7th Academy Awards · 1935
It Happened One Night
Directed by Frank Capra
“An unforgettable entertainment...the outstanding performance of two outstanding careers!”
The story
A runaway heiress makes a deal with the rogue reporter trailing her but the mismatched pair end up stuck with each other when their bus leaves them behind.
What critics & audiences say
Tomatometer98%Fresh#5 of 98 winnersFamous lines
…Behold the walls of Jericho! Uh, maybe not as thick as the ones that Joshua blew down with his trumpet, but a lot safer. You see, uh, I have no trumpet.
Ellie: Well, I proved once and for all that the limb is mightier than the thumb.
Peter: Why didn't you take off all your clothes? You could have stopped forty cars.
Ellie: Oh, I'll remember that when we need forty cars.
Peter: What's holding up the annulment, you slowpoke? The walls of Jericho are a-toppling.
Mr. Andrews: Send them a telegram right away. Just say, 'Let 'em topple.'
Just goes to show you - twenty millions, and you don't know how to dunk.
Ellie: You've been telling me what not to do ever since I can remember.
Mr. Andrews: That's because you've always been a stubborn idiot.
Ellie: I come from a long line of stubborn idiots.
Mr. Andrews: I asked you a simple question! Do you love her?
Peter: Yes! But don't hold that against me. I'm a little screwy myself.
Any guy that'd fall in love with your daughter ought to have his head examined.
Ellie: Your ego is absolutely colossal.
Peter: Yeah, yep. Not bad. How's yours?
Shapeley's the name - and that's the way I like 'em!
Remember me? I'm the fellow you slept on last night.
Quotes via Wikiquote
Fun facts
- It Happened One Night may have helped inspire Bugs Bunny: a character keeps calling Clark Gable 'Doc', a 'Bugs Dooley' is mentioned, and Gable fast-talks while eating carrots. Animator Friz Freleng, who helped develop Bugs, counted it among his favorite films.Wikipedia · Influence
- Claudette Colbert skipped the Oscars, feeling she had 'just finished the worst picture in the world', and boarded a cross-country train. When she won, Harry Cohn sent someone to drag her off the train before it departed, and she accepted in a two-piece traveling suit.Wikipedia · Reception
- The lead role of Ellie was turned down by Miriam Hopkins, Myrna Loy, Margaret Sullavan and Loretta Young. Constance Bennett wanted to produce it herself, Jack Warner wouldn't lend Bette Davis, and Carole Lombard had a scheduling conflict.Wikipedia · Casting
- When Clark Gable undresses in one scene, he takes off his shirt to reveal a bare chest. An urban legend claims sales of men's undershirts declined noticeably as a result.Wikipedia · Influence
- It Happened One Night was the first film to win the 'Big Five' Oscars: Picture, Director, Actor, Actress and Writing. Only One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and The Silence of the Lambs have matched it.Wikipedia · Academy Awards
- Claudette Colbert balked at hiking her skirt to hitch a ride, but when she saw the chorus girl brought in as her body double, she told Frank Capra: 'Get her out of here. I'll do it. That's not my leg!'Wikipedia · Filming
- Colbert's first film had been a Capra-directed disaster, and neither wanted to work together again. She agreed only if her salary was doubled to $50,000 and her scenes were finished in four weeks so she could take a planned vacation.Wikipedia · Casting
- Legend says MGM lent Clark Gable to lowly Columbia as punishment, but biographies partially refute this. MGM paid him $2,000 a week and lent him out for $2,500, netting $500 a week while he was gone.Wikipedia · Casting
- In 1996 Steven Spielberg bought Clark Gable's Oscar at auction for $607,500 and donated it to the Academy. When Christie's offered Claudette Colbert's Oscar the next year, it attracted no bids.Wikipedia · Academy Awards
- Only moderately successful at first, the film took off in secondary movie houses and small towns, becoming Columbia's biggest hit at least until the late 1980s. Its Greyhound bus also spurred interest in bus travel nationwide.Wikipedia · Reception