"You watched a movie. You knew it wasn't very good. But you loved it anyway."
From September 18 - 20 the Classic Movie Blog Association pays tribute to those guilty pleasures with a movie blogathon.
The premise of the CMBA’s Guilty Pleasure Movie Blogathon makes me feel guilty about my participation in said blogathon because I don’t think The Greatest Show on Earth is a bad movie. I don’t! Plus, I don’t feel guilty about watching and loving it. I don’t! Well, I used to…well, not always…not every time...
The premise of the CMBA’s Guilty Pleasure Movie Blogathon makes me feel guilty about my participation in said blogathon because I don’t think The Greatest Show on Earth is a bad movie. I don’t! Plus, I don’t feel guilty about watching and loving it. I don’t! Well, I used to…well, not always…not every time...
Betty Hutton, Cornel Wilde
When I was a kid in what I recall as the sunny sixties and The Greatest Show on Earth came on television, it was an event! In my eyes, it was the most glorious movie. It was big, bold, emotional and exciting. Brad was such a good guy. Sebastian was so charming. Klaus was so bad. Angel was so interesting. Holly was so brave. Buttons was so wonderful. Oh, Buttons was the most wonderful man in the world.
James Stewart, Cornel Wilde, Charlton Heston
When I was a teen in the seventies I started reading everything I could get my hands on that concerned the movies including those Best and Worst lists. There it was, time after time, in black and white, "worst Best Picture Winner of all-time" into perpetuity, The Greatest Show on Earth. Why? Apparently, because The Greatest Show on Earth was big, bold, emotional, and exciting. Only the words were changed to corny and overblown. While my affection for the movie never changed, guilt and shame wracked my heart. The Greatest Show on Earth was no longer a movie celebration, it was something to be watched on the sly.
The only way to travel.
In 1950 as Cecile B. DeMille neared his 70th birthday, he felt the desire to run away and join the circus. He spent months with the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus at their Winter quarters in Sarasota, Florida learning all he could about the operation of a circus. He studied the people who populated the big top; their way of speaking, the way they come together year after year as a troupe of traveling players.
Perhaps only DeMille with his expertise in big pictures could relate to that same grandiose quality in the circus and have the guts to tackle the logistics and complications of the location shoot which would not only give his film the air of authenticity he experienced but capture for us all a passing way of life.
Perhaps only DeMille with his expertise in big pictures could relate to that same grandiose quality in the circus and have the guts to tackle the logistics and complications of the location shoot which would not only give his film the air of authenticity he experienced but capture for us all a passing way of life.
Cecil B. DeMille
The Greatest Show on Earth was not only honoured by the Academy with the Best Picture Oscar and Best Writing, Motion Picture Story, but it also received nominations for Costume Design, Color, Best Film Editing, and Best Director. The Greatest Show on Earth was also the Golden Globe winner for Best Motion Picture and won Best Director and Best Cinematography, Color. Cecil B. DeMille was one of 18 directors nominated by the Director’s Guild that season.
James Stewart, Emmett Kelly
DeMille was making a circus picture. Hollywood was filled with lots of folks with a desire to run away and join him. Jimmy Stewart called. He’d always wanted to be a clown. “We have Stewart,” DeMille told his staff. “He wants to be a clown.” Jimmy’s clown, Buttons, would be the heart and soul of the story. Jimmy Stewart helped to create his own clown makeup for Buttons. He was helped by Wally Westmore but had the final decision. He also learned routines and worked with the best including International Clown Hall of Famer Emmett Kelly and the man known as King of the Clowns, Felix Adler.
Gloria Grahame, Minyak, Lyle Bettger
Lucille Ball was DeMille’s original choice for Angel, the elephant trainer. Under contract to Columbia with one picture left, Harry Cohn offered her a contract breaker, a picture so bad the actor would bail and could be sued. Lucy, anxious to do The Greatest Show on Earth, agreed to The Magic Carpet and her work was completed in five days for $85,000. Lucy and Desi then had to report to Mr. DeMille that she couldn’t take the role of Angel because she was now pregnant. Famously, the director said, “Congratulations, Desi, you are the only person in the world to screw Harry Cohn, Columbia Pictures, Paramount, Cecil B. DeMille, and your wife, all at the same time.”
Gloria Grahame took on the role of Angel, a circus temptress with a heart of gold. I think she deserved a medal for some of her stunts with the huge animals. The girl had guts. There is not one man of my acquaintance who doesn’t look at the Oscar-winning (The Bad and the Beautiful) actress and turn into Bert the Cop. There’s always an exception to the rule and in The Greatest Show on Earth, that exception is circus manager Brad Braden played by Charlton Heston. He’s not immune to ladies, after all, he has a thing for trapeze artist Holly, but the circus comes first. He has sawdust in his veins.
Where's my hat, you damn dirty ape?Cornel Wilde, James Stewart, Betty Hutton
Charlton Heston, John Ridgely, Gloria Grahame
Heston was driving off the Paramount lot one day and stopped to wave at DeMille. DeMille had met the young actor in the studio dining room once. His secretary reminded him of the actor’s name and the movie he had screened, and had not liked called The Dark City. “Umm, I like the way he waved just now. We’d better have him in to talk about the circus manager.”
The big thing about the character Brad was choosing the hat. DeMille told him “Shoes don’t matter so much…usually, you don’t even see them. But if you wear a hat, it’s in every shot, and featured in every close-up.” They looked at dozens before the right hat clicked, but click it did.
The Flying Concellos
Genuine circus performers such as The Zoppes Equestrian act, The Flying Concellos, and The Alanzas of the high wire are featured in the film and the cast was expected to fit in. Dorothy Lamour learned her iron jaw act. Olympic calibre fencer Cornel Wilde and energetic Betty Hutton worked hard to look plausible on the trapeze. Cornel was doubled in some scenes by aerialist and clown, the son of circus performers, Jackie LeClaire.
The bubbly Hutton was also a woman of fragile emotions, and she found in DeMille a supportive and understanding director. The role of Birdie, the circus wardrobe woman was one of the better ones bestowed on Julia Faye. At one time DeMille’s mistress, she appeared in all of the pictures after that relationship ended.
Our movie follows the fortunes of The Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey Circus from the opening of their season. As long as the manager, Brad, can keep the finances in the black they can play a full tour including the smaller cities. A gangster played by the genuinely frightening Lawrence Tierney plants John Kellog with a crooked sideshow game on the lot to mess up the works and cheat the rubes. He’s got plans to take over the whole operation.
Another guy with plans is elephant trainer Klaus played by Lyle Bettger (Has anybody ever seen him play a good guy?), but as his plans involve pretty Angel and her plans involve Brad…well, you can see trouble coming. Brad’s girl, Holly is distracted by fellow flyer Sebastian. First, she wants his centre ring, and then she’s not so sure it isn’t something more personal.
Another guy with plans is elephant trainer Klaus played by Lyle Bettger (Has anybody ever seen him play a good guy?), but as his plans involve pretty Angel and her plans involve Brad…well, you can see trouble coming. Brad’s girl, Holly is distracted by fellow flyer Sebastian. First, she wants his centre ring, and then she’s not so sure it isn’t something more personal.
Buttons the perpetually made-up clown is a doctor on the run. He killed the thing he loved. (Oh, heartbreak!) All of this angst and intrigue is but a background to the day to day work of putting up, taking down, and putting up again the greatest show on earth. The movie is the circus.
The real audiences caught coming and going are moments in time that are a joy to share. Those Hollywood folk who didn’t get to be clowns or barkers like Edmond O’Brien got to be spectators. It is especially fun to see Bing Crosby and Bob Hope as their Road picture comrade Dorothy Lamour does her stuff.
William Boyd as Hopalong Cassidy leads a parade. He first worked for DeMille in 1927's King of Kings. Among the spectators, it is fun to spot or try to spot many favourite character actors including Kathleen Freeman, Mary Field, Dorothy Adams, Clarence Nash, Arthur Q. Bryan, Stanley Andrews, and Peter Hansen. Pretty leading lady Nancy Gates makes an impression. Yes, that is her. You’ve been right all these years.
This poster simply screams "melodrama". I love it!
DeMille does nothing small. The gangster plot crosses with the thwarted lover plot and that can only mean one thing, a train wreck. A circus train wreck with wild animals on the loose and ruination in the offing. Also, there is a paralyzed Sebastian, a detective closing in on Buttons, and fateful decisions all around. Ooh, it’s good stuff. Yes, it is. It’s good in the way a banana split is good. A banana split with extra whipped cream. Extra! Why I feel no more guilty about watching The Greatest Show on Earth than I do about eating a banana split with extra whipped cream. And I don’t feel guilty about the ice cream. I don’t. Well, I used to…well, not always…not every time...
