Recorded at the Historic Camelot Theater, Palm Springs, CA on March 19, 2023
TRANSCRIPT
(LAUREN WOLFER:) “Nick Charles” became known as the Thin Man.
How did that come to be?
There are five sequels, to “The Thin Man”, but no “Clyde Wynant”.
(ALIECE PICKETT:) It is confusing.
The novel’s author, Dashiell Hammett, put a major clue into the title of the novel, “The Thin Man”.
It refers to the missing inventor “Wynant”, not the detective “Nick Charles.” The inventor ends up murdered.
MGM, wanted to capitalize on the great success of the film.
When they came up with a sequel, they wanted to re-use the title of the original film in the sequel, even though that character had been killed in the original film.
So, audiences concluded the “Thin Man” must be “Nick Charles”.
But that’s incorrect.
>> LW: The film was a huge breakout.
It was a hit, critically and commercially, and it shook things up.
>> AP: Indeed, because of the way the film portrayed marriage.
Previously, marriage had been portrayed three ways, in comedy or drama, with a henpecked husband and a shrew wife, for laughs or dramatic effect.
It was also used in melodrama.
The couple is dealing with infidelity, medical woes, or financial woes. Or third, marriage was completely omitted.
You would see a couple engaged or wed.
Then, end of film.
To have a married couple where marriage is sexy and fun?
These people like each other.
They like being married.
They like sleeping together.
This was novel.
Audiences were bowled over.
They have this banter, they flirt with each other, they tease each other.
They tease each other about their weaknesses.
“Nora” teases “Nick” about his drinking.
He teases her about her spending, and buying herself presents.
Most important, “Nora” is portrayed as his equal. That was unusual.
She matches him sarcastic-line for line, and drink-for-drink.
>> LW: That is one of my favorite things in the movie.
She says, “How many martinis have you had?”.
The setup makes you think she’s going to nag.
You’re just meeting this couple.
Your expectation is she’s going to say, “How much have you had to drink?”.
Then she orders five more martinis, “just line them up here.” She’s asking so she can catch up.
It’s darling.
>> AP: And unusual.
She’s not passive.
She’s not on the sidelines.
She’s an active participant.
She is a partner in the marriage.
She is getting into the detecting.
She wants to be in the thick of things.
This was novel.
>> LW: The booziness itself, that was novel.
Were there other films that have this much alcohol?
>> AP: It started a trend.
It’s a common element in Screwball Comedy, alcohol, because alcohol leads to uninhibited behavior.
Eccentric, zany behavior is a hallmark of Screwball Comedy.
You’ll see alcohol often in the Screwball Comedy genre.
There is a second reason.
We’ve talked about the five major social, political and economic events in the United States during the 1920s and 30s that led to the advent of Screwball Comedy.
One was Prohibition.
Congress made alcohol-use a moral issue, then decided to legislate morality by making it illegal.
It was a 13-year experiment that failed miserably.
The end result was organized crime got a strong toehold across the country.
This movie is a celebration.
Prohibition started in 1920, through 1933.
The novel was written at that time, and the movie came out in 1934.
This is a celebration of the repeal of Prohibition.
>> LW: Speaking of the novel, let’s talk about Dashiell Hammett.
How much of him is in the novel?
>> AP: He followed the tenet of many successful writers, write what you know.
As you mentioned in your excellent Introduction, Dashiell Hammett had been a Pinkerton detective. He was fascinated by crime and investigation.
He loved being a detective, until he was called out on an assignment in Butte, Montana.
He learned the assignment was Pinkerton detectives were to infiltrate a group of workers trying to organize a union, and then to undermine union efforts.
He knew this was in the midst of the Depression.
Millions of people were out of work.
Wages had been driven low because there was an over-abundance of available labor.
Here, these people, their only hope to get a decent living wage was to organize as a group and negotiate as a large number.
He became disillusioned.
He left the Pinkerton Agency, and left detective work.
He transitioned to writing.
He became a successful writer immediately with “Red Harvest” in 1929.
His next book was “The Maltese Falcon”, which was Immortalized, the Sam Spade character, by Humphrey Bogart in 1941.
Then he wrote “The Glass Key”, which became a classic Film Noir in 1942, with Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake.
Then, “The Thin Man”.
Why was it so different?
It was crime fiction, overlaid with urbane, sophisticated, wonderful couple.
You want to be with them.
You want to be at the party with them.
You would like to live their life.
And to have them having fun…
you never read detective crime fiction with murder and fun simultaneously.
It was a knockout.
>> LW: I never knew that about Dashiell Hammett.
The screenwriters, Francis Goodrich and Albert Hackett.
They added their own special magic to the dialogue.
>> AP: Dashiell Hammett based the character “Nora” on his longtime partner, acclaimed writer Lillian Hellman, to whom he dedicated the novel “The Thin Man”.
Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett took the ball and ran with it.
They were a married couple, and writing partners.
They understood about partnership and a married couple working together.
They were ideal to write “The Thin Man” screenplay. and other Screwball Comedies about man-woman partners, working together.
They upped the playful banter between the couple.
They were experts at innuendo and sexual wordplay able to get past the censorship rules.
One of the key components that led to the advent of Screwball Comedy was extreme censorship imposed on all films.
Especially about any visual or verbal depiction of sexual-anything.
They were clever.
It leads to a sophisticated and clever, nuanced screenplay.
They had a huge career.
Pulitzer Prize winning.
They wrote for Broadway and film.
This is just one example of a masterpiece.
They were nominated for an Academy Award for this film, and for the sequel in 1936, “After The Thin Man”, which screenplay they also wrote, and for which they were nominated for an Academy Award.
>> LW: Let’s talk about the director, W.S. “Woody” Van Dyke.
>> AP: He was maligned during his career. Before directing films, he was a vaudevillian.
So he was intimately familiar with physical comedy, a cornerstone of Screwball Comedy.
In addition, he wrote detective fiction.
He was ideally suited to recognize the cinematic potential of “The Thin Man” when he read the novel.
He proposed it to MGM Studios.
He had worked with William Powell and Myrna Loy on “Manhattan Melodrama” in 1934 and realized that they had a terrific rapport.
With their off-screen banter, he thought they would be perfectly suited to play “Nick and Nora”.
He was called “One Take Woody”, a pejorative moniker, because he did not do multiple cover shots, he didn’t shoot every scene from many different angles, because he felt that filming a scene over-and-over made the performances dry and stale.
Energy drooped.
He became known as “One Take Woody”, as though he were a sloppy filmmaker, a lazy filmmaker.
It was only decades after his death that his work was re-assessed.
Now he’s considered a master because he guided many actors to Academy Award-winning performances.
And his movies, such as today’s perfect example, have stood the test of time.
>> LW: Myrna Loy, both have impeccable comic timing.
I adore Myrna Loy.
They’re both terrific.
William Powell has a connection to Palm Springs.
>> AP: He does, indeed.
Deep roots.
He maintained a residence in Beverly Hills. But he lived in Old Las Palmas in Palm Springs for 48 years with his wife.
He had deep roots in the desert.
Also, he contributed two scenes to this film.
He was more than an actor.
His comic entrance where he is instructing the bartenders on the art of shaking cocktails, with different rhythms for different cocktails.
He came up with that.
He also came up with the scene where he is shooting Christmas tree ornaments off the tree with an air gun.
>> LW: The political comedy of that is terrific.
>> AP: He was goofing around during a break.
Woody Van Dyke saw it and incorporated it in.
It’s one of the delights of the film.
He was more than an actor.
Very creative.
>> LW: People went nuts for them.
They were in so many films.
>> AP: They became one of the great Screwball couples.
They were in many Screwball Comedies, making 14 films together.
The public loved them.
They have such grace and charm.
They’re fun to watch interacting.
They’re beautiful.
>> LW: We can’t forget “Asta”.
For anyone here last week, we had “Bringing Up Baby” (1938).
George” the terrier in “Bringing Up Baby” is played by Skippy.
>>AP: AKA “Asta”.
Skippy had a huge career, 30 films and five major Screwball Comedies, (“The Awful Truth” 1937), and “Thin Man”.
He was as popular as any human actor.
Look at his comic scenes.
He’s popping balloons, he’s hiding from danger, sniffing out corpses, pulling on the leash as they’re on walks.
Total comedy.
He started a national craze for Wire Fox Terriers across the country.
People wanted that dog for the family dog.
>> LW: Thank you Aliece.
It’s always a delight to chat with you.
Anything else we should know about “The Thin Man”?
>> AP: I’m glad to see the big turnout.
It’s a joy to watch these movies on the big screen, help audiences understand the context they were made in, and why Screwball Comedy is special and revolutionary.
We can’t let it be forgotten.🎥
Film Society of Screwball Comedy®
Edited by Aliece Pickett
Copyright 2025