A heartwarming journey to find the true riches of life
Movies can offer hope and inspiration as well as entertain, and the delightful “Holiday”, which takes place largely on New Years’ Eve, is one that can cheerfully stimulate those buried aspirations for change. Its uplifting and scrumptious mix of comedy, romance, drama, and exuberant performances give this film a special magic all its own. Directed by the consummate George Cukor and starring Hollywood legends Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant, this fun and intelligent examination of personal fulfillment versus societal norms was nominated for one Oscar, has a 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating, and provides enchanting viewing be it as a New Year approaches or anytime at all.
“Holiday” follows the story of “Johnny Case”, a free-spirited man of modest beginnings. He's just returned to New York City from a holiday at Lake Placid where he met “Julia Seton” and the two immediately fell in love and plan on marrying within weeks. “Johnny” is about to meet “Julia’s” family and soon discovers that she’s one of the “Setons” – an ultra-wealthy dynasty known as “one of America’s sixty families”.
The “Setons” are ruled with an iron fist by “Julia’s” father, millionaire mogul “Edward Seton Sr.”, and she must get his approval before she can marry “Johnny”. The other "Setons" include "Julia's" defiant and rebellious sister “Linda”, who longs for something beyond her blue-blood life, making her the black sheep of the family. "Linda" spends most of her time in the home’s playroom, a room that symbolizes freedom, for it’s the one room in the house where people can have fun. There's also their brother, “Edward ‘Ned’ Seton Jr.”, a stifled musician forced to follow in his father’s footsteps, who numbs his pain with alcohol.
“Johnny’s” goal is to earn enough money so he can take a long holiday from work to explore the world and discover who he is while he’s young and able. Money doesn’t guide him, as he explains: "I want to save part of my life for myself… Retire young and work old. Come back and work when I know what I'm working for”. But when he meets “Julia’s” family, he quickly realizes his dream doesn’t fit into the “Seton’s” money-centric, upper-crust lifestyle. “Julia” earnestly tries to convince him, "There's no such thrill in the world as making money”, but he's a hard sell.
“Linda”, however, sees “Johnny” as “a breath of fresh air”, not yet bitten by the "reverence for riches”. His nonconformity awakens something deep within her – her own dreams of freedom from the life she has – and the two develop a kinship. I’ll end my plot description at that, so you can joyfully discover how things play out.
Underneath the wit and sparkling dialogue emerge matters about society, conformity, individualism, financial security versus the search for fulfillment, freedom, and the courage and commitment to follow one’s heart. These deep and universal themes may make the film sound serious and heavy, yet it’s anything but. Often labelled a romantic comedy, a first-rate comedy of manners, or mislabeled a screwball comedy, “Holiday” is unique in that it's not pure comedy or pure drama, but a seamless blend of both, making the film feel very plausible and lifelike.
“Holiday” was based on a 1928 Philip Barry hit Broadway play, and as this film’s director, George Cukor, explained to Gavin Lambert in the book “On Cukor”: “Phil Barry’s comedies always had damn good situations, and like all good comedies, the story was something that could have played seriously as well. I find it wonderful to take a serious subject and treat it with a kind of impertinence and gaiety”. Cukor worked with writers Donald Ogden Stewart (who appeared in the stage production) and Sidney Buchman to adapt the play for the screen and slightly tailor it to the strengths of the film’s stars. Possibly better than anyone else, Cukor could successfully adapt stage plays into first-rate films that stand on their own, with “Holiday” as a heavenly case in point.
Though dialogue driven, "Holiday" never feels like a play due to Cukor’s sensitive direction. A believer that camerawork should not intrude on a story, he knew the best spot to place the camera to focus our attention on what was important, and kept his camera moves and edits barely noticeable. The opening scene with "Johnny" and his two best friends "Nick" and "Susan Potter" beautifully illuminates this. The entire sequence (from when “Johnny” enters their apartment until he leaves) happens in just five shots, some static, to let the action play out before us, or ones where he subtly moves the camera to follow “Johnny”, keeping our main focus on him in relation to his friends.
Cukor frames this sequence to subliminally inform us about the characters. "Nick" and “Susan" are always seen in a frame together to visually affirm their bond as a couple, and "Johnny" is placed between them as if they were protecting and embracing him, painting a clear picture that they are devoted, tight-knit friends, while keeping our main focus on “Johnny”. Cukor knew exactly how to showcase story, characters, and performances.
Cukor was also known for extracting fantastic, often iconic performances from actors, and by focusing the attention on them, his films are arresting and often incredibly touching. As he told Peter Bogdanovich in the book “Who the Devil Made It”: “I think human behavior, the human heart, is to me what is very dramatic and rather complicated: and, I think, interests and moves the audience. One can do very dazzling tricks – dazzling beauty and pyrotechnics – but unless the human heart is there I don’t think it goes very deep. I can’t imagine a picture that has made a great impression without that”. "Holiday" is filled with heart.
Cukor’s invisible directing approach affected his reputation. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, while he directed more classics than easily 95% of all other directors, when people mention great directors his name rarely arises because his films are remembered for their story, emotion, and/or performances, rather than for a Cukor style. Andrew Sarris wrote of this in his book “The American Cinema”, explaining why Cukor is a “genuine artist”: “George Cukor’s filmography is his most eloquent defense. When a director has provided tasteful entertainments of a high order consistently over a period of more than thirty years, it is clear that said director is much more than a mere entertainer”. You can read more about the life and career of George Cukor in my previous posts on a few of his other classics, "The Philadelphia Story", "Gone with the Wind", "Born Yesterday", "Camille", “Gaslight”, "The Women”, and "It Should Happen to You”. Just click on the film titles to open the posts. Because he directed so many classics, you can be sure more George Cukor films will appear on this blog in the future.
I should mention that this is the second screen version of “Holiday”. The play was first adapted for the screen in 1930, directed by Edward H. Griffith and starring Ann Harding and Robert Ames. That film version followed the play more closely than this one.
The star of this version of “Holiday” was Cukor’s most famous collaborator, Katharine Hepburn, who plays “Linda Seton”, the sister who feels suffocated by her aristocratic life. Though it may seem like the film is “Johnny’s” story, it’s just as much “Linda’s”, for she unwittingly shares the same dreams, and his conviction and passion stir up her dormant longings for escape. When "Johnny" tells “Mr. Seton” that he has to follow his dream of not working because “I’ve got a feeling if I let this chance go by there’ll never be another one for me”, he’s also speaking for “Linda”, who has a sense that this is her moment. As she tells her father, “Tonight means a great deal to me. I don’t know what precisely, and I don’t know how, but something is trying to take it away from me and I can’t let it go”. The urgency and bewilderment Hepburn injects into "Linda" give a clear sense that this woman is at a crossroads.
As Hepburn walks us through this woman’s journey, there’s no shortage of deep, complex emotions, whether bonding with “Johnny” over his dreams in the playroom, anger and upset at not being able to throw her sister’s engagement party, or the frustration and yearning when she tells her sister “I've got to do something, I've got to get out, quit, change on it somehow or I’ll go mad”. I particularly love how you can see her falling in love with "Johnny" at the trapeze just from the way she looks at him, and am hypnotized by the flurry of shifting feelings she shows as “Ned” explains to her what it’s like to get drunk. Hepburn is fascinating, moving, sincere, and spirited all at the same time in a performance that exposes the complexities of being human. It's fantastic acting and a great example of why she is one of the biggest icons from Hollywood's Golden Age of Cinema.
Katharine Hepburn had a history with “Holiday”. At the start of her career, she understudied the role of “Linda Seton” in the original 1928 Broadway production (reportedly replacing the lead just once). In 1932, she appeared on Broadway in the play "The Warrior's Husband", which led RKO Pictures to ask her to test for a major role in the film "A Bill of Divorcement". Not liking the test scene she was given, Hepburn told RKO she preferred to do a scene from "Holiday" – which she did. Her screen-test by all accounts was dull, but as she explained in her autobiography "Me: Stories of My Life”, she got the part because "George Cukor, who was to direct 'A Bill of Divorcement', liked the way I put down the glass in my test on hearing the engagement announcement”. Cukor elaborated about it to Bogdanovich: “She put it down on the floor – because there didn’t happen to be a table there – but she did it with her whole body, and the angle of her body, the way she played that particular moment – it occurred to me: ‘My God, that girl’. It wasn’t just speaking lines – she would suffuse a thing with feeling – and that business with the glass really convinced me she was right [for the part]”. “A Bill of Divorcement” became Hepburn’s film debut and made her a star. After more triumphs, including a Best Actress Oscar win for “Morning Glory” (her third film), and an iconic performance in the blockbuster hit "Little Women” (also directed by Cukor) both in 1933, Hepburn became one of RKO's top stars.
But after a handful of flops, Hepburn’s career took a nosedive, and according to her, when RKO wanted to cast her in the B movie "Mother Carey's Chickens", she refused and wanted out of her contract. Hearing that Columbia Pictures was going to make a screen version of “Holiday”, she made a deal with RKO to be loaned to Columbia for the film and bought out the rest of her RKO contract. By all accounts, filming “Holiday” was a happy occasion for everyone. Then, just weeks before the film’s release, the Independent Theatre Owners Association took out a full-page ad in the Hollywood Reporter titled "WAKE UP! Hollywood Producers", naming stars "whose dramatic ability is unquestioned, but whose box office draw is nil", listing Hepburn alongside the likes of Mae West, Edward Arnold, Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, and Marlene Dietrich. She was now branded "box-office poison”. Like Hepburn’s previous film, the screwball comedy “Bringing Up Baby”, “Holiday” was a critical success but a box-office flop (over the years both films have become certified classics). It took another Philip Barry play to restore Hepburn’s career, 1939’s “The Philadelphia Story”, and the 1940 screen version (also adapted by Donald Ogden Stewart) catapulted her to stardom once again, this time for the rest of her life. You can read more about the legendary Katharine Hepburn in my posts on “Bringing Up Baby”, “The Philadelphia Story”, “The African Queen”, “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner”, "Stage Door”, and “The Lion in Winter”. Check them out.
Starring opposite Hepburn is Cary Grant as “Johnny Case”, a nonconforming idealist who values freedom and adventure above all else. A more difficult role than it appears, Grant has to be convincing enough to make it feasible that he’d inspire "Linda" so powerfully, she’d want to change her own life, and he more than succeeds (his portrayal is so down-to-earth real, it even inspires me to want to make a change). As I've said before, Grant's intoxicating charm and natural screen presence make acting look so effortless that it's almost a given to overlook his immense talent, which rarely gets its due. But if you watch him closely, you'll see Grant give a delicately layered rendering of an optimistic, determined man being forced to grapple with his purpose and values. Grant beautifully plays this struggle when his emotions come to a head in the scene waltzing with "Linda" in the playroom. He's contemplative, reflective, heartbroken, affectionate, and confused. Grant is also a wonderful listener (a keystone of great acting), and you’ll see him genuinely react to the people, sights, and sounds around him. A former circus performer, “Holiday” also gave Grant a chance to use his acrobatic skills doing flips and tumbles. He also adds tiny physical details that give “Johnny” personality, such as bumping into a statue, or quickly shuffling his feet to be in step with the butler. Grant’s sensational performance is genuinely warm, funny, charismatic, and pained, and like Hepburn, he was one of the biggest stars to ever grace movie screens.
A lot has been said about the pairing of Hepburn and Cukor, but one rarely reads about Cukor’s influence on Cary Grant, which was monumental. As Cukor recounted to Bogdanovich: “[Grant had] been a very handsome leading man, hadn’t been getting many breaks and then, when we did ‘Sylvia Scarlett’, there was this wonderful part written, and somehow – I suppose it was instinct casting him – he played this part and it changed his whole career. I think it was the first time he found himself, the first time he felt the audience like him. It was a rather shady character – a cheap theatrical fellow – and Cary had been in circuses and things and he understood it. I think it was the first time he played a comedy part”. Even Hepburn chimed in on the subject in the book “Cukor & Co”, saying “It was Cary Grant’s first decent part because George knew Cary and cast him as a character comedian, which is what he made his career on”. Grant always considered “Sylvia Scarlett” his breakthrough, and it was the film in which his immortal screen persona first began to emerge.
“Holiday” was Grant and Cukor’s second pairing, and their third and final was “The Philadelphia Story”, All three films co-starred Hepburn, and just before “Holiday”, Grant and Hepburn co-starred in “Bringing Up Baby”, directed by Howard Hawks. Though they only make four films together, something must be said about Grant and Hepburn's chemistry, which is among "Holiday's" most compelling and enticing aspects. They each bring impeccable comedic timing, their own brand of unbound physicality, she’s hard and he’s soft, and when you put them together, magic happens. They are completely in sync and bring out the best in each other. Watch their interplay during the waltz scene until he goes to kiss her. They listen, react, and impact one another, and their intimacy sizzles as we get a deep understanding of each of these characters. You can’t help but want them to end up together. It’s magical. For more about the incomparable Cary Grant, check out these previous posts: “Bringing Up Baby”, “Notorious”, “The Philadelphia Story”, “His Girl Friday”, “Arsenic and Old Lace”, "North by Northwest”, and "I'm No Angel”.
A testament to Cukor’s skill with actors is that everyone in “Holiday” is sensational, and that certainly includes Lew Ayres who plays “Edward ‘Ned’ Seton Jr.”, the alcoholic son of the family. In a standout supporting role, Ayers brings a touchingly tragic undercurrent to "Ned's" wit and humor, giving us a glimpse at what this man could have been had he not been derailed by his father. Ayres is sensational and especially funny in the scene sitting in church still drunk with a hangover and nursing a bump on his head. Without doing much, he tell us volumes about this broken man.
Ayres' big scene, explaining about being drunk to “Linda”, is a major feat in acting in which he convincingly plays drunk while showing us the different degrees of "Ned's" gentleness and pain. And when he drinks a toast to “Linda” being in love, it’s heartbreaking (as is his final scene). Ayres infuses a deep despair into “Ned’s” sarcasm all throughout – a reminder of the painful trap from which he can't escape. Ayres began his career as a musician, and in “Holiday” he gets to play a variety of instruments. His stunning performance earned him a Best Acting National Board of Review Award.
“Holiday” was the second time Ayres worked with Cukor, the first being the 1930 Best Picture Academy Award winner “All Quiet on the Western Front” directed by Lewis Milestone. Ayres was new to movies (having previously appeared in only one substantial role) and wanted desperately to be in that film but Milestone wasn’t interested in him and had another actor in mind. Ayres finally managed to get screen-tested for the part, and the person directing his screen-test was none other than Cukor. When Milestone couldn’t get the actor he wanted, he looked at the last few screen-tests, including Ayres’, and instantly chose him for the part even though Cukor made it clear he thought Ayres couldn’t play the role. The film made Ayres a movie star. Cukor acted as dialogue director on the film, rehearsing and coaching the actors on how to dig deeper with their dialogue with such rigor that Ayres and fellow actors found Cukor unnerving. Six years later (after Ayres appeared in thirty-two more films), Cukor reached out to Ayres to play “Ned” in “Holiday”. Ayres recounted in “On Cukor”: “I was surprised and grateful that he thought of me as the drunken brother… It was an opportunity to do something with big, stellar figures. Cukor was still the same but by now I was a different person. I could take him in stride. I didn’t try to carry the load. I wasn’t bothered by the long exegesis of the characterization”. Their collaboration worked, for Ayres is remarkable in the role. Read more about the life and rocky career of Lew Ayres in my post on “All Quiet on the Western Front”.
Another top-notch performance in “Holiday” comes from Edward Everett Horton who plays “Professor Nick Potter”, one of “Johnny’s” best friends. Horton was one of Hollywood’s great comedic character actors, and though this is one of his more subdued portrayals, he provides a lot of the film’s boldest comedy, such as his reaction when he arrives at the black-tie New Year’s Eve party and the butler accidentally removes one of his shoes with one of his galoshes. He also gets to show his mastery delivering a quip, as with his retort when his wife tells him there’s a run in her stocking and he half seriously exclaims, “Good heavens, we’re ruined”. Horton is truly superb. He played the same role in the 1930 film version.
Born in Long Island, New York, Edward Everett Horton began on stage, performed in vaudeville, joined a theater troupe, and debuted on Broadway in 1910's "The Cheater". He acted in theater his entire career (and early on was also a successful theater producer). In 1919, he moved to Los Angeles and soon made his film debut in 1922's "Too Much Business”, which began a steady film career. Typecast as a "jittery, worrying fuss budget who”, according to his New York Times obituary, “could utter a mild 'Oh, dear' and make it sound like the end of the world", he is credited with making "an institution of the Nervous Nellie character" (aka gay). With the enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code in 1934 (see my “Red Dust” post), it was forbidden to portray anything remotely homosexual in American movies, so there emerged a slew of comical, sexless dandy characters (often butlers, clerks, managers, sidekicks, and so forth), who gay people knew were gay without it being stated, of which Horton (who religiously played these roles) was one of the most popular. He appeared in 180 films and TV shows almost exclusively as a "Nervous Nellie", including "Here Comes Mr. Jordan", "The Front Page", "Lost Horizon", "Trouble in Paradise", "Design for Living”, “Pocketful of Miracles", three with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers (“Top Hat", "The Gay Divorcee", "Shall We Dance?”), as the narrator of "Fractured Fairy Tales" on TV's "Rocky and Bullwinkle", and his final film, 1971's "Cold Turkey”. “Holiday” contains one of his least effeminate performances. He never married, was reportedly gay, and was rumored to have had a relationship with actor Gavin Gordon. Edward Everett Horton died in 1970 at the age of 84, and you can read a bit more about him in my "Top Hat" and "Arsenic and Old Lace” posts.
Another fine performance in “Holiday” is that of Henry Kolker as “Edward Seton Sr.”, the strict head of the family. Kolker presents a mighty sternness, making it utterly believable that his children won’t cross him (such as when he tells “Ned” to stay in the office until six o’clock). Yet he balances it with caring (as in his talk with “Julia” about marrying “Johnny”), and humor (as when struck by "Johnny's" necktie), rendering this man as multi-dimensional and real. The strength of his performance is a vital part of why this film is so effective.
German-born Henry Kolker moved to America at the age of five, and began his acting career in theater. He worked on Broadway in many comedies starting with 1904's "Harriet's Honeymoon". After appearing in fifteen more shows by 1912's "Our Wives”, he switched to movies in 1914, first as a director (with "Santo Icario") and then as an actor (starting with 1915's "The Bigger Man"). Kolker had substantial roles in silent films such as “Midnight Rose" and "Sally, Irene and Mary”, and directed eighteen silent films through 1924, most famously 1921's “Disraeli”. Sure to be a familiar face to classic movie watchers, this prolific character actor worked continually (he was in 29 films in 1934 alone), appearing in 169 films, often as doctors, judges, district attorneys, and such. Just some of his other films include "Baby Face”, "Imitation of Life", "Marie Antoinette", "Diamond Jim", "Romeo and Juliet", "Reckless", “Conquest", "Union Pacific", "A Woman's Face”, "The Crash”, and his final, 1947's "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”. He was married twice. Henry Kolker died in 1947 at the age of 72
The last actor I’ll mention is the wonderful Jean Dixon, who plays “Susan Potter”, “Nick’s” wife and “Johnny’s” friend. Another outstanding actor with terrific comic timing and a flair for a wisecrack, Dixon is a joy to watch, whether it’s her apprehensive expression when entering the New Year’s party, her rapid attitude change from put-off to friendly when she meets “Linda”, or her fabulous rapport with Horton, which is first evident as the film starts and they exchange glances and “manhandle” “Johnny”. Dixon also adds a playfulness, be it how she hits the elevator button or delicately dances when hearing music in the "Seton's" hallway. A very successful theater and Broadway actress especially known for comedy, she only appeared in thirteen films, of which “Holiday” was her last before retiring. She brightens any scene she’s in, and you can read more about the life and career of Jean Dixon in my post on the film that contains her most famous role, as the maid in “My Man Godfrey”.
"Holiday" contains phenomenal art direction with rooms that tell us so much about the “Setons”, and the playroom giving insight about “Linda”. It earned Stephen Goosson and Lionel Banks the film’s only Academy Award nomination (for Best Art Direction).
This week’s classic features crackerjack performances in an engaging mix of comedy, romance, and food-for-thought drama that might even inspire you to take action on some of your New Year’s resolutions. Ah, the power of cinema. It’s also extremely entertaining. Have a very Happy New Year, and enjoy “Holiday”!
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Our Christmas Eve plan
Thanks for posting this. Have not seen the movie yet but will in the next few days. Loved Jean Dixon in My Man GodFrey.
I'm convinced that if this movie hadn't been a box office failure, then Lew Ayres and Katharine Hepburn would have been nominated for an Oscar, that's the only explanation i have to them being snubbed, because both, but particularly Lew received great reviews for this movie and also was a comeback of sorts for him because his career was in a low point back then. And those raves were deserved because his performance in this is so beautiful and heartbreaking, it's a small role but makes wonders with it.