Born Yesterday (1950)
Bribe & Prejudice
Happy Election Day, ILTBTA readership! (Remember: if you’re in line, stay in line!) Instead of refreshing your Twitter feed or the 538 homepage, how ’bout you instead pass the time with our post on the D.C.-based rom-com-dram Born Yesterday. Wouldn’t you rather read about how an uncultured woman learns the value of reading than re-learn the names of counties in Wisconsin? Surely you’d rather take a break from watching Steve Kornacki analyze precinct-level returns from Pennsylvania and take in some fun facts from Wikipedia about a movie you’ve never heard of and will promptly forget about after you’re done, right? Doesn’t that sound fun? We vote yes.
Previews
What, if anything, did we know about this coming attraction before we watched it?
Ellen: Never heard of it, I may as well have been born yesterday, amirite??
Tyler: I vaguely remember reading about Judy Holliday in the incredible (yet lengthy) book Oscar Wars1 I read earlier this year, but I know nothing about the actual plot. Time to change that whether I like it or not!
Plots & Feelings
This one’s pretty self-explanatory.
Short Version (courtesy of IMDb): While in Washington to lobby for favorable legislation, a garbage tycoon hires a reporter to teach his ex-showgirl mistress proper etiquette to better fit in with high society, but she ends up learning more than he bargained for.
Long Version (modified from Wikipedia and formatted to fit your screen):
There comes a time in every two-bit, blustering, bullying tycoon’s life that he seeks to buy a politician, and we the audience are here to witness it for Harry Brock, junkyard king. He bursts into the Statler Hotel with his bleach blonde fiance, Emma “Billie” Dawn, and his crooked lawyer Jim Devery, to demand a private wing, a shave, and anything else he might require. He’s paying $400 a day2, after all! In an attempt to get word out about a new big fish in town, Jim introduces Harry to journalist Paul Verrall from The Washington Bulletin for an interview. Paul does not hide his disdain for Harry’s whole deal particularly well, but Harry’s one of those “I like you kid, you’re a straight shooter” kind of guys, so he doesn’t mind that much.
Tyler: You can tell Paul is a real intellectual-type because he’s wearing glasses. Meanwhile, Harry looks like Colin Farrell’s Penguin.
Meanwhile, Billie is busy unpacking her many fur coats and stoles and trying to get someone around here to let her have a drink. She’s mostly there to spend money and sign documents transferring assets to her at Jim’s direction, so it’s not all bad. She meets Paul briefly and there’s a bit of mutual 👀👀3. Jim is also privately advising Harry to hurry up and marry her, because a wife cannot testify against her husband4! Harry’s put to the test, however, when Billie is as brash and uneducated as ever when meeting a congressman and his wife, not knowing anything about the Supreme Court, the game of bridge, or that it’s insanely rude to keep blasting the radio and scatting in the middle of conversation.
Ellen: There are things I believe that she wouldn’t inherently understand just from lack of exposure, but the radio thing was too much. She did it like 3 separate times! What was she, raised in a barn?!
Tyler: As I wrote in my notes: “Omg Billie I know it's part of the plot of this movie but for the love of god read the room.” Aren’t we supposed to like her??
Tyler: Also, whoever decided that Billie’s accent should sound … like that … should be fired into the sun. I cannot handle an entire movie of that.
Harry and Jim agree they can’t have another meeting like that, so Harry gets the bright idea to hire that jabroni with the glasses (aka Paul) to get Billie a bit more educated. She’s got some raw intelligence, if the intensity and skill with which she slaughters Harry at gin rummy is any indication. Initially, Billie is just like “mmm yes, an affair, sounds great,” but Paul, though interested, is a true believer, and he drops off a pile of books and the morning papers for her. He tells her to just circle anything in the paper she doesn’t understand, and he’ll explain later.
Tyler: I appreciated the relatively long (and mostly silent) scene of them playing gin, I thought it was a good way of showing that (despite everything we’ve seen of her thus far) she's actually “smart” in her own ways.
The next
morningafternoon (Billie likes to sleep!), Paul returns and finds most of Billie’s newspaper circled, so they head off on a field trip to Congress and the library thereof. It’s clear that Billie has never thought about any of this, but she’s fascinated by the impressive buildings and founding documents. Paul attempts to explain to her an article he wrote, but just parsing the headline takes a good five minutes. At least there’s ice cream! They persist in her studies and eventually they end up at a night on the Potomac, watching a symphony from the steps of the Watergate Hotel. The duo has a lovely time, and as the evening winds down, it’s time for Billie to play her Personal Tragedy Card (as is tradition). She became estranged from her father after she joined the chorus line, and does this add to the plot? No. Does it come up again? Not really. Does Paul absolutely eat it up? YES.Tyler: The most generous read of her mentioning her relationship with her father is that it not only gives her slightly more depth as a character but also gives her “daddy issues” (in the most patronizingly patriarchal way possible), which could explain why she’s even with Harry in the first place. Billie is essentially defined solely by her relationships with the men of this movie, and this just adds one more to the heap.
Sending funny tweets to your friends (Source)
Months pass, and Billie is surprising everyone with her appetite for knowledge and work ethic, including herself! She’s lending books to the maids at the hotel, reading on her own, and continuing to accompany Paul to places like the National Gallery of Art. As Billie’s crash course in becoming as smart as she can continues, she comes to the depressing realization that she hates her life and wants more. Harry, meanwhile, is pissed, as he often is. He’s not pleased with the lack of progress on favorable legislation, and on top of that, he thinks his fiancée thinks she’s better than him! Billie demands to know why Harry thinks he ought to have such a say in the laws, who ever voted for him?? Fascist.5
Jim later attempts to get Billie to sign more documents, and to his shock, she puts on a pair of glasses and starts reading them. He vainly insists that it’s all on the level, but Billie rightly points out that it must be fishy, otherwise he’d just tell her. Harry can’t have that, and he starts yelling at her and eventually hits her! He forces her to sign the contracts, and she runs off to the Jefferson Memorial, of all places. She gathers herself and calls Paul.
Ellen: Right before Harry slaps her, Billie sees it’s going to happen, and she’s got this look on her face that just seems like she knew it would come to this with him at some point, and it’s so sad.
Paul and Billie hatch a plan to gather evidence against Harry and hide it in a safe place. There’s a whole hubbub of Harry yelling at Paul, yelling at Billie, yelling at Jim, yadda yadda yadda it never ends with this guy! Billie and Paul successfully blackmail Harry into not proceeding with his attempted bribery or any of his other shenanigans. She’ll mete out his assets back to him little by little, year by year to make sure he behaves. Jim, who never seemed all that into this crime stuff, is kind of amusedly resigned to the whole thing. Billie departs with a triumphant, “hit something else, I’m leaving!”
Billie and Paul eventually skip town, brandishing their brand new marriage license to a cop who pulls them over as they drive away.
Tyler: In yet another “this didn’t age super well” moment, I didn’t really like the fact that Billie and Paul went and got married. I guess we don’t technically know how much time has passed (maybe a reasonable amount for once!), but for a movie that seems to think it’s quite feminist, having them get married sort of undercuts that a bit right away. I would’ve liked it much better if they just bid adieu at the train station as she left to reconnect with her father.
Intermission
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Wiki-Wiki-Whaaat?
Love a good Wikipedia rabbit hole in search of some fun facts? Us too.
Born Yesterday’s Wikipedia page has some interesting facts and anecdotes that we recommend you read through, but here are a few of our favorites:
Born Yesterday is the film adaptation of the 1946 Broadway play of the same name written by Garson Kanin. Kanin’s other stage work includes directing The Diary of Anne Frank and Funny Girl, whose film adaptations were both well-received. His best-selling novel Smash (released in 1980) was inspired by his time directing Funny Girl and was later adapted into the TV series of the same name.
Kanin’s most famous quote is on a plaque on the sidewalk outside a NYC Public Library: “I want everyone to be smart. As smart as they can be. A world of ignorant people is too dangerous to live in.”
Ellen: RT if you agree!
Judy Holliday originated the role of Billie in the Broadway play, appearing in over 1,200 performances on top of playing the role in the film adaptation. While she initially didn’t want to play the role in the movie, Kanin convinced her to do so by writing a role for her in the 1949 rom-com Adam’s Rib. Holliday would later win the Oscar for Best Actress.
Loyal ILTBTA readers will recall the name of film adaptation director, George Cukor, as the director of Romeo and Juliet (1936) and Gaslight. Cukor’s prep work for this movie included having the actors rehearse in front of a live studio audience (of studio employees) to gauge how funny certain lines were.
While the character of Billie wore only five costumes in the stage show, the film’s costume designer created thirteen costumes for the movie. Cukor asked for the clothes to be expensive and ornate at the beginning of the movie, with her wardrobe becoming simpler and more elegant as she became more cultured.
Ellen: So I now know who to blame for this waistcoat/jacket/skirt situation that I’m now obsessed with!
Born Yesterday was remade in 1993 with Melanie Griffith in the leading role. Despite receiving an audience CinemaScore of B+, it holds a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 25% and Griffith got a Razzie nomination for Worst Actress.
Oscar NomNomNomz
Since we all know a movie is nothing without the food and drink it incorporates.
It’s now time to award the Oscar for Best Snacktor in a Supporting Role6. And the nomnomnominees are:
The largest fruit basket you've ever seen, courtesy of the Hotel Statler
Scotch and water from the “mini” bar
A chocolate ice cream bar from outside the Library of Congress
And the Oscar goes to … a chocolate ice cream bar outside the Library of Congress! Unfortunately, Joe Biden stole the ice cream bar to take to his Election Night party, so we will accept this award on its behalf.
Fill In The Blank
How did we really feel about The Academy nominating this?
Ellen: I’d like to kick The Academy’s butt in gin rummy. This one didn’t really do it for me, folks. I felt kind of “whatever” about most of it. Short list of things I liked: general ideals it represents, character growth for a woman, allowing me to look at William Holden. Maybe the play hits harder, but I don’t think this movie belongs with the likes of Sunset Boulevard and All About Eve.
Tyler: I’d like to ask The Academy if Harry bribed them too. Simply put, this movie did not pass The Cell Phone Test for me. I didn’t find myself all that engaged with the characters or the plot itself. It’s never a good sign when a movie ends and I say “Okay, that happened” and proceed to forget everyone’s names and not think about it until writing this post. Harry and Billie are each at the very least not likable, though I applaud Billie for actually trying to better herself. Meanwhile, Paul is as shallowly written as the character is smug, in that “Aw shucks lady, lemme show you the world and then get married” kind of way that seems endemic to movies from this era. It’s a shtick that doesn’t particularly age well, as evidenced by the poorly reviewed remake. I vaguely recall chuckling a couple times, but it ultimately didn’t strike me as anything special.
Let The Credits Roll
Thanks for reading! Some quick housekeeping as you exit the theatre:
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Post-Credits Scene
Get a sneak peek at the next ILTBTA installment.
Bust out your French-to-English dictionary and keep your reading glasses handy, because our next ILTBTA post will feature the 1937 French war drama La Grande Illusion (The Grand Illusion in English, if you can believe it). The Grand Illusion follows a group of French prisoners of war during World War I as they plot an escape from their German captors. The first foreign language film to be nominated for Best Picture, it is considered a masterpiece of French cinema and one of the greatest films ever made.
It is available to watch for free with a subscription to Le Hùlu (Hulu), TCM (with a cable log-in), or something called kanopy (with a public library card, which you should all have because libraries are great).
Until then, … okay you’re free to go back to election coverage.
Ellen: Shout out to our brand being so strong that my friend Lisa gave me this book for my birthday without knowing Tyler read it!
That’s over $5,000 in today’s using-money-as-a-stand-in-for-strength!
👀 like my ex-wife!
As we learned in Arrested Development.
We can’t seem to escape people calling each other fascists.
Results tabulated and certified by the accountants at Ernst & Yum™.