Happiness Ahead is a 1934 American comedy film directed by Mervyn LeRoy and starring Dick Powell with Josephine Hutchinson.[1] This was Hutchinson's (credited) debut.[2]
Plot
Joan Bradford is a society heiress who rebels against her mother's choice of a future husband by masquerading as a working-class girl and dating a window washer.
Cast
- Dick Powell as Bob Lane
- Josephine Hutchinson as Joan Bradford
- John Halliday as Henry Bradford
- Frank McHugh as Tom
- Allen Jenkins as Chuck
- Ruth Donnelly as Anna
- Dorothy Dare as Josie
- Marjorie Gateson as Mrs. Bradford
- Gavin Gordon as "Jellie" Travis
- Russell Hicks as Jim Meehan
- Mary Forbes as Mrs. Travis
- J. M. Kerrigan as The Boss
- Mary Treen as The Girl
- Mary Russell as Girl
- Jane Darwell as Landlady
- George Chandler as Window Washer (uncredited)
Reception
Andre Sennwald, critic for The New York Times, called it "a winning and agreeable film", adding: "Mervyn LeRoy, the director of detonating screen melodramas, goes soft and sentimental in his new work without losing his grip on life. "Happiness Ahead" has a continuously warming effect and it produces a mood of benevolence and good cheer. In addition to the strawberry and heart-popping tunes, there are the title number and "Beauty Must Be Loved," which have a good uplift percentage in Dick Powell's sunny tenor. Mr. LeRoy seems to have made a lot out of a little.[2]
Preservation status
The film is preserved in the Library of Congress Packard Campus for Audio-Visual Conservation collection.[3]
References
- ^ The AFI Catalog of Feature Films:Happiness Ahead
- ^ a b Sennwald, Andre (October 11, 1934). "Josephine Hutchinson Makes a Film Debut in "Happiness Ahead," at the Strand -- "Wake Up and Dream."". The New York Times.
- ^ Catalog of Holdings The American Film Institute Collection and The United Artists Collection at The Library of Congress, (<-book title) p.74 c.1978 by The American Film Institute
External links
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