Claudette Colbert Movies
Paris-born actress Claudette Colbert was brought to New York at the age of seven by her banker father. She planned an art career after high school graduation, studying at the Art Student's League. Attending a party with actress Anne Morrison, the 18-year-old was offered a three-line bit in Morrison's new play The Wild Westcotts. That ended her art aspirations, and Colbert embarked on a stage career in 1925, scoring her first big critical success in the 1926 Broadway production of The Barker, in which she played a duplicitous snake charmer. One year later, the actress made her first film at Long Island's Astoria studio, For the Love of Mike (1927), but the film was unsuccessful and she enjoyed neither the experience nor her young director, Frank Capra. So back she went to Broadway, returning to films during the talkie revolution in The Hole in the Wall (1929), which was also the movie-speaking debut of Edward G. Robinson. Once again, Colbert disliked film acting; but audiences responded to her beauty and cultured voice, so she forsook the stage for Hollywood.Colbert's popularity (and salary) skyrocketed after she was cast as "the wickedest woman in history," Nero's unscrupulous wife Poppaea, in the Biblical epic The Sign of the Cross (1932). Colbert expanded her range as a street-smart smuggler's daughter in I Cover the Waterfront and in the pioneering screwball comedy Three-Cornered Moon (both 1933), but it was for a role she nearly refused that the actress secured her box-office stature. Virtually every other actress in Hollywood had turned down the role of spoiled heiress Ellie Andrews in Columbia's It Happened One Night (1934), and when director Frank Capra approached an unenthusiastic Colbert, she wearily agreed to appear in the film on the conditions that she be paid twice her normal salary and that the film be completed before she was scheduled to go on vacation in four weeks. Colbert considered the experience one of the worst in her life -- until the 1935 Academy Awards ceremony, in which It Happened One Night won in virtually all major categories, including a Best Actress Oscar for her.
Colbert spent the next decade alternating between comedy and drama, frequently in the company of her most popular co-star, Fred MacMurray. She gained a reputation of giving 110 percent of her energies while acting, which compensated for her occasional imperviousness and her insistence that only one side of her face be photographed (which frequently necessitated redesigning movie sets just to accommodate her phobia about her "bad side"). Colbert remained a top money-making star until her last big hit, The Egg and I (1947), after which she lost some footing, partly because of producers' unwillingness to meet her demands that (under doctor's orders) she could only film a short time each day (her doctor was her husband). She hoped to jump-start her career in the role of Margo Channing in All About Eve, but those plans were squelched when she injured her back and had to relinquish the character to Bette Davis. Traveling the usual "fading star" route, Colbert made films in Europe and a budget Western in the U.S. before returning triumphantly to Broadway, first in 1956's Janus, then in the long-running 1958 comedy Marriage Go Round. The actress also appeared on television, although reportedly had trouble adjusting to live productions. In 1961, she returned to Hollywood as Troy Donahue's mother in Parrish. It would be her last film appearance until the 1987 TV movie, The Two Mrs. Grenvilles -- in which she far outclassed her material. Still a prominent figure in the Hollywood hierarchy, Colbert retired to her lavish home in California, where she frequently entertained her old friends Ronald and Nancy Reagan. Claudette Colbert died in 1996 in Bridgetown, Barbados, at the age of 92. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1933
Three-Cornered Moon is regarded by many film buffs as the first of the genuine "screwball comedies." Claudette Colbert stars as the only level-headed member of a wacky Brooklyn family. Her mother (Mary Boland) loses the family fortune in the stock market, forcing Colbert's knuckleheaded brothers to look for work. Unfortunately the boys seem interested only in jobs for which they're uniquely unsuited. Even Colbert has her weak moments, especially when she falls for a callow writer (Hardie Albright), but she eventually finds happiness with sensible doctor Richard Arlen. Three-Cornered Moon was written by the gloriously named Gertrude Tonkonogy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Richard Arlen, (more)
- 1933
In this musical drama from directors Alexander Hall and George Somnes, Claudette Colbert stars as Sally Trent, a children's radio show host by day and a nightclub singer by night. After giving her only child (a daughter) up for adoption amid hard times, Sally uses the listeners of her show as surrogate children while she searches for the girl in hopes of being reunited. Unfortunately, the girl's father also has plans of tracking him down. Penned by songwriters Ralph Rainger and Leo Robin, some of the songs in the film include "Don't Be a Cry Baby," "Give Me Liberty or Give Me Love," "It's a Long Dark Night," "The Torch Singer". ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Ricardo Cortez, (more)
- 1932
Legendary songwriter and vaudevillian George M. Cohan made his first appearance in a sound film with this satiric musical comedy. Theodore Blair (Cohan) is a politician running for president; while he has talent and intelligence, he's unfortunately as exciting as warm milk, and he is not doing well on the campaign trail. Blair's staff discovers Doc Peter Varney (also played by Cohan), a ball-of-fire carnival pitchman who looks and sounds exactly like the candidate. Varney is hired to stump for Blair in his place; the prospective voters are fooled, as is Felicia Hammond (Claudette Colbert), Blair's girlfriend who is pleasantly surprised to see that her man has suddenly developed a personality. Blair's minders soon think that Varney has grown too big for his britches, and they want him out of the way before election day, but it's Blair rather than Varney who ends up getting shanghaied. Jimmy Durante appears as Varney's sidekick Curly. Cohan clashed with producers and studio heads during the production of The Phantom President, and it proved out to be his next-to-last screen appearance. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George M. Cohan, Claudette Colbert, (more)
- 1932
Director Cecil B. DeMille returned to Paramount Pictures for this typically epic production, which became his first box office hit after the close of the silent era. Fredric March stars as Roman Prefect Marcus Superbus, a noble military leader of the year 64 A.D. Emperor Nero (Charles Laughton) has just burned down the city and blamed the conflagration on Christians, which has exacerbated anti-Christian sentiment. Marcus encounters a beautiful young Christian woman, Mercia (Elissa Landi), pleading with soldiers over the arrest of her beloved stepfather Titus (Arthur Hohl). The Prefect intervenes on her behalf, hoping for romance. Mercia rebuffs him, however, so Marcus attempts to humiliate her by sentencing her to live with a lesbian (Joyzelle Joiner), who has even less luck seducing the chaste Mercia. The Empress Poppaea (Claudette Colbert) desires Marcus for her own bed and becomes jealous of Mercia. When Nero orders that Christians are to be fed to the lions in the arena, Poppaea seizes the opportunity to get rid of her romantic rival, though Marcus pleads in vain with Nero to spare her life. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Fredric March, Claudette Colbert, (more)
- 1932
Joan Blondell, borrowed for the occasion from Warner Bros., earned top-billing in this delightful Hollywood parable, but the real star is of course Stuart Erwin as the irrepressible grocery clerk Merton Gill. Paramount screenwriters Saul Mintz, Walter De Leon and Arthur Kober based their witty scenario on Henry Leon Wilson's 1922 novel Merton of the Movies, the 1923 Broadway play by George S. Kaufman and Marc Connelly, and the 1924 Famous Players silent version starring Glenn Hunter. By 1932, the story was indeed well-known: Aspiring to become a famous screen cowboy, small-town delivery boy Merton Gill arrives in Hollywood, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and complete with a diploma from the National Correspondence Academy of Acting. Crashing the gates of Majestic Pictures (read: Paramount), Merton manages to fumble his one line bit in the latest Buck Benson (Dink Templeton) western and is fired on the spot. Unwilling to leave the studio, the hapless thespian survives on leftover scraps from the extra's lunch boxes until discovered by comedy starlet "Flip" Montague (Blondell), who takes pity on him and arranges a meeting with Jeff Baird (Sam Hardy), head of the slapstick comedy unit. Bestowed a new name, Whoop Ryder, Merton is starred in what he assumes to be a serious western melodrama but what in reality is yet another burlesque featuring cross-eyed low comic Ben Turpin. Although a big hit with preview audiences, a humiliated Merton is ready to return to the grocery business when "Flip" persuades him to stay by telling him that he is "darn near perfect." ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stuart Erwin, Joan Blondell, (more)
- 1932
Claudette Colbert plays a dizzy socialite who wants to become an actress. She buys her way into an audition for the part of a seductive vamp in an upcoming film. To prove she's worthy of the role, Colbert comes on strong to unsuspecting bachelor Edmund Lowe. He falls like a ton of bricks, but Colbert drops him when she's cast in the film. Lowe is not so easily disposed of; he abducts Colbert from the studio and spirits her away. She eventually realizes that she's loved him all along, while the modern-day feminists in the audience grind their teeth and pull their hair. Misleading Lady was based on a play by Charles W. Goddard and Paul Dickey. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Edmund Lowe, (more)
- 1932
Margaret Hughes (Claudette Colbert) returns from a trip abroad to discover that her sweetheart, crusading attorney David Rolfe (Melvyn Douglas), has been framed for murder. To save Rolfe from the chair, Margaret poses as a trollop and insinuates herself into the confidence of the criminal underworld. Her efforts to get her hands on the evidence that will free Rolfe are stymied by gang boss Harry Evans (William "Stage" Boyd), but Evans is himself destroyed by his castoff mistress Claire Foster (Lilyan Tashman). The Wiser Sex was inspired by the recent crime-busting activities of New York's Seabury committee, though one assumes that the real-life participants were not as glamorous as Colbert and Douglas. Featured in the cast is a talented young actor named Ross Alexander, who would go on to a tragically brief starring career at Warner Bros. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Melvyn Douglas, (more)
- 1932
The "Enoch Arden" theme is trotted out and slicked up for The Man From Yesterday. Nurse Claudette Colbert marries army doctor Charles Boyer, believing that her first husband, Clive Brook, has been killed in World War One. Not quite; Brook has survived (though not by much), ending up in the same hospital with Dr. Boyer and nurse Colbert. She is willing to honor her first marriage, but Brook, aware that he is dying from the aftereffects of poison gas, nobly sends her away. The Man from Yesterday is ideal fare for stiff-upper-lipped Clive Brook, but not all that suitable to the ebullient Claudette Colbert; still, she is excellent, as is the rest of the cast. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Clive Brook, (more)
- 1931
Trailblazing female director Dorothy Arzner helmed this well-crafted romantic drama. Julia Traynor (Claudette Colbert) is a secretary working for Jerry Stafford (Frederic March), a successful stock broker. Jerry has taken a decidedly non-professional interest in Julia, and when he asks her to join him on an ocean cruise, she firmly declines the offer. Hoping to throw Jerry off her trail, Julia accepts a hasty marriage proposal from Philip Craig (Monroe Owsley), a young and struggling securities broker. When Jerry learns that Julia has tied the knot, he rashly fires her and predicts that the marriage won't last six months. Jerry soon regrets his outburst and not only gives Julia her job back but hires Philip as well. However, Jerry's prediction proves to be not far from the mark; Julia is not happy with Philip, and Jerry learns that Philip has been embezzling company funds to play the market on his own. After a downturn in the market wipes out Philip's investments, Julia discovers that he owes $100,000 as a result of his bad investments. Desperate to raise money, Julia offers herself to Jerry in exchange for a loan; he refuses to take advantage of her, but he agrees to front her the money anyway. Philip, however, cannot believe that Jerry would give Julia the money without demanding her favors in return, and he goes after Jerry in a jealous rage. Ginger Rogers, Charles Ruggles, and Pat O'Brien lend sparkle to the supporting cast. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Fredric March, (more)
- 1931
In this drawing room drama, an impetuous heiress goes on a cruise and ends up marrying a Latin gigolo on a whim. Her father then dies, and as soon as her devoted husband discovers that the old man died destitute, he takes off. Now the girl must work; she gets a job as her father's best friend's wife's social secretary. The former socialite finds herself tormented by her boss's rotten daughter. Even so, when the mean young woman finds herself involved in a murder, it is the ex-socialite who tries to help her cover up the crime. Later the heroine's conniving ex-husband tries to blackmail her boss with the information. Trouble ensues. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Herbert Marshall, (more)
- 1931
Maurice Chevalier plays a 19th century Viennese lieutenant, conducting an affair with sexy violinist Claudette Colbert. While publicly flirting with Colbert, Chevalier is spotted by a dowdy princess (Miriam Hopkins), who thinks that the lieutenant's wink was meant for her. Forced to marry the Princess, Chevalier despairs at her lack of charm. But good-hearted Colbert takes the princess aside, dolls her up, and instructs her how to bewitch--and keep--her man. Chevalier is enchanted by the "new" princess, while Colbert, who will have no trouble finding someone else to keep her warm and comfortable, cheerfully sashays out of his life. Long thought lost, The Smiling Lieutenant was rediscovered in an East European vault in the 1970s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Maurice Chevalier, Claudette Colbert, (more)
- 1931
In this drama, a remake of Sal of Singapore(1929), the captain of a freighter becomes an instant father when his crew rescues a drifting Navy boat that contains a baby. The captain decides that he will keep the baby and take it back to the U.S. instead of turning it in to the authorities. He begins advertising for a "mother" for the baby to help him while he runs the ship. His call is answered by a woman with a dubious, secret past. During the interview she lies about her character and qualifications and gets the job and a free cruise to the States. It is smooth sailing until one of the sailors recognizes her and attempts to blackmail her into sleeping with him. Fortunately, the captain rescues her and tosses the loutish seaman into the sea. The woman immediately falls for the good captain who has also fallen for her. They encounter more rough seas when, upon docking in New York, the captain is arrested for attempted murder. The woman becomes his witness, but when he learns the truth about her, he loses his respect and they go their separate ways. She again becomes a loose woman, and he begins to drink heavily. When the baby gets deathly ill, the two are reunited--this time it is for good, and happiness ensues. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gary Cooper, Claudette Colbert, (more)
- 1930
In this sports drama, Toby McLean, a sportswriter encounters another journalist, Ann Vaughn at the Tunney-Jack Dempsey fight. They end up married and living in a tiny New York apartment. One day he travels to St. Louis to cover the World Series and meets a socialite named Puff. Though she uses her feminine wiles, he ignores her and stays true to his wife until she becomes a famous magazine writer and he gets jealous of her success. To get even, he begins an affair with Puff. Meanwhile, his distraught wife begins drinking bootleg whiskey and goes temporarily blind. Her husband is horrified and leaves poor Puff. He then throws himself into his work so he can prove his desire to reconcile with Ann. The film is the feature film debut of Ginger Rogers (she played Puff). ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Norman Foster, (more)
- 1930
Le Grande Mare is the French-language version of Paramount's The Big Pond (1930), with Maurice Chevalier and Claudette Colbert in their original roles as Pierre Mirande and Barbara Billings. Pierre is a Venetian tour guide, who falls in love with wealthy American tourist Barbara. Her male relatives think that Pierre is merely a fortune-hunter, but Barbara's mom persuades her husband to give Pierre a job in his chewing-gum factory. The menfolk finally approve of Barbara's choice when Pierre comes up with the brilliant, money-making idea of coating the gum with liquor! Both La Grande Mare and The Big Pond were filmed simultaneously at Paramount's Long Island studios, but if the stars were tired out by this procedure, one would never know it from their enthusiastic performances. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Andree Corday, Claudette Colbert, (more)
- 1930
L'Enigmatique Monsieur Parkes is the French-language version of the American romantic melodrama Slightly Scarlet. Replacing Evelyn Brent and Clive Brook, the stars of the original version, are Claudette Colbert and Adolphe Menjou. The story takes place on the French Riviera, where heroine Lucy (Colbert) successfully poses as a princess to mingle with the glitterati. To keep her low-born origins a secret, she is forced to serve as accomplice for a master jewel thief (Paul Lukas in the original, Emile Chautard in the French version). While pilfering the jewels of a wealthy American woman, Lucy is caught in the act by gentleman thief Monsieur Parkes (Menjou) -- and it's love at first sight, whereupon each crook promises to reform for the other's sake. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Emile Chautard, Adrienne D'Ambricourt, (more)
- 1930
Poor but honest district attorney Fredric March, sick of the "one law for rich, one law for poor" imbalance, sentences selfish society girl Claudette Colbert to ten years in prison for vehicular manslaughter. The sentence is reduced to two years due to political pressure; nonetheless, Claudette feels humiliated by March and vows revenge. While incarcerated, the girl learns a few lessons in humility, and by the time she has completed her sentence she has become most popular and kindhearted inmate in the joint. Upon her release, Claudette seeks out March and declares her love for him. Based on a story by Alice Duer Miller, Manslaughter had been previously filmed by Cecil B. DeMille in 1922; the great director used the plotline as an excuse for an extended (and gloriously pointless) flashback to Ancient Rome. This 1930 talkie remake is infinitely more tasteful and restrained than the DeMille version--but not quite as much fun to watch. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Fredric March, (more)
- 1929
When blue-blooded widower Robert Rossiter (Walter Huston) announces his plans to marry salesgirl Joyce Roamer (Claudette Colbert), his family goes out of their way to stop the engagement. Despite their original suspicion that Joyce (Colbert) was only involved with their father for his money, however, the upper crust family eventually welcomes her as one of their own. The Lady Lies was directed by Hobart Henley and also features actors Charlie Ruggles, Patricia Deering, and Tom Brown. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Walter Huston, Claudette Colbert, (more)
- 1929
Claudette Colbert and Edward G. Robinson both made their talking-picture bows in Paramount's The Hole in the Wall. Based on a play by Fred Jackson, the story is set in motion when Jean Oliver (Colbert), seeking vengeance against the wealthy dowager who had her sent to prison, poses as a fortune teller named Mme. Mystera and charms her way into the dowager's home. It is Jean's plan to kidnap the old woman's granddaughter Marcia (Marcia Kagno) and teach the young girl to be a thief. But this insidious scheme is complicated when The Fox (Edward G. Robinson), a dapper but ruthless gangster, falls in love with Jean. When Jean spurns his advances, The Fox spitefully kidnaps Marcia and ties the poor child to a railway-dock pillar, leaving her at the mercy of the tide. In the process, the Fox is himself drowned, leaving Marcia's fate in the hands of crusading reporter Gordon Grant (David Newell) -- who also is in love with Jean! For years, Edward G. Robinson dismissed Hole in the Wall as a disaster and refused to watch it, until his co-star Claudette Colbert caught the film on TV and convinced Robinson that it wasn't so bad after all. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Edward G. Robinson, (more)
- 1927
Recently fired by comedian Harry Langdon, young director Frank Capra found it difficult to line up any new projects. He was finally afforded the opportunity to direct a New York-based production originally titled Hell's Kitchen, but eventually released as For the Love of Mike. The story is the old bromide about three men -- Irishman O'Malley (Hugh Cameron), German Schultz (Ford Sterling) and Jewish Katz (George Sidney) -- who adopt an orphaned lad named Mike (played as an adult by Ben Lyon) and finance his education. Once he gets into Yale, Mike nearly falls in with a bad crowd but in the end is redeemed by the love of pert coed Mary (Claudette Colbert, in her movie debut). Despite a strong supporting cast and worthwhile production values, For the Love of Mike was sabotaged by distribution problems and ended up a failure -- and worst of all, Frank Capra was never paid for his participation. Completely on the outs in Hollywood, Capra was forced to take a job at bottom-barrel Columbia Pictures, which in the long run turned out to be immeasurably beneficial for both director and studio. As for newcomer Claudette Colbert, she too managed to survive the For Love of Mike debacle, eventually winning an Academy Award for her work in the Frank Capra-directed It Happened One Night. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Claudette Colbert, Ben Lyon, (more)
