Lewis Seiler

Birth Name: Lewis Seiler

Date of Birth: September 30th, 1890

Date of Death: January 8th, 1964

Number of Films that Lewis Seiler Made with Humphrey Bogart: 5

The Lowdown

Well, it was a bit tough to find much information on Lewis Seiler, which surprises me just a little considering that he directed at least 88 films over his career and was a contract worker for Warner Brothers.

A few things did come to light, though. Seiler seemed to treat his job as a director as just that – a job. He worked slow. He rarely read scripts before showing up for the day. He had to be reminded that he should precede the cast to the set each day.

So John Huston he was not.

What he was was a “house director” for many Warner Brothers films when Bogart was beginning his career. They had a script. They had a cast. Call the next name on the director’s list and he’d show up. Starting in comedy shorts, then moving on to Tom Mix Westerns, Seiler would eventually direct the much-acclaimed war film, The Guadalcanal Diaries for Fox.

All that being said, I think there are a lot of underrated gems in his filmography, especially a few in his Bogart collaborations. Seiler was known as the man who could get a gritty gangster film done efficiently, but as I’ll point out in just a bit, his experience in comedies led to one of my favorite Bogart guilty pleasures.

So, without further ado, let’s welcome Lewis Seiler into The Usual Suspects!

The Filmography

Crime School – 1938

A remake of 1933’s The Mayor of Hell, Bogart is now in the role of the prison reformer that James Cagney played in the original. Crime School is also incredibly similar to another film by stars Bogart, Billy Halop, Gale Page, and Director Seiler that would come out a year later – You Can’t Get Away With Murder, as once again Halop would play a good kid who’s made some bad choices and just needs the right mentoring. Page would even go on to play the exact same character of an exasperated older sister in the later film.

So as you’ve probably already guessed, there’s nothing new or groundbreaking going on in Crime School. That’s not to say that it’s terrible – it’s not. The performances are all decent, the direction is straight forward, and the plot is the “kid friendly” version of what we saw between Bogart and Pat O’Brien in San Quentin. All that being said, it’s probably not a must-see unless you’re a big Bogart fan, or you really like the “Dead End Kids”

Tepid Bogart at best, but not the worst in his filmography. You can check out my original post on the film here.

King of the Underworld – 1939

The key word to this film is potential. There’s a lot of potential to be had here, but unfortunately, King of the Underworld falls short of living up to it. It seems as if Director Seiler can’t decide whether he’s making a crime drama, a gangster comedy, or a love story. King of the Underworld feels like a mashup between the taut dramatics of Bogart’s gangster-on-the-run film, The Petrified Forest, and the goofy shenanigans of Seiler’s own gangster-in-hiding film, It All Came True.

Despite all of my issues with the tone and script of this film, it’s not unwatchable. The acting is well done, Seiler knows how to frame a shot and keep a story moving, and the plot has a few interesting turns.

I think that the fault for any shortcomings might lie both with Director Seiler’s inability to pick a mood, and the fact that the screenplay was written in part by another multi-time Bogart collaborator, Vincent Sherman. Sherman, as many regular Bogie Film Blog readers know, directed two of Bogart’s more offbeat films – The Return of Doctor X and All Through the Night – both films that I contend were meant as spoofs of the horror and gangster genres respectively.

So was King of the Underworld meant more as a parody? I don’t think so. So much real angst was built into the story between Bogart and his Kay Francis that I think the comedic moments were just a bit too overplayed. There’s just enough humor thrown in that it undercuts Bogart’s threat as an antagonist. My guess is that Sherman and Seiler were both still in the infancy of their experimentation with turning the gangster genre on its head, and they put in a little too much silliness to make any of the gravitas truly effective.

Regardless, this one might be a fun double feature with Seiler’s own It All Came True, or Vincent Sherman’s underrated gem, All Through the Night.

You can read my original post on the film here.

You Can’t Get Away with Murder – 1939

Problems with this one aside (see the aforementioned Crime School), there are numerous good scenes of comedy, action, and drama which all help elevate the film above a sub par script. The second joint effort between Bogart, Seiler, and Billy Halop, Warner Bros certainly seemed to be trying to mold “Dead End Kid” Halop into a new leading man.

The melodrama can skew a little heavy as Halop wrestles with his secrets while in prison.  There are multiple crying-into-the-elbow moments, and a few “You ain’t the bossa me!” teenage rebellion outbursts. While Halop occasionally appears a little green, and his sibling tension with Gale Page often seems unmotivated, there are some flashes of good work in his performance.

The biggest problem, I felt, was that Director Seiler was a scene or two short in setting up the seemingly unbreakable bond between stars Humphrey Bogart and Billy Halop. Money and power lured them together, but after ending up in the jail, what kept Halop loyal?

Again, not the worst film in Bogart’s filmography, but you could do better. You can read my original post on the film here.

It All Came True – 1940

Now we come to my favorite film between Bogart and Seiler! This is exactly the kind of movie that I was looking for when I started this blog – a thoroughly entertaining Bogart film that I’d never seen or read anything about.

On top of that, I had one of those Ah-ha! moments with an actor.  My whole life I’ve heard people rant and rave about Ann Sheridan, but for some reason she’s never clicked with me. I always figured that I’d just never seen the right movie, and now I have. What a spitfire. From her first machine gun conversation with the B&B folks, to her final song, she was amazing.

While It All Came True isn’t rated well on IMDB or Rotten Tomatoes, it’s got a great cast, capable directing, and wonderful timing. There were lots of moments that reminded me of the all-time great screwball comedies like Arsenic and Old Lace and Bringing up Baby – movies that were able to balance wonderful gags with just enough pathos to keep me hooked on the characters. Seiler’s early comedy chops get to shine here at their brightest.

So what am I missing with all the bad reviews?!?  Feel free to tell me why I’m wrong!

You can read my original post on the film here.

The Big Shot – 1942

The fifth, and last film from Director Seiler and Bogart’s collaborations, this one showed such a devotion to detail for the Film Noir genre (in most parts) that it’s hard to imagine this is the same director who helmed the four previous Bogart collaborations.

Other than a brief chair tipping scene, gone is almost any element of silly gangster antics à la King of the Underworld and It All Came True. And other than a few minutes in a cabin hideaway between Bogart and Irene Manning, gone are any of the melodramatic trappings of teenage rebellion or love-angst as we saw in Crime School and You Can’t Get Away with Murder.

With its dark atmosphere, low camera angles, nightmarish voice montages, anti-hero protagonists, ultra-violent shootouts, and car chases, this film is almost a straight-up Film Noir thriller. The only time Seiler seemingly errs away from Noir is the aforementioned scene where Bogart goes on the lam to a mountain hideout with his dame. Then, for a few minutes, we get some lighthearted romantic comedy, but only just the smallest of doses. Does it detract from the overall film? Maybe a bit, but I could also see someone arguing that the moment of levity helps round out Bogart and Manning’s characters while giving us a chance to catch our breath before the big finale.

So why is The Big Shot not more widely known? I’m not sure. It’s not a perfect picture by any means, but it certainly seems like a more important film for Bogart’s Noir filmography than it’s given credit for. There is a character that appears in blackface for a short section of the second act, but he’s already been established as a not-so-nice guy, and Classic Film fans can be pretty forgiving when it comes to racial tension from a different era, so I would imagine that’s not the reason – although it probably doesn’t help.

Regardless, if you get a chance to catch this one on TCM, take it. Guaranteed to stir up some good conversation on what it means to be an “innocent” criminal, Seiler is able to explore some deeper territory here than what I’m used to seeing in his previous films. While it might have a few stumbling blocks that keep it from being a true classic, it’s more than watchable, and it’s a fun Noir film that’s not afraid to get its hands a little bloody.

You can read my original post on the film here.

*The Usual Suspects is an ongoing section of the blog where I highlight some of Bogart’s more regular collaborators. You can read the rest of the write ups here.*

Ann Sheridan

Birth Name: Clara Lou Sheridan

Birthdate: February 21, 1915

Date of Death: January 21, 1967

Number of Films Ann Sheridan made with Humphrey Bogart: 7

The Actress

The daughter of a Texas auto mechanic, Ann Sheridan grew up as a bit of an athlete and Tomboy who would later take a page out of her father’s handbook and develop a passion for restoring cars. On track to become a school teacher until her sister entered her in a “Search for Beauty” contest, Sheridan’s bathing suit picture was enough to win over the judges and earn her a bit part with Paramount Pictures.

Twenty-four films later, Sheridan made her way over to Warner Brothers where she would end up working alongside of Hollywood’s greatest legend, Humphrey Bogart. While Hollywood dubbed her the “Oomph Girl,” Sheridan reportedly hated the nickname, but her pin-up popularity and alluring film roles did nothing to dissuade the general public from picking up on the moniker and keeping it alive.

Full disclosure – I have a heavy, heavy, crush on Ann Sheridan, so any opinion I have on her movies is deeply colored by my adoration. Having made 7 films with Bogart, this post is late in coming to ‘The Usual Suspects’ portion of the blog.

Free tonight? Pop in It All Came True and try – just TRY – not to fall in love with this woman!

The Filmography

Black Legion – 1937

Sheridan appears as Betty Grogan, the girl-next-door girlfriend to Bogart’s best friend in the film, Dick Foran. She’s sweet enough in the role but doesn’t get a lot to work with as she spends most of her time trying to be the good girl who reforms her beer drinking boyfriend into marriage material. You can find my original write up on the film here.

The Great O’Malley – 1937

Sheridan plays school teacher Judy Nolan, the woman that tames, teaches, and eventually falls for Pat O’Brien’s stuffy cop. It’s another underdeveloped role for Sheridan, but she’s just so doggone cute and charismatic that it’s clear she did the most she could with the script. It’s fun to watch her strut her stuff to the chagrin of O’Brien as she gets to play the street-smart gal to a man who expects all women to fall into a cookie-cutter housewife stereotype. You can read my original write up on the film here.

San Quentin – 1937

Sheridan gets a little more to work with here as the lounge singing May, girlfriend to Pat O’Brien’s prison warden. Suffering from a few character inconsistencies, Sheridan begins the film as a sultry nightclub act, only to switch over to the innocent girl-next-door type for the rest of the film. It certainly doesn’t ruin the film, but it might have been more interesting to see her with a bit of a darker character, especially since she’s playing the sister to Bogart’s small-time hood. This was also supposedly the film where Sheridan and Bogart became good friends off screen. You can read my original write up on the film here.

Angels with Dirty Faces – 1938

Sheridan plays Laury Ferguson, and while she does the best she can here, she is severely underused in this film. There are a few moments of promise at the beginning when she starts a relationship with Cagney, but after that, Sheridan is relegated to occasionally popping up to fret over the men of the film and try not to look out of place even though she has little to do. Still, she does look great, and it’s fun to see her onscreen mixing it up with James Cagney and Pat O’Brien. You can read my original write up on the film here.

It All Came True – 1940 Sheridan = perfection here. I know this isn’t a great film by any means, but her portrayal of the dancing and singing Sarah Jane Ryan goes toe-to-toe with Bogart’s dastardly gangster and she steals nearly every scene that she shares with Hollywood’s biggest legend. If any Bogart collaboration captures her spitfire personality, it’s this one. From her first entrance to her final song, she was amazing. You can read my original write up on the film here.

They Drive by Night – 1940

Sheridan plays truck stop waitress Cassie Hartley who falls for George Raft after he’s more than a little persistent. Sheridan does a good job of giving us the impression that she’s a good girl who’s perhaps done some dark things in her past, and she has some really nice scenes with Raft as they share a hotel room for a night before eventually falling in love and making a life together. I can’t get enough of Sheridan, and this is one of her most solid Bogart film appearances. You can read my original write up on the film here.

Thank Your Lucky Stars – 1943

Sheridan plays herself in this star-studded wartime musical, although she doesn’t share any scenes with Bogart. Singing Love isn’t Born It’s Made, Sheridan teaches a group of young ladies who are pining over their singleness how to proactively search for love. Wearing a slinky, silky, white dress, Sheridan’s musical number is definitely one of the highlights of the film, even with the audio turned off! You can read my original write up on the film here.

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre – 1948

It’s another Bogie Film Blog cameo that never was! While Sheridan is listed on IMDB with a cameo in the film as a pretty woman walking by a storefront, the woman in question is clearly not Sheridan. A few online sites say that there are test photos of Sheridan in the costume, so perhaps John Huston initially had her in the film and then decided the cameo was too distracting? Again, if anyone has any info on how this rumor got started, let me know. You can read my original write up on the film here.

* ‘The Usual Suspects’ is a regular feature on the blog where we highlight one of Bogart’s regular collaborators. Check out other posts here. *

Zasu Pitts

Birth Name: Eliza Susan Pitts

Birthdate: January 3, 1894

Number of films Zasu Pitts made with Humphrey Bogart: 2

The Lowdown:

Named after her father’s two sisters, Eliza Susan Pitts would later legally adopt the stage name “Zasu” (pronounced SAY-ZOO by the actress). Cutting her teeth in the theater, Pitts would go on to become a prominent silent film actress before transitioning to the talkies, Broadway, and then finally finishing out her career with a series of supporting roles on television.

Only sharing two small roles with Bogart, and mostly used for comic relief, I was struck by how compelling Pitts could be onscreen. Dour-faced and grumpy, she could still steal every scene she walked through with just the right flustered expression or an angry “Hmm!” Having never seen Pitts before I watched It All Came True, she was one of the first actresses that I’ve come across for this blog that I instantly wanted to explore further.

While I’ve only begun to chip away at the legacy of work that Pitts has left behind, here’s a short summary of her work with Bogie.

The Filmography:

The Bad Sister – 1931

Pitts plays Minnie, the maidservant to the Madison family. I thought Pitts had the standout performance of the film with her impeccable timing and ability to get laughs with little more than a frustrated “Hmm!” every time one of the main characters did something to complicate her life. I think one of the hardest roles to pull off is the likable grouch, but Pitts proved she was more than up for the challenge. Apparently, after her career in the silent films, Pitts was often relegated to smaller roles like this one in the talkies and used mostly for comic relief. While she may not have been given the full opportunity to shine here, she definitely helps save this dramedy from melodramatic overindulgence.

My original write-up on the film can be found here . . .

It All Came True – 1940

Ann Sheridan with Pitts . . .

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Pitts plays Miss Flint, the addle-minded boarding house tenant who shares a bathroom with Bogart’s gangster on the run, Chips Maguire. It’s another scene stealing performance for Pitts as she spends most of the movie snooping on Bogart’s toilet habits and fretting over imaginary stalkers. Of all the films that I’ve watched for the blog so far, It All Came True has been one of the real hidden gems that I believe deserves a lot more notice. Pitts plays a wonderful basket case, and while I felt that she was a little underused (couldn’t we have had a little less of the other boarders and more Zasu?), she has a number of good scenes with Ann Sheridan and the other goofball characters that are sharing a house together.

My original write-up on the film can be found here . . .

In Closing . . .

A quick perusal of Twitter and Google shows me that there are quite a few Zasu fans out there keeping her memory alive with a lot of love and affection. While she may not have been a major player in Bogart’s life, her work elevated the quality of two of his smaller films. This’ll will hopefully be one of those posts that I’ll be able to add to over time as I continue to explore her filmography!

Zasu Pitts’ IMDB page can be found here . . .

Zasu Pitts’ Wiki page can be found here . . .

The Usual Suspects is an ongoing series of posts about some of Bogart’s more regular collaborators. You can check out other entries in the series here.

It All Came True – 1940

My Review

—A Great Comedy— 

Bogie Film Fix:

 out of 5 Bogies! 

Director:  Lewis Seiler 

The Lowdown

A gangster on the run (Humphrey Bogart) hides out in a boarding house run by the mother of his nightclub’s piano player (Jeffrey Lynn). 

What I Thought

This is exactly the kind of movie that I was looking for when I started this journey – a thoroughly entertaining Bogart film that I’d never seen or read anything about.  

On top of that, I had one of those Ah-ha! moments with an actor.  My whole life I’ve heard people rant and rave about Ann Sheridan, but for some reason she’s never clicked with me.  I always figured that I’d just never seen the right movie, and now I have.  What a spitfire.  From her first entrance to her final song, she was amazing.  It makes me want to round up all of her movies that I haven’t seen yet and have a marathon. 

I worry that this may be one of those entries that I get a few negative responses over – perhaps even the one the gets my film blogging license revoked.  It All Came True isn’t rated spectacularly on IMDB or Rotten Tomatoes, but I feel like I’ve found a new movie for my top twenty.  Great cast.  Great direction.  Great timing.  I can’t say enough. 

There were lots of moments that reminded of the all-time great screwball comedies like Arsenic and Old Lace and Bringing up Baby – movies that were able to balance wonderful gags with just enough pathos to keep me hooked on the characters.  What am I missing here?  Why is this movie not on more great comedy lists?!?  Feel free to write me the riot act in the comments below and tell me how wrong I am, but I loved this one. 

The Bogart Factor

Was this the first time that Bogart truly spoofed his iconic gangster image?  I know he’d done some comedies before It All Came True, but Chips Maguire has got to be his first time playing a mobster with such an affable, slapstick edge.  Watching him stumble around his bedroom, gasping and gaping at all the stuffed birds and monkeys, is almost enough to make you forget that he’s blackmailing poor old Tommy (Jeffrey Lynn). 

Add in his relationship with the motherly boarding house proprietors, Una O’ Connor and Jessie Busley, and Chips Maguire becomes downright lovable as he begrudgingly accepts their tender loving care while he “recuperates” in bed.  

Bogart was very, very good at comedy, and I think this film is a perfect showcase for it.  Surrounded by a wonderful cast, you get a great taste of Bogart’s dry wit as he enthusiastically dances, sings, and mugs his way through this film.  (That’s right, you get to see him do a little jig, sing a chorus of “Strolling Through the Park One Day,” and take target practice at a stuffed monkey.)

Not even a year later, we get to see him play a very similar character, “Gloves” Donahue, in the comedy gangster thriller All Through the Night, but I’m pretty sure this movie was his first step towards turning some of his more notable personas on their ear. 

After making my way through two of Bogie’s recent bios, I’m a little shocked that this movie didn’t come up.  It seems like he’s really enjoying himself in the role.

The Cast

Ann Sheridan = perfection here.  Her portrayal of Sarah Jane Ryan goes toe to toe with Bogart’s dastardly gangster, and she does her best to steal every scene.  I’ve already added her to the list of actor filmographies that need to be explored much more deeply. 

Jeffry Lynn is great as Tommy, the nightclub piano man who comes home to his mother and old sweetheart.  He reminds me a little bit of a young Hoagy Carmichael from To Have and Have Not, and for once, I’m not unhappy that Bogart didn’t end up with the girl.  Lynn does very well in the role. 

Una O’Connor and Jessie Busley, as the curmudgeonly Mrs. Ryan and the flighty Mrs. Taylor respectively, play off each other, and their boarding house guests, with just the right amount of silliness without derailing the show. 

Felix Bressart as the failed magician, The Great Baldini, also has a number of scene stealing moments as he repeatedly tries to save his act from his “stooge” of a poodle who is constantly trying to trump his best tricks. 

And Zasu Pitts as the basket case boarder, Miss Flint, garners her fair share of laughs as she spends the movie crying wolf over all the men who supposedly stalk her, until she finally has her nightmares fulfilled in Chips Maguire. 

Classic Bogie Moment

There are quite a few great Bogart moments in this film.  

It’s hard not to see Duke Mantee when Bogart’s lying in bed, pulling the trigger on an unloaded gun as he aims towards a particularly freakish stuffed monkey that haunts him from the wall. 

We also get treated to some classic gangster dialogue as Bogart says lines like, “Don’t worry ‘bout me, baby!  I got myself covered both ways from the middle!”  and, “To think I might get in trouble for pluggin’ a rat like that!” 

But my favorite moment, by far, comes when nutty Miss Flint begins drinking to calm her nerves.  Sarah Jane, afraid that Miss Flint will squeal to the cops, tells her that gangsters like to strangle squealers, seal them in a cemented barrel, and throw them in the river.  Playing off Flint’s fears, Bogart stands just behind her as she’s guzzling champagne, saying offside to an imaginary cohort, “Ya got the barrel and the cement ready? Get plenty of wire!”  It’s enough to send the poor woman over the edge and out the door into the hands of the police where we get another hilarious drunken scene. 

The Bottom Line

This film is too good to be ignored.  I’m going to have to watch it again in a couple of months to see if I’m off my rocker.  I thought it was one of the best Bogart comedies I’ve ever seen.