“Girls Will Be Girls:” Examining the Adaptation of Female
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“GIRLS WILL BE GIRLS:” EXAMINING THE ADAPTATION OF FEMALE CHARACTERS IN SCREWBALL COMEDY FILMS AND THEIR SOURCE TEXTS A Thesis by SAMANTHA ANNE JANES Submitted to the Office of Graduate and Professional Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS Chair of Committee, Anne Morey Committee Members, Mary Ann O’Farrell Daniel Humphrey Head of Department, Maura Ives August 2020 Major Subject: English Copyright 2020 Samantha Anne Janes ABSTRACT This research explores the representation of female characters in classical Hollywood screwball comedy films and their often-obscured source material. The examination of both the original comedic literature and the film adaptation results in new perspectives on the agency and characterization of female characters in screwball comedies. Five films – Gregory La Cava’s My Man Godfrey, Alfred Santell’s Breakfast for Two, Ernst Lubitsch’s Design for Living, Howard Hawk’s His Girl Friday and W. S. Van Dyke’s The Thin Man –and their respective source texts – Eric Hatch’s “Irene, the Stubborn Girl,” David Garth’s A Love Like That, Noël Coward’s Design for Living, Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur’s The Front Page, and Dashiell Hammett’s The Thin Man serve as the foundation for the case studies in this research, with each chapter examining modes of female agency through two different class positions. I argue that by renewing the presence of these original texts it is possible to see that through process of adaptation there is a systematic softening of female characters that appears and results in the tempering of the original character’s personality and agency that dramatically affects her role in the film adaptation. I examine two different class positions: upper-class society and professional middle-class society, in order to explore different modes of female agency for both wealthy and working women. I also delve into how the element of casting introduces a new level of affect that is not present in the literary texts and maintain that it becomes a compensatory act to help the filmic female characters regain part of the agency that is lost in the adaptation process. ii DEDICATION For my mom and dad. Thank you for supporting me, cultivating my interest in film, and always being willing proofreaders and motivators. I will never be able to thank you for your love and encouragement. Thank you to my sister Courtney, brother-in-law Nick, and nephew Landon for their endless support and love. Court, thank you for always looking out for me, being my biggest champion, and always supporting me for who I am. You are my truly the best sister anyone could ever ask for in life. Thank you to my Aunt Irene for her unwavering affection throughout the years. You are the true Auntie Mame. Thank you to Nana, for always praying for me. You are the core of our family and I love you so much. This is for all the women, real or fictional, who fought to hold onto their agency both on and off the film screen throughout the 1930s. Thank you for being my inspiration and motivation to fight harder, talk faster, and have the smarts to stuff a doorknob in a boxing glove if necessary. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not have been possible without the direction and support of Dr. Anne Morey, who was an unwavering guide and the most steadfast editor as this project developed over the last year. Dr. Morey has inspired me with her knowledge and passionate for film studies throughout my undergraduate and graduate years. Thank you so much for all of your patience and enthusiasm. I would also like to thank Drs. Mary Ann O’Farrell and Daniel Humphrey for serving as committee members for this project, encouraging me throughout the years, and offering their input on this project. Thank you to Dr. Laura D’Aveta for her assistance in helping me trace and locate numerous scholarly sources for this project. I would like to thank my colleague Andrew Zalot for his encouragement, kindness, and enthusiasm throughout our graduate careers, and especially over the course of this research. Lastly, I would like to thank my friends - Gena Markantonis - my ride or die, Madison Phillips – the best listener and sounding board, and Alice Corcoran – my English 336 person. You have all supported me throughout the development of this thesis and I will forever appreciate it. iv CONTRIBUTORS AND FUNDING SOURCES Contributors This thesis was supervised by a thesis committee consisting of Anne Morey and Mary Ann O’Farrell of the Department of English and Daniel Humphrey of the Department of Film Studies. Funding Sources No funding was required for the development of this thesis. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................... ii DEDICATION ................................................................................................................. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................. iv CONTRIBUTORS AND FUNDING SOURCES .............................................................. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................. vi 1. INTRODUCTION:"FROM. A STORY BY. .... " THE ORGIN STORIES OF SCREWBALL COMEDY ................................................................................................. 1 2. SLIP A BIT IN (AND CALL IT A DAY): DEBUTANTS AND HEIRESSES ON THE HUNT ...................................................................................................................... 29 2.1 "Irene, the Stubborn Girl"/My Man Godfrey (1935) ....................................... 33 2.2 My Man Godfrey (1936) ................................................................................. 51 2.3 A Love Like That (1935) ................................................................................. 65 2.4 Breakfast for Two (1937) ............................................................................... 80 3. "DON’T WORRY I'M ON THE JOB:" AGENCY FOR THE WORKING WOMAN ......................................................................................................................... 89 3.1 Design for Living (1932) ............................................................................... 93 3.2 Design for Living (1933) ............................................................................. 100 3.3 The Front Page (1928) ................................................................................ 107 3.4 His Girl Friday (1941) ................................................................................ 112 4. CONCLUSION: THE "DELICATE CONDITION" OF THE THIN MAN .............. 124 WORKS CITED ............................................................................................................ 131 vi 1. INTRODUCTION: “FROM. A STORY BY . .:” THE ORIGIN STORIES OF SCREWBALL COMEDY Smashing car windows, tackling a man, or stuffing a boxing glove with a doorknob – for the female characters in the screwball comedy films of the 1930s these actions could easily be part of a Tuesday evening out on the town. While these characters often get into trouble with the police or wreak havoc on the lives of other characters, they are continuously lauded in scholarship and history for their stunning wit, sexual allure, and ability to hold their own against their male counterparts. In the 1930s, the film industry dominated the American cultural consciousness, and no film genre more effectively than the comedies. While comedy films were nothing new to the American public by 1930, the advent of sound revolutionized both the way in which slapstick humor was used and the relative proportions of physical to verbal comedy in new films. As Christopher Beach mentions in Class, Language and American Film Comedy, “comedy…most obviously benefitted from the arrival of the ‘talkies’” (1). The advent of sound motivated the expansion from intertitles and diversification of plots while providing the ability to afford higher production values and cast prominent stars. These entertaining films are acclaimed for their fast-talking, quick-witted characters and the physical humor that resonates back to the vaudeville shows of the 1910s. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term “screwball” originates from the baseball term when a pitch is “thrown with reverse spin in order to make it 1 curve towards the side from which it was thrown” (OED). This term is applicable since the films in this genre often went against the expectation of a film with romance in it. At their core, screwball comedies are love stories that satirize marriage and often champion the subversion of societal norms. Usually, the romance plot involves a confident and eccentric female character whose presence dominates over a more mild-manner male character, or a battle between the couple who appear to be on a more equal footing. These narratives usually revolve around the coupling of a pair into marriage or the remarriage of a divorced couple. Elements such as fast-paced dialogue, upper-class or professional middle-class characters, physical slapstick humor, economic or social class concerns, mistaken identity, and frantic marriages served to make this madcap genre relevant and progressive during the 1930s. The formula for screwballs usually begins with two characters who do not want to be together and ends with them solidifying their relationship. Though these