On May 9, Turner Classic Movies will be presenting the best work of Preston Sturges, the first workaday Hollywood screenwriter to transition into a major writer-director. TCM will be screening The Lady Eve, The Palm Beach Story, Sullivan’s Travels, Hail the Conquering Hero and The Great McGinty, an impressive body of work that Sturges churned out between the ages of 42 and 46. Unfortunately, his turbulent personality led to conflict in his business affairs, which exacerbated his drinking. He burned out and was dead at age 60, but he left behind some of the very, very smartest and funniest movie comedies.
Preston Sturges’ masterpiece is Sullivan’s Travels, a fast-paced and cynical comedy about a pretentious movie director who goes on the road to be inspired by The Average Man – and gets more of an adventure than he expects. There has never been a better movie about Hollywood. (See the clip below.) It’s on my A Classic American Movie Primer – 5 to Start With.
And don’t miss the brilliantly funny Hail the Conquering Hero. It’s one of Preston Sturges’ less well known great comedies. Eddie Bracken plays a would-be soldier discharged for hay fever – but his hometown mistakenly thinks that he is being sent home a war hero. Hilarity ensues. All the funnier when you realize that this film was made in 1944 amid our nation’s most culturally patriotic period.
