a trailer; Loy is Margit Agnew, who lives with her sister Irene (Florence Rice) and Irene’s long-time fiancé Waldo (John Beal). Margit, who is a comic example of a person with OCD has planned every aspect of her sister’s and future brother-in-law’s wedding, honeymoon and future married life down to a tee. Problem is, Waldo is a 100% milquetoast and will not stand up to Margit. After a mind-boggling series of misadventures, Irene marries Waldo and - not surprisingly - Margit winds up with Charlie. Tightly directed by Richard Thorpe with a screenplay by the Ukrainian-born Jo Swerling based on a play by the brilliant and at times contoversial Ferenc Molnar, production on Double Wedding was shut down for nearly a month due to Jean Harlow’s death.
I Love You Again (1940): Directed by W.S. Van Dyke (Minnie and Bill’s favorite director), Powell stars as Larry Wilson, an upstanding - and mean -teetotaler. While on a cruise he receives a blow on the head, causing him to revert to his old forgotten persona of a suave conman named George Carey. When he docks in New York, he is met by Kay (Loy) whom he discovers is his wife. What Larry/George does not know is that she is in the process of divorcing him in order to marry Herbert (Donald Douglas). As in Double Wedding, a series of misadventures
Love Crazy (1941): Costarring Gail Patrick (who had played Cornelia Bullock in Powell’s 1936 smash hit My Man Godfrey, and would go on to produce the long-running television show Perry Mason in the 1950s and ‘60s). In this romantic comedy Minnie and Bill played Steve and Susan Ireland, who are about to celebrate their 4th wedding anniversary by reenacting their first date. Susan’s meddling mother interrupts and injures herself. Steve is left to take care of her and when he meets an old flame in the elevator, Susan’s mother takes the opportunity to break up their marriage. She convinces Susan that Steve is cheating on her and urges her to divorce him. Upon seeking legal advice, Steve is informed that the only solution to save his marriage is to pretend he’s insane. Steve goes so far as to dress in drag (minus his famous moustache) to proof that he is bonkers. Both critics and public alike fell in love with this picture. Variety called it “. . . another marital comedy loaded with solid comedy, compactly set up and tempoed at a zippy pace. Love Crazy is a standout laugh hit of top proportions, a happy successor to previous Powell-Loy teamings.
The Senator Was Indiscreet (1947): Although Myrna Loy only has but a cameo in this, their last pairing, she nearly steals the picture. And believe it or not, the cast and crew kept her presence in the picture - which occurs at the very end - a secret from William Powell. In this, the only film that playwright, theater director and producer, humorist and drama critic George S. Kaufman ever directed, Powell plays the dim-witted blowhard United States Senator Melvin G. Ashton, who wants more than anything to be elected President. Ella Raines plays a reporter interested in the detailed diary he has kept for years and years detailing all the political misdeeds of his colleagues. The diary gets stolen and all hell breaks loose. Eventually the diary is found (Sen. Aston believed it had been stolen by Communists) and the Senator and his political bosses, are forced to flee to a South Sea Island, where he becomes chief of the native population. Loy shows up at the end of the movie in an uncredited cameo appearing as Aston’s wife who, throughout the film we’ve heard about but never seen. All-in-all, a hilarious though lightweight romp . . .
Although this was Minnie and Bill’s cinematic swansong together, they continued making motion pictures for several more years. Powell had starring and co-starring roles in an additional 8 films, his swansong being “Doc” in the 1955 delight Mister Roberts, starring warhorses Henry Fonda, James Cagney and Ward Bond, and directed by the greatest of them all, John Ford. By the time the film was shot, Powell was beginning to have trouble remembering his lines and was suffering from Cancer. Unbelievably, he lived another 29 years, spending the lion’s share of his time in Palm Springs with his 3rd (and longest lasting) wife, Diana "Mousie” Lewis. to whom he was married to until the day he died, March 5, 1984. (Powell’s 2nd wife was Carole Lombard, his costar in the 1936 screwball comedy My Man Godfrey. Despite the fact that they had divorced 3 years earlier, Powell demanded that Universal Studios hire her for the role of ditzy Irene Bullock.) His first wife was Broadway actress. Eileen Wilson, with whom he had his only child, a son named William Powell, Jr. Young Bill committed suicide at age 43; he had been suffering from depression, hepatitis. and kidney problems.
Minnie would continue making motion pictures and guest-starring on popular television shows (Ironside, Columbo, The Virginian) until the early 1980s. Among the 31 films and television shows she made, none was better - or more warmly remembered - than 1948’s Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House in which she plays Cary Grant’s wife, Muriel Blandings. In this much beloved films, the Blandings decide to build a home in the country. It turns out to be a whole lot more fraught with difficulties than they ever imagined. In 2000, the American Film Instituted listed this film as #72 of the Top 100 Funniest American Movies. Myrna Loy was married and divorced 4 times; her most notable husbands were producer Arthur Hornblow Jr. (to whom she was married from 1936-1942.) He was best known for Gaslight (1944), The Asphalt Jungle (1950) Oklahoma (1955) and Witness for the Prosecution (1957). Her, third husband was screenwriter Gene Markey (married 1946-1950), who is best remembered for penning the 1939 The Hound of the Baskervilles, and for also being married to actresses Hedy Lamarr and Joan Bennett. Myrna never had any children. Myrna Loy died in New York City on December 14, 1993. She was 88 years young.
Like all truly gifted thespians, William Powell and Myrna Loy, always made their craft look so very, very easy. What made them so exceptional as a cinematic couple, is that the audience knew they were having a grand old time together. Is it any wonder then, that most of the movie-going public believed they were husband-and-wife both on screen and off? They made movie magic by making marriage a glorious gambol.
Nora: Pretty girl.
Nick: Yes, she’s a very nice type.
Nora: You got types?
Nick: Only you darling. Lanky brunettes with wicked jaws.
Copyright 2024 Kurt Franklin Stone