[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hi, I'm Jen.
[00:00:02] Speaker B: I'm Sophia.
[00:00:04] Speaker C: And I'm Maria.
[00:00:05] Speaker A: And you're listening to every rom com, the podcast where we have fun taking romantic comedies seriously.
[00:00:11] Speaker B: This week we're celebrating Christmas with a classic romantic comedy from the 1940s.
[00:00:17] Speaker C: We'll talk about how this movie inspires and is also quite different from the modern Hallmark style Christmas rom com.
[00:00:24] Speaker A: We'll discuss the pressures of living up to lifestyle influencers, from the magazine columnists of the past to the Tik Tok and YouTube stars of today.
[00:00:34] Speaker B: And we'll explore the career of legendary actress Barbara Stanwick as we talk about the 1945 classic Christmas in Connecticut.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: Hi, Sophia.
[00:01:08] Speaker C: Hi, Jen.
[00:01:09] Speaker B: How are you?
[00:01:10] Speaker A: Oh, I'm hanging in there. It's been a bit of a rough fall, so we haven't had quite as many episodes of the podcast as usual. But I'm absolutely delighted to be talking with you again.
[00:01:21] Speaker B: Same, same.
[00:01:22] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I'm really glad to be talking to you again because this is like the podcast is one of my favorite things. And, and I'm also really like super excited to be having our guest on today who is Dr. Maria de Blassi. And I encountered her, I can't even remember exactly where, on social media.
And I collaborated with her to write a little guest blog for her rom com class that she teaches at a university, which is so exciting. And I can't wait to tell you all about her. I'm going to read you her little introduction here first and then we're going to ask her some questions.
So Dr. Maria de Blassi is a native New Mexican mestiza and award winning writer and educator living in the land of enchantment. She writes and teaches about spooky stuff, romance and all things witchy. She is forever looking for magic in her life and somehow always finding more than she thought was there.
Find out more about Maria and conjuring everyday
[email protected] and yeah, I've had the pleasure of working with her before and I've looked over at her blog and read some great articles over there by Maria herself and by other authors and scholars. And yeah, I'm so excited to talk to you. So welcome to our podcast, Maria.
[00:02:39] Speaker C: Thank you so much for having me. I really love your podcast. It is so, you know, just soothing to me to listen to. And then I make my students listen to it as well. I use it as material in my classes just to show them, you know, really great examples of what it means to have fun taking romantic comedy seriously.
[00:03:02] Speaker A: Oh, thank You. I so appreciate that. My cat appreciates it too, apparently, because she just jumped on my lap.
[00:03:07] Speaker B: So I am beaming right now. I'm like, high five every rom com.
[00:03:13] Speaker A: That is really exciting.
[00:03:14] Speaker C: Absolutely.
[00:03:16] Speaker A: So there are so many things I want to ask you about, but first of all, I'd like to ask how that you came. How you came to be teaching a class about romantic comedies.
[00:03:26] Speaker C: Well, it was a bit of a circuitous route, to be honest.
I really love looking at history and classic literature and pairing it with modern pop culture and what we would consider highbrow art versus low brow art. I think there's a lot of really wonderful things we can learn from pop culture and popular texts like romantic comedies. And they tell us a lot about our historical moment, our social moment, what we're thinking of. Right.
[00:04:00] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:04:00] Speaker C: And so I.
When. When I finally had the opportunity at the UNM Honors College to teach a humanities course like this, I was so excited to be able to pair, like, Shakespeare with silver screen screwball comedies and romance novels. I really love mixing those different things from history and different cultures and different moments in time so that we get a much broader perspective of how we talk about love and romance and gender and sexuality and race and class and all the things that get rolled into something as seemingly simple as a romantic comedy.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: That's so fantastic. Like, I wish I had had an opportunity to take a class like that when I was in my undergrad.
Oh, for sure.
[00:04:51] Speaker C: I. I feel like I'm basically designing courses I wish I could take.
[00:04:57] Speaker A: And how long have you been teaching that particular course or a variation of it?
[00:05:02] Speaker C: Gosh, I think almost a decade now. About.
Yeah, like eight or nine years, I think.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: Is there anything or like, anything that comes to mind that you've sort of learned about the genre that's really delighted you in that time or changed sort of your perspective on. I mean, this is a pretty broad question on romantic comedies or fiction or anything in general.
[00:05:24] Speaker C: That is such a wonderful question.
I think the big thing I've learned is that one person's beloved story is another person's absolute worst nightmare.
And so much of that is dependent on our personal desires. What we're getting out of a story, when we see it, who we see it with, how it shapes us.
So I think that's a lot of fun. And we have fun in my classes just appreciating why someone really loves something or why someone really hates it because it broadens our perspective.
I also think, and all the times I've taught this course, it's really lovely because sometimes we can touch on heavier topics, you know, issues of consent or racism.
But the genre itself is so playful and light hearted that we can unpack these things in a way that feels really generative and empowering and forward thinking versus, you know, other contexts which might be a little more difficult to have conversations like that.
So there's always this playfulness involved.
And I think one, one last thing I'll say. I think these stories are important, possible not to take personally or impossible not to look at them while also thinking about our own romantic lives.
So we have a lot of fun in my classes thinking about healthy romantic takeaways. You know, what did we get out of this? Maybe what are some lessons we've had to unlearn from certain romantic comedies we've seen and what are, like, healthy lessons we've taken from our class discussions and from certain texts about better ways to communicate better, emotional literacy, how to appropriately romance someone, you know, all that fun stuff. And it's fun teaching it at the college level because, you know, there's. There's all this, like, emphasis on seriousness and serious academic study.
But these are important things, too. Emotional literacy, figuring out how to deal with all the ups and downs of your dating life. Like, that stuff matters too. And I think it's really important to be both academically rigorous in the class and also have that personal component that students can take into their. To their lives however they so choose.
[00:07:58] Speaker B: Yeah, I was just listening to Dax Shepard's podcast, Armchair Expert, and he had Reese Witherspoon on, and they're talking about relationships and yada yada, and she's the. And she says basically what you're saying as well, that we learn how to date and how to be in relationships from the rom com, and there needs to be good rom coms out there. And I was like, that's right, Reese. You tell them.
And she makes really smart rom coms is the thing, you know, I mean.
[00:08:31] Speaker C: Evely Blonde ages really darn well for a 2000s movie.
[00:08:37] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I was. When you were talking about it being very personal genre, I was thinking about some of our episodes where we get really personal. And I was also thinking about how much I learned from Baby and Dirty Dancing and just like, how much between her. Between her and Joan Wilder and Romancing the Stone, I think, like, oh, my gosh, that was my template, so.
[00:08:56] Speaker C: Oh, yeah.
And these stories stick with you. You know, you can't.
You know, I talked to my students about watching you've Got Mail and When Harry Met Sally And I know you've got mail.
The enjoyment varies for people because it's got a lot of problems.
But as someone who saw it when it first came out in theaters and all these different ways, it taught me about communication and loving the little moments of daily life and the passage of time. I mean, that really stuck with me. And a lot of my personality is based on those two movies.
You know, you've. When Harry Met Sally the same thing. I mean, it was the first film that really made me understand, like, how beautiful a contemporary romantic comedy could be.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: Yeah. When Harry Met Sally is one of my favorite movies. And that's one of the reasons we haven't covered it yet, because sometimes I get. I also have a special idea of how I'm going to cover it, so. But it's going to take a lot of labor, so we'll see.
[00:09:56] Speaker C: I'm excited. I'm excited for that.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: We'll get there eventually.
And so. And so you're talking about some of your favorites. Like, I usually ask this question right at the end of our little mini interview, but.
Well, it sounds like you've got mail. When Harry Met Sally, Moonstruck Girl, ones you mentioned that were influential.
Are those your favorite rom coms? Do you have any other favorites you'd like to shout out?
[00:10:15] Speaker C: Well, I'll try and avoid any ones that we're going to talk about later.
So. One of the things I cover in class is the importance of stories that have happy endings for people with historically marginalized identities. For example, as a woman of color, it's really hard to see narratives where we're just, like, living our best lives.
Usually it's a lot of, like, trauma porn and, you know, really heavy stuff.
[00:10:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:42] Speaker C: So I really one. One movie I promote in my classes and we watch it's. It's a little known indie film. It's with John Leguizamo and Isabel Pena, and it's called Sueno.
It's this beautiful movie that blends magical realism and finding your way and finding love and finding hope and joy. And it centers like a whole Latina cast.
And to me, that's when I always go back to. Because when it came out in 2007 or 2006, it was so shocking. Like, I'd never seen a narrative like that that was just completely about brown joy.
[00:11:21] Speaker A: Right.
[00:11:23] Speaker C: I was like, oh, my gosh, this is just, like, done something to my heart and my whole, like, being.
And so I always recommend that one because it's a small film, it's not perfect, but it's just so beautiful and how it's expressing the sense of, like, overwhelming joy. And this might sound funny, but I don't think brown men are depicted very well in media.
You know, there's always like, they're like the. The drug lord or the gangster or, you know, the machi macho dude. And John Languizamo as Antonio is just like this beautiful, wonderful brown man. And I'm like, I just. I love seeing that because I know a lot of men like that in my personal life, and I love seeing it represented on screen. Like, it's just so joyful.
[00:12:13] Speaker A: Well, I'm glad that you brought forth a movie that a lot of people probably haven't heard of. I believe I read. I think I read about it in one of entries in your blog on your website, and I think I did put it on my letterbox watch list. Either that or I screenshotted it. But yeah, I definitely want to see that based on your description there.
[00:12:31] Speaker C: There's not a lot of info out on it, but so I did write an essay for it for my students to give them some context. And I was like, let me just. It ended up being like a long love letter about why I love this movie.
[00:12:43] Speaker A: Nice.
And. Okay. I feel like we could just interview you for an entire podcast. I swear we won't ask you too many more questions.
But in addition to being a professor, you also have written a number of books. I had a chance to look at your conversations with the tarot, which is really cool. I'm. I am interested in tarot and I'm interested in witchcraft. And I'm just wondering if there's any of your books on the topic of witchcraft or do you call it witchcraft or do you say. I'm trying to say brujeria or.
[00:13:14] Speaker C: Yeah, brujeria.
[00:13:16] Speaker A: It's.
[00:13:16] Speaker C: So my approach to. To it is I think of it more in terms of everyday magic.
So I want anyone who is spiritually inclined to feel like they can have access to a deeper connection to themselves and the world around them without necessarily needing traditional spell work or fancy tools or expensive, you know, resources or whatever.
In the new age world, there can be a lot of performance of spirituality without really, actually connecting to oneself or the world around yourself.
And so. And with that comes an element of gatekeeping. You know, it's like, what, you don't have $3,000 worth of crystals? Are you even spiritually inclined?
Or with tarot? You know, I think people can get really intimidated by tarot because they feel like they. They need to Be able to do complex spreads or know the entire history of each card. And you don't really need any of that. You just need some time to explore. And yes, consult the, the book and just, just spend time with it. And do use the tarot in a way that feels organic and meaningful to you. Cultivate a spiritual practice that feels organic and grounded in your daily life.
That wouldn't even really cost anything, right? It's just you, your breath and your. Your energy.
So that's a lot of the work I do. And again, this goes back to like Brown Woman Joy as someone who's like a product of colonization and I'm mixed race.
A lot of the work we do, like as brujas, is thinking about moving forward from those histories of trauma and, and really cultivating a sense of embodied joy and happiness and groundedness in our here and now. So not looking to the past, but paving a way forward for ourselves, our communities and our families. So that's a little bit about the magical work I do.
[00:15:27] Speaker A: And is there any particular book right now that you'd like to highlight or recommend if people wanted to start somewhere with reading your work?
[00:15:36] Speaker C: Oh, yes. Well, I just re released my first book, Everyday Enchantments, under my own imprint, Kitchen Witch Press, so that would be one I'd highlight. It's a series of little short prose poems about the magic of everyday life. So you could read it cover to cover or just open it up for a little daily inspiration. And the idea is just to help people tune into their lives and appreciate, you know, the ordinary enchantments that are all around us. So I think it's kind of easy to say, you know, I'm gonna go to a different country and everything's gonna be so much better there, or I'm gonna go on vacation. It'll be so magical.
And of course those things are fun, but I think real fulfillment and joy comes from tuning into daily life.
And so that's what that book is about. I do also warn people that I have a gothic set side. So you're going to get my everyday magic side. And then if you poke around a little bit, you'll see some of my more gothic stories.
One of these days I. I've got a romantic comedy in me.
[00:16:42] Speaker A: Oh.
[00:16:43] Speaker C: A sort of magical, real realism New Mexico romcom. So maybe I'll get that out one of these days.
[00:16:48] Speaker A: Oh, yes, please do, please do. Yeah, okay. Like I said, I could just like endlessly talk to you about this, but like, we do have to start talking about the Actual movie. Oh. And I was gonna. I was gonna ment.
The reason I finally like it hit me like, duh, to invite you on the show is that recently you hosted a double feature screening of Christmas in Connecticut with the Shop around the Corner.
I think that was at a local theater. It was.
[00:17:15] Speaker C: Yes, it was awesome. So it's a local theater in my neighborhood that I go to. It's one of the oldest theaters in Albuquerque. And I was just talking to the owner a lot because I go to the movies. And he had a special screening a while back of It Happened One Night. And so we started talking about romantic comedies and I told him about my class and he was like, you know, we should really do something. And we finally got around to it. So it's really fun to do sort of a holiday event, Shop around the Corner, Christmas in Connecticut. I gave a little introductory lecture, you know, just something for people to think about. And it was a lot of fun because I had students and community members and friends there. And a lot of them commented on how interesting it was again, to. To get some highlights about how to deconstruct or understand this movie or these movies in their historical moment in ways they wouldn't have thought of if they just sat down and watched it. So it was. It was a blast. And of course, it was like, so festive. It was holiday magic. I mean, it was. Yeah, it was just a good time all around. And I got to. I watch these movies like two or three times anyway during the holidays because they are my favorite holiday movies.
[00:18:28] Speaker B: Nice.
[00:18:29] Speaker C: And selfishly, I always wanted to see them on the big screen.
So the owner of the Guild, where The Guild Theater where we did it, he was kind enough to make that happen for me. So it was a magical event.
[00:18:43] Speaker A: That's wonderful. I hope you get to have many more like that.
[00:18:46] Speaker B: That sounds absolutely.
[00:18:49] Speaker A: So, Maria, just let. Can you also let our audience know really quick where they can find your work?
[00:18:54] Speaker C: Yes, you can find me on my website, mariadoublassi.com or on Instagram. And Facebook is where I'm at primarily now.
[00:19:02] Speaker A: And I'll also include that in the show notes so you can check her out. And please do, please do check her workout.
[00:19:09] Speaker C: Thank you so much.
[00:19:11] Speaker B: So, before we continue, a few notes first. As usual, the beginning of the episode will have a spoiler free section, but listen out for our spoiler warning when it comes. If you haven't watched the movie yet.
[00:19:23] Speaker A: We'D also like to remind you that you can follow the podcast on social media. Our Facebook page is everyromcom podcast and blog. Our Instagram is veryromcom. Our Twitter handle is Very Romcom Pod. And you can also find us on bluesky vryromcom.
[00:19:40] Speaker B: And as always, you can find the
[email protected] send us
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[00:19:57] Speaker A: And you can also now listen to our episodes on our YouTube channelryromcompodcast. Please visit us on YouTube today and hit the subscribe button.
[00:20:07] Speaker B: And finally, if you'd like to help support the show financially, please visit our buy me a coffee
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[00:20:23] Speaker A: And now we're going to listen to a couple short trailers for Christmas in Connecticut. I found the original trailer and it's one of those kind of like old Hollywood trailers that like, has the actors kind of be themselves and then it has a lot of visuals and not a lot of audio. So I'm going to play a little bit of that one.
And then the other one is a modern trailer, which was. Is wholly uninspiring. So.
But between the two of them, we'll have to make do. So here we go.
[00:21:01] Speaker D: Who said there isn't any Santa Claus?
Look what I found in the my stocking.
[00:21:07] Speaker E: Heaven help a sailor on a Christmas like this.
This is the jolliest, merriest Christmas I ever spent.
It is so, so romantic. It gives me pimples all over the course.
I'm as free as a bird.
[00:21:29] Speaker D: That's what you think.
[00:21:39] Speaker A: Okay, that was. That was a little bit of our classic one. You got to hear the Wishing that I May Wishing that I Might song. And now, now we're gonna play our modern trailer, Christmas in Connecticut.
[00:21:50] Speaker E: You're going to invite me to join your Christmas party.
[00:21:52] Speaker D: He thinks I have a farm, a husband and a baby in Connecticut.
[00:21:55] Speaker E: If he ever finds out we've been making all this up, he'll find hire.
[00:21:57] Speaker A: The both of us. Where nothing is what it seems.
[00:21:59] Speaker D: The baby, the one I've written about, they'll expect to see him. We forgot about the baby.
[00:22:03] Speaker B: And no one is who they say.
[00:22:05] Speaker E: You don't act as if you were married.
[00:22:07] Speaker D: I don't feel as if I was married.
[00:22:09] Speaker E: Would you mind if I came down and watch you cook breakfast in the.
[00:22:12] Speaker A: Morning own Christmas in Connecticut?
Yep, that's what they had.
Wow.
You should also, if you want, you should check out the classic version of the trailer because it really highlights.
Well, it's a spoiler. Just. Just. If you've seen the movie, click out the. Check out the classic trailer and see what they choose to highlight about that movie.
Do you already. Do you already know, Maria? You sound like you already know a little bit. Yes, I'm trying not to be spoilery.
All right, so let's get into talking about Christmas in Connecticut. So Christmas in Connecticut was released on August 11, 1945. It was directed by Peter Godfrey. It was written by Lionel Hauser and Adele Comandini, based on a story by Eileen Hamilton, and it stars Barbara Stanwyck as Elizabeth Lane, Dennis Morgan as Jefferson Jones, Sz Sacal as Felix, Sydney Greenstreet as Alexander Yeardley, the publisher Reginald Gardner as John Sloan, one of Elizabeth's suitors, and Una o', Connor, the wonderful character actress, as Nora, who is John Sloan, Reginald Gardner's maid.
[00:23:34] Speaker B: So the basic premise of the film is about Elizabeth Lane. She is a writer for Smart Housekeeping magazine, and her writing has given her a national reputation as a wife, mother, and America's best cook who lives in Connecticut in a farmhouse.
In reality, Elizabeth is a single New York City apartment dweller whose latest victory is buying herself a mink coat. Jefferson Jones, a heroic sailor, is nominated by his adoring nurse to spend Christmas with Elizabeth and her family in the hopes that by experiencing the best of domestic life, he'll be ready to get married and settle down.
Elizabeth's publisher, unaware that her Connecticut life is all fiction, insists that she host Jones and also invites himself along to Christmas dinner. Elizabeth must now find a Connecticut farm, a husband, a baby, and someone who can actually cook. In order to keep her job, Elizabeth manages to pull together a fake Connecticut life. But more complications ensue when Elizabeth and Jefferson Jones experience love at first sight.
[00:24:44] Speaker A: Yeah, I think it's love at first sight. Do you guys agree with me?
[00:24:47] Speaker C: Yes. Oh, absolutely.
One of my favorite parts of this movie is just the incredible chemistry between Barbara Stanwyck and Dennis Morgan.
[00:24:58] Speaker A: Yeah. Honestly, Stanwyck, I feel like Stanwyck always has chemistry with whoever she's with, but.
Well, with a few exceptions. But this is one of the better examples for sure.
All right, so I was looking all over to try to find interesting facts about this movie. There's not as much information about Christmas in Connecticut as there are as about some other, you know, Christmas classics or even romantic comedy classics of the era, for whatever reason. But I was able to pull together a few things.
So in terms of The World War II aspects of the film. This is really interesting to me. I really like watching movies that were made during World War II. They often have a very interesting flavor to them. It began production in mid-1944, and World War II was still underway at that time, and victory was uncertain.
And so the context in which this film was being made, we didn't even know if we were going to win. So that those movies, especially ones that are a little more about the war, that always interest me so much. And then the film was given a wide release on August 11, 1945.
Now this puts us after Victory in Europe, but a few days before the official Japanese surrender. And this was also. It came out a few days after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I mean, that is a. That is a contrast. I mean, I mean, yeah, like, I'm sure we look at it mostly in horror today, but I'm sure at the time people were also feeling a great deal of relief because, you know, they were hoping their relatives would be coming home from the war.
So such a. Such a. Such a time to come out, though.
Wow. Yeah. Interestingly, this movie was also not released anywhere around Christmas. It always is somewhat bewildering to me when this happens, though. Many of the shots in Christmas in Connecticut look like location shots. The whole film was actually shot on the sound stages and the backlot at Warner Brothers. And there's a sort of a common fact out there. It's on IMDb's trivia page. And I also found it on a. In a book in Christmas movies that said that the house sets were the same for Christmas in Connecticut and Bringing Up Baby. But I could not find an original source that confirmed this. And then I saw a blog entry which featured comparative screenshots from the two films. And it seems to kind of disprove this.
Like things like the fireplace, the bar, the staircase don't match.
So it looks like that one might not actually be true. This comes up a lot with IMDb trivia, for whatever reason that is interesting.
So more about Barbara Stanwyck. She had performed in light romantic roles before Christmas in Connecticut and even appeared in a previous Christmas romance, 1939's Remember the Night. But Christmas in Connecticut was released just one year after perhaps Sandwick's most iconic role, which is also Oscar nominated as the very dangerous femme fatale in Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity.
So she's coming right off of that. And Sydney Greenstreet also had kind of a tougher image. He plays the publisher, Alexander Yeardley. In this film, but he was associated at the time with darker roles, such as his role in 1941's the Maltese Falcon.
I think it's always interesting because, like, these actors at the time, they often had such Personas, right? And so how the audience would see them, you know, like, just like we're affected today, if we see an actor play a kind of role we're not usually seeing them in. Like when Adam Sandler started doing drama, you know, so Jefferson Jones, Stanwick's romantic interest in the film, was played by Dennis Morgan. Now, he's not very well known today, but apparently in the 1940s, he was approaching the peak of his stardom. The book TCM Christmas in the Movies by Jeffrey Arnold cites a 1945 issue of the magazine Screen Land, which said Morgan was receiving more fan mail than any other actor on the Warner Brothers lot. And Morgan was, for a brief time, the highest paid actor at the studio. Like, personally, I don't think I've seen another one of his movies. Like, now. I kind of want to, but I.
[00:29:00] Speaker C: Read somewhere that he was considered, like, what was it like, a gentleman actor, where when they needed, like, a handsome man for a role, they got him.
But he never, like, made it big. He was never this.
Not big in the sense of Cary Grant or, you know, some of the other silver screen stars. And interesting to me because I think Christmas in Connecticut really depends on him being an everyman, like a very handsome everyman. But, you know, if the role were played by someone recognizable like Cary Grant, it may not carry the same sort of nuance.
[00:29:41] Speaker A: See, I think he was recognizable at the time, though, given what they're saying. I think he's just somebody who didn't transcend his era. Like, I think that's interesting. Like, I don't think. Certainly I don't think he was as big as Cary Grant, but.
[00:29:53] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, but.
[00:29:54] Speaker A: But at his own studio, like, they're saying, yeah, this guy was especially during the war years, and other actors were kind of like, gone fighting or working in some capacity for the government at that time, too. So some of those. Some of those actors profited from being the only ones left.
[00:30:11] Speaker C: I wonder if the end of the war.
That'd be interesting to look at, if the end of the war changed his.
[00:30:17] Speaker A: Yeah, Hollywood. You know, I didn't look deeply enough into Morgan, but, yeah, I kind of want to see some of his other work now. I know that he also. His ability to sing was also attractive for casting him in the role.
[00:30:29] Speaker C: Definitely.
[00:30:30] Speaker A: So the TCM book I referenced just now also described a special premiere Christmas in Connecticut had in Norwalk, Connecticut. It included a summertime Christmas parade, which attracted 20,000 spectators, and a Christmas party for soldiers on leave who had been overseas during the previous Christmas.
[00:30:49] Speaker C: So.
[00:30:50] Speaker B: Which is seems outlandish, but having just found out that, like, the war was mostly over, like, I can see where they were. Like, it's Christmas, we're doing it. And.
Yeah.
[00:31:03] Speaker A: So once it was in wide release, Christmas in Connecticut was successful at the box office. It had a budget of $864,000 and it earned over $3 million domestically.
But the movie really ascended to its true popularity in the era of television.
Stanwyck told American Movie Classics, it was a very relaxed project and I enjoyed participating in it, but never in my wildest dreams did I think it would be resurrected every holiday season.
Obviously, from the letters I've received, the public enjoyed it then and still does. That pleases me.
And in addition to its own legacy as a classic Christmas movie, Christmas in Connecticut has inspired several adaptations.
It was turned into a half hour radio play in 1952.
In 1956, it was a one hour television version. And then, of course, in 1992, Arnold Schwarzenegger directed a TV movie remake, which at least I will talk about briefly later in the episode. I don't know if either of you have seen that one.
[00:32:00] Speaker C: No, I saw the preview and I was like, I just can't. I just can't.
Thanks for doing the brave thing.
[00:32:09] Speaker A: Yeah. You know, and then More recently in 2022, there was a musical version produced at the Goodspeed Opera House in Connecticut. And that would be cool to see, I think. Yeah.
[00:32:20] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:32:20] Speaker A: I mean, honestly, I'm sure shocked that there have hasn't been a actual, like, remake. Remake of this in recent memory. Like, like. We'll also talk about one that you noticed, Maria.
Joy to the world. But it's different enough that it's not really a remake of Christmas in Connecticut. Like, this feels, this story feels so relevant today. So I guess now we'll talk about our general opinion of the movie. So, Maria, why don't you go first, actually?
[00:32:49] Speaker C: Well, what I love about this movie and the reason why it's one of my favorite holiday movies is that it is a romance or a romantic comedy that happens to take place around Christmas, which means it's festive vibes, it's snow, it's tinsel, it's smooching, it's, you know, all the fun stuff. And it bypasses some of the holiday movie issues that that Sort of bother me, which is like, you know, normalizing toxic family stuff. Or when you have more religious overtones. Because, you know, I have a ton of religious triggers, so those don't work for me.
But this one is just. Just pure fun.
[00:33:33] Speaker A: I don't know.
[00:33:33] Speaker C: There's something about the time between Christmas and New Year that's like a liminal space. You know, people are letting down, they're relaxing, so you see different sides of people. And I think this movie taps into that really well. You know, what's going on behind closed doors, of course, in a very fun and playful way.
And again, I know I've said this before, but I just think Dennis Morgan and Barbara Stanwyck have a delightful chemistry. You're just rooting for them. Their chemistry is palpable to everyone around them.
Barbara Stanwyck is dazzling, and it's just a fun caper of a film.
It doesn't miss a beat. And so it also makes me want to eat a bunch of delicious food.
[00:34:16] Speaker A: And just when did you first actually see the movie? Like, was it something you grew up with, or did you see it more recently?
[00:34:23] Speaker C: I think it was maybe 10 or 15 years ago. And I love Shop around the Corner. I saw that when I was a kid, and I think around the time streaming became a thing.
No, it was on Turner Classic Movies, actually. So I grew up watching that channel. And then one year, I saw that they were showing Christmas in Connecticut. I was like, what is this? I've never seen it. Then absolutely fell in love with it. And that was, I would say, about 15 years ago. So it became a staple.
[00:34:53] Speaker A: Nice. And how about you, Sophia?
[00:34:56] Speaker B: I think I, for the first time, was maybe last year when we were doing. Was it last year that we did the Preacher's Wife?
[00:35:03] Speaker A: Oh, it was longer ago. It was longer. Oh, my gosh.
[00:35:06] Speaker B: Then I guess it.
[00:35:08] Speaker A: A couple years ago, maybe.
[00:35:09] Speaker B: Then a couple years ago.
Yeah. So that was the first time.
And I don't know, last year was not the most fun Christmas. And I didn't indulge in many shows, so this was maybe just my second time watching it. But it's fantastic. It's hilarious.
And I don't know if anybody's still on Amazon the way I am sorry, world, but it sounds like you can buy it for 7.99 to, like, download, which is nice. So I did, because I'm gonna watch it all the time.
[00:35:43] Speaker A: Nice. Nice. Yeah, I'm a physical media girl, so I've got the dvd. But I. I hear you. I hear you.
That's it's one of the ones I decided to own.
[00:35:53] Speaker B: It was 7.99 to buy or like 3.99 to rent. I'm like, well, guess who's buying it. So, yeah.
[00:36:01] Speaker A: And I will also remind our listeners, a lot of libraries have DVDs if you still have a DVD player. So that's another way you can access things that people often don't take advantage of.
[00:36:10] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:36:11] Speaker A: All right. Yeah. So, Sophia, like you, I only recently saw Christmas in Connecticut. I credit Poppy from Confessions of a Closet Romantic for getting me into these older films.
She got me interested in looking at classic romcoms. And when I first saw Christmas in Connecticut, I that's when I fell in love with Barbara Stanwick. I had seen her in Double Indemnity. I knew she was good, but like, it's like I saw her with new eyes after I watched this movie. And then I watched Remember the Night, which I'm going to talk about a little bit later. And like it just grew. And yeah, now I'm trying to watch every movie that Barbara Stanwick's ever done. So I love her. So I love this movie. I think she's great in romantic comedies in general. She's done a ton of great ones.
But the more I watch this movie, the more I'm like SC Zakal, the guy who plays Uncle Felix, my absolute favorite character, love him good. Every, everything that comes out of his mouth I love.
He actually is from Budapest, Hungary. I found out, like his character's from Hungary. He is also from Hungary. So I love that. So he's not even, I don't know if this, the accent might be a bit of a put on because I've heard him talk in other movies and he doesn't sound exactly like that, but I don't think it's a total put on either. So pretty, pretty great guy.
So yeah, I, I, it's a five star for me on letterboxd.
I don't know if it really technically is a five star movie, but it is for me in my heart it's a five star movie.
So yeah, I watch it every year now. I wish I'd seen it when I was like 10 years old. I would have been shipping this couple at that time.
So yeah, but you know, so Barbara.
[00:37:49] Speaker C: Stanwyck is so dazzling in this film. And there's a line in the Holiday, which I know we're going to talk about later where, you know, the Kate wins like character is recommended. Someone recommends that she watch the Lady Eve because Barbara Stanwyck is dazzling. And that's what got me to watch the Lady Eve. And I was like, she is dazzling. And that's what sent me down a rabbit hole of Barbara Stanwyck films and then stumbling on to Christmas in Connecticut on tmc. And I was like, her whole energy in this movie is glamorous. And because I'm a writer and she's a writer, you know, I saw it in my early 20s. I was like, she is, like, life goals. I just love her. I love her style.
You know, the first time we see her, and she's in the white shirt with the trousers and, like, the leopard belt. I was, like, chic and, like, a little dangerous. So. So great.
[00:38:43] Speaker A: Yeah. She always plays strong women, too, and I know that was purposeful on her part. She was one of the only actresses. I'm skipping ahead a little, but she was one of the only actresses that wasn't, like, kind of penned in by the studio system. I don't know how she managed it, but she was able to get it. So she's working at different studios, so she was able to pick her projects much more so. And she was picking these strong women to play, which I love.
[00:39:06] Speaker C: That's awesome.
[00:39:07] Speaker A: Yeah. And I guess we may as well transition into talking about Barbara Stanwyck then.
So. Yeah, we're all Barbara Stanwyck fans here, it sounds like. And now it's time to tell a little bit about her life. So she was born Ruby Stevens in Brooklyn, New York, on July 16, 1907.
Her family was poor, and she became an orphan at only age 4 when her pregnant mom died after falling off a streetcar and experiencing a miscarriage. And then her father abandoned the family. So she had a tough, tough beginning. Yeah, she was raised in a variety of foster homes, and she was also raised part of the time by her showgirl sister, Millie.
And following in Millie's footsteps, she began working by 14 years old, and she became a chorus girl and part of the Ziegfeld follies at 15 years old.
She acted in her first Broadway show, the noose, at age 19, and that is also when she was given her stage name.
Then she met and married the vaudevillian Frank Fay, and they moved to California. They later divorced in 1935.
Now, when she first arrived in Hollywood, Stanwyck was initially unsuccessful. Her first three roles are an uncredited role in Broadway Nights and then roles in two early talkies that did not do well, the Locked Door and Mexicali Rose.
But she had her first successful role in a Frank Capra film Ladies of Leisure in 1930, and Capra was one of her earliest champions in Hollywood. In the preface to Victoria Wilson's biography of Stanwyck, he says she was the greatest emotional actress the screen has yet known.
After Ladies of Leisure, Stanwyck made a number of other successful pre code films, including perhaps the most well regarded of these, 1933's Babyface. That is also one of my favorite Stanwyck movies.
[00:41:00] Speaker B: Oh man, yeah, catch up here. I'm so behind.
[00:41:05] Speaker A: I mean she's made a few bad ones to be honest, but like most of her work is worth seeing that I've seen. So yeah.
Stanwyck worked steadily in the 1930s and in 1937 she received her first Oscar nomination for her role as a loving and self sacrificing mother in the melodrama Stella Dallas.
Other notable films of the post code 30s included Annie Oakley, Interns Can't Take Money and Remember the nights with Fred McMurray.
But the 1940s was kind of her decade. She was nominated for Oscars for the films Ball of Fire, Double Indemnity and Sorry, Wrong Number. And she continued to work with really great directors and co stars in movies like the Lady Eve, which we mentioned just now, and Meet John Doe.
And throughout her career, Stanwyck performed in a wide variety of genres, from romantic comedies to noir movies to ensemble dramas. In the 1950s she continued to work steadily in a variety of genres and she added a lot of westerns and adventure films to her roster such as the Furies, the Moonlighter, Blowing wild, Titanic and 40 guns.
Other notable films from the 50s included Clash by Night, which she appears in with Marilyn Monroe, and the Douglas Sirk melodrama There's Always Tomorrow.
So then in the late 1950s Stanwyck began making appearances on TV as well. And most of her acting work from then on was on television, often in westerns. And Stanwyck performed a lot of her own stunts. She was able to ride a horse very well, so that's something cool about her.
Her last three feature films were all in the 60s in the movies Walk on the Wild side, Roustabout and the Night Walker. She did appear in TV movies in the 60s and 70s, but her most significant work in those years were in the Western TV series the Big Valley, which ran from 1965 to 1969, and the Colbys, a Dynasty spinoff which ran from 1985 to 1987.
Her role as Constance Colby on that show was her last.
And notably she was also in the miniseries The Thornbirds. In 1983.
She never won an Oscar in her life, but she received an honorary Oscar in 1982.
So obviously, even though she didn't get that competitive Oscar, she had a really strong career. But her personal life was pretty difficult. Her first marriage to Frank Faye became abusive before they divorced in 1935. She had adopted a son with Fay, but she became estranged from him when he was an adult.
And she later married actor Robert Taylor. They were married in 1939, but then they divorced in 1950.
She did, however, have good working relationships with her many of her co stars and crew members on her films. She had a reputation for helping younger actors and making introductions for. For other creative people in Hollywood.
And she died Jan. 20, 1990, of heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
So she had a super long career. One of the things I really admire about her is how she let herself age naturally, but she didn't let aging stop her from working. I mean, we don't always have control about that as women. Granted, especially in Hollywood, women don't always have control. But she was able to keep working right almost up until she died, which is fantastic.
All right, so let's get into the actual movie. In the credit sequence, I just wanted to point out that we get two songs. We get Jingle Bells and there is a One Horse Open Sleigh in this movie. So that's awesome.
And then the song that I believe was written for the movie, I didn't double check that, so it's possible it wasn't. But the song that's in the movie, the Wish that I Wish Tonight, which was written by M.K. jerome with lyrics by Jack Scholl.
We go from this festive Christmas music introduction to unexpectedly beginning the film in a boat that's been torpedoed by Germans in World War II. Like, the first time I saw the movie, I was like, well, that was unexpected.
[00:45:09] Speaker B: Yeah, I forgot all about that. And so when it came up, I'm like. I was. I was a little shocked.
[00:45:14] Speaker C: I think it's interesting too, because when I watch it, that part of the film is so intensely disconnected from the rest of the movie.
[00:45:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:45:24] Speaker C: And I. So I started digging because, I mean, it's such a sharp contrast. And I read in my research that that was intentional by the director because they wanted to acknowledge what World War II and that it was serious and intense and there were real people, you know, being stranded in the ocean with these things, so they didn't want to down pedal that.
[00:45:53] Speaker A: That is not the impression I got though.
[00:45:57] Speaker B: It just Turns too jovial. Even though they've been on, you know, a raft for 18 days and starving.
[00:46:04] Speaker A: Yeah. I'm remembering back to when I read Lucy, Louis Zamperini's book about being stranded on a raft. Like, unbroken. Like, I'm like, that's not what it was like, man. Those guys were, like, killing albatrosses and eating them raw.
[00:46:17] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly.
[00:46:18] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:18] Speaker C: I. I think they were probably like, well, we want to acknowledge it, but this is a romantic comedy, so there's only so far we could push it.
But, yeah, and then, you know, the. The scene where they're in the hospital, it's just like flirting games between sailors and nurses.
But. So they did want to acknowledge the war in some way and then really focus on the fantasy of. Of this new, new America and this new domestic reality, you know, prosperity and what they could have.
But it was interesting because, yeah, the first part is just such a. Like, you were not set up for that at all.
[00:46:57] Speaker A: Yeah, you definitely feel that World War II is a presence in the movie. Like. Like throughout the movie, even. You see people in uniform in the background. You see, like, them selling war bonds at one point. So that's there. But, yeah, like, the sailor on the raft, Jefferson Jones, our main character, he's. We. We see him in a daydream about food where he's imagining all the different foods he wants to eat if he gets off this raft. And then when he gets to the hospital, he ends up flirting with this nurse, Mary Lee, and kind of even being a suitor to her and kind of sort of agreeing to marry her because he wants to get fed something other than a raw egg and milk. He's like, how am I going to get some solid food? These doctors don't want me to eat.
And this is so disgusting.
[00:47:40] Speaker B: Raw egg and milk.
What if I. But they let him smoke. I don't know if he caught that.
[00:47:46] Speaker A: Yeah, I know.
[00:47:47] Speaker C: That's totally fine.
[00:47:48] Speaker B: They're worried about his health and he can't handle solids. But you go ahead and have a cigarette. Have a cigarette. Yeah.
[00:47:56] Speaker C: Well, I love how from the moment, almost the moment we get him back to safety, just how suggestive this film is. It's so sexy.
And I'm surprised it gets away with some of what it gets away with with the production codes. But, you know, he's talking about, you know, how far do I have to go to get Mary to give me a steak? And, you know, his friend is like, you got to go all the way. And there's all this, like, you know, everything is transactional. And it's like, well, for 90, 45, that's a. That's a pretty saucy with, you know, how suggestive all their dialogue is.
[00:48:34] Speaker A: And then as he's about to be released from the hospital, Mary's talking to a different nurse and complaining that she's worried that he's getting skittish about, you know, really getting married to her. And she comes up with this plan that he should spend time in a, quote, real homey home so he'll appreciate domesticity.
And now she's inspired because they've both been reading this Elizabeth Lane cooking and housekeeping column in Smart Housekeeping magazine. So she writes to the magazine's publisher, Alexander Yardley, like, who, coincidentally, she somehow nursed his granddaughter back to health. And like to find out if, like, Jefferson Jones can, like, spend Christmas with this author.
And just. Let's pause for a moment to appreciate how convoluted this plot is, even though it really doesn't matter at all that it's convoluted it.
[00:49:24] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:49:24] Speaker C: I will say, when you explained it earlier, too, I was like, so well done. I. I really struggled to explain the plot when I was doing the movie theater collaboration. I was like, how. How does one even go about explaining this?
[00:49:40] Speaker A: Yeah, it's just like, this is not how any of this works, though. Like, one, like this. What are the chances this random nurse would know this magazine publisher? Okay, two, what are the chances this guy only gets one letter delivered that day, which he then reads immediately, and then immediately makes a decision about three. This is like, what, a few days or a week before Christmas or something, and they're just going to throw this together. I'm like, what is going on here?
[00:50:03] Speaker C: It's movie magic. It's movie magic.
[00:50:05] Speaker B: Perfect. Perfect.
[00:50:07] Speaker C: Magic of Christmas.
[00:50:08] Speaker A: That's the other one.
[00:50:10] Speaker B: And would we say that this is like a very Rom Comic kind of thing to happen? Just kind of convoluted step after step after step. Like, what is. How is this even real?
[00:50:21] Speaker A: Yep, yep.
Anything else anybody wants to say about the introduction to Jefferson? Well, I guess we should mention that he has a pal who is on the raft with him. Sinkowitz or Sinky, who's in the hospital with him? He'll come. He'll come in later. Much later. So, yes.
One thing I'd like to mention about this is a wartime romance is there's another movie I'm going to talk about in the double feature recommendation recommendations called I'll Be seeing you from 1944. It's another Christmas romance. And that movie handled the war with a much like, kind of darker element. Like the main. The male romantic interest in that one actually has ptsd.
So I think it's pretty interesting how these movies that came out, you know, in the years one after another, have such a different touch, different take on.
[00:51:10] Speaker B: The war and just how.
[00:51:13] Speaker A: What a.
[00:51:13] Speaker B: What a thing to acknowledge the PTSD and, you know, say that your boys are coming home, but they kind of had a hard time over there. That's. That's an important thing to. To acknowledge.
[00:51:28] Speaker A: Yeah. Meanwhile, Jefferson's just like, please give me a steak. Like that's his. Yeah, yeah.
[00:51:32] Speaker B: He's like, I don't know. I don't know if I want to get married and maybe I do want to get married. And, like, he's very wishy washy fella.
[00:51:39] Speaker C: Like, he's surprisingly unfazed.
[00:51:43] Speaker B: Yes, yes, that's it. Unfazed.
[00:51:49] Speaker A: All right, so we go from the hospital with Jefferson, Jones and Sinky to introducing Elizabeth Lane and her story.
So first we kind of see Yeardley phoning the editor and telling him that Elizabeth must host Jones.
And when the editor objects, he says he asks of his employees to, quote, print the truth and obey my orders.
We then cut to Barbara, or rather Elizabeth lane. It's about 13 minutes into the movie. She's introduced. She's writing her column at a desk. As she is writing about the cedar logs in her fireplace and the view of the farm out her window, the camera pans over to show a hissing radiator and a view of a skyline from a New York City apartment with a clothesline full of clothes.
[00:52:36] Speaker C: This is one of my absolute favorite scenes in the whole movie. It is just so well done.
Which aspect of the, you know, the idyllic country home paired with the visuals of, like, a hard New York life.
[00:52:56] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. She's talking about the good cedar logs, and there goes the rain.
[00:53:03] Speaker B: Not the bad ones, the good ones.
[00:53:06] Speaker A: And you already mentioned she has a fantastic outfit in this scene with the pants. Oh, my gosh, yes. Gotta have the nice pants.
Speaking of fashion, she is then delivered a mink coat and her friend Felix comes over to bring her food after that. So we find out that not only is this woman not living in a Connecticut and far Connecticut farmhouse, she doesn't even cook her own food. And Felix has been providing her the menus. We get all this with exposition.
I love this line. She has to Felix, all my life, I promised myself a mink coat. You know, Felix, it's very Important to keep promises, especially to yourself.
That's a great line. Even though I don't. I. I'm not. I'm a vegan, so I'm not a mink person. I more agree with Felix when he says, nobody needs a mink coat, but a mink.
[00:53:49] Speaker B: Yeah, I. I like her. You know, make a promise to yourself, keep it. That's nice philosophy, but, yeah, I mean. I mean, my gosh. Which she really can't even afford yet. She's, like, buying it, and it's gonna cost me. What did she say? A bunch of her future paychecks. It's like, oops, that's.
[00:54:08] Speaker A: And that adds another incentive for her to do that. Go through the ruse she has to go through in this movie.
[00:54:14] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:54:14] Speaker C: And she follows up with Felix and she says, it's one of my favorite lines. You have no idea what a mink coat can do for a girl's morale.
And it's, you know, obviously, protect the minks. We don't want to hurt any animals. But this idea of fashion as something that armors her and protects her and allows her to move in the world with style and aesthetic sense of self assurance, I just. I think that's so beautiful.
And it really points to her as like a city person.
[00:54:46] Speaker A: Yeah. And also, there's another. I think there's another added meaning in that. At first, when Felix sees the mink, he assumes it means that she's hooked up with some guy in a serious manner. And then she's like, oh, no, no, no. I got it for myself, basically. Like, I think having that kind of very fancy material possession at the time might have indicated that a man bought it for you. But here's Elizabeth. She is providing for herself and also.
[00:55:11] Speaker B: Setting the stage for her priorities.
[00:55:12] Speaker A: Right.
[00:55:12] Speaker C: She.
[00:55:13] Speaker B: She continues with this ruse to keep the main coat. And, you know, her priority isn't the farm and the cook, the menu or whatever.
[00:55:22] Speaker A: It's.
[00:55:23] Speaker C: It's.
[00:55:24] Speaker B: It's style. It's buying this thing for herself and not waiting on somebody else for it like that.
[00:55:30] Speaker C: Or.
[00:55:31] Speaker B: And she can't even. You know, she's eating sardines, you know, like, sardines from a can.
[00:55:38] Speaker A: Oh, man. When I.
When I work hard, man, like, I will. Like, I will feed myself horribly sometimes. Like, when I was working, I was a professor when I was in Korea, an English teacher. And you should have seen the. The bad diets I was eating when I was, like, grading papers and meeting with students all the time. It was not good.
No.
[00:55:57] Speaker B: When you're working totally I want a Felix to come and bring me food, you know, and you got a deadline and all that for sure.
[00:56:05] Speaker A: Mink outside, sardines inside. That's no good too.
[00:56:10] Speaker C: We all need a Felix, an Uncle Felix in our lives.
[00:56:14] Speaker B: Love, Felix.
[00:56:16] Speaker A: One more thing from Felix I want to say too. Elizabeth then muses to Felix that she ought to learn how to cook. To which Felix says, no, no, no, no. Then you would find out it isn't the way you write now, all easy and fun and don't cook.
[00:56:30] Speaker C: There's like an interesting part too that's kind of easy to read over. But she was like, she says something like, oh, Felix, I owe you. Thank you so much. You know, he gives her the recipes she's going to be writing about next month and he says, oh, you paid that back a long time ago by saving my restaurant.
And I love that so much because it's not just her taking from him, she's giving something to him in return.
Which sometimes in remakes, there's been a few, like holiday romance novels that have tried to remix this.
[00:57:00] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:57:01] Speaker C: And like historical romances and they, they don't ever find a way to get past like the exploitation of labor of the lower classes for this one person to make money off of their skills.
And here we have Elizabeth Lane saying, oh, no, but I'm going to compensate you. Like, I'm a businesswoman woman and this is a business arrangement. Like we are friends and we are close, but I'm not going to leave you hanging. Yeah, I think that's just so, so sharp and so clever.
[00:57:29] Speaker A: It seems like maybe she helped him set up the restaurant initially or something. I don't know. Yeah, it's unclear, but yeah. Yeah.
So now we have more people coming over. The editor comes over and tells Elizabeth about their problem where she's supposed to host all these people here. Non existent farmhouse. And then John Sloan, who is a suitor of Elizabeth's also comes over. Yeah, he's this upper class, sort of twitty British sounding guy who's an architect and nobody else likes her. Like, nobody likes John. Sorry, John, I.
[00:58:02] Speaker B: The editor is great and I'm sad that we lose him in the film and. Yeah, we're stuck with John Sloan.
[00:58:11] Speaker C: Oh, it's so funny. Well, and it's. What's funny to me is he's. He represents like the more traditional, conservative, like, ideas of what a marriage and what gender roles should be.
And for all that Elizabeth Lane does not embody like traditional domesticity or traditional gender roles. Like she can get it? She gets a lot of male attention just by being who she is.
And she's also not, you know, she's really empowered in herself. So there's a funny, ongoing joke early in the movie where John keeps proposing to her and she keeps rejecting him.
And that might not seem like a big deal, but for 1945, that's a pretty big thing for a woman to, like, repeatedly reject a sure thing, so to speak.
It's not. Marriage isn't her priority.
[00:59:03] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, obviously not. Yeah.
So there's also a scene where Elizabeth is sent to Yeardley's house, the publisher's house, where she fails to convince him to call off the visit to the farmhouse. He's a very forceful personality, as she says to the butler.
They go to restaurant Felix then to reconvene her, her editor and John.
Elizabeth and her editor are miserable. But John is all happy because now that Elizabeth won't have a job, he's sure that she will accept his new job as his wife. And it's so sad because, like, you know, right away he's not the right man for her because he is delighting in her failure, basically. Yes.
[00:59:41] Speaker C: Right.
[00:59:41] Speaker A: And he.
[00:59:42] Speaker B: And she's like, I don't love you. She says it. Ah. He's like, well, that'll come later.
And, you know, what does he see in her, you know, if she's, you know, already not this picture of domesticity that he clearly wants in somebody.
[01:00:00] Speaker A: He has someone who cooks and cleans house for him. So, like, I don't know if he needs that so much as he wants kind of like the middle class, upper middle class, house kind of woman, you.
[01:00:09] Speaker C: Know, I do love this scene too, because they're going down, like the buffet and Felix is like swelling on the food, but every time John says something he doesn't like, he's like, nuts. No. Pickled walnuts. Try the pickled walnuts. Yes, Horseradish. And it's like his. His whole coded way of being like, don't listen to this man. We don't like him for you.
[01:00:29] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes.
[01:00:31] Speaker B: Another Felix asides.
[01:00:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:00:34] Speaker B: The whole film. Hilarious.
[01:00:37] Speaker A: And also there's an interesting scene, little brief interaction in this restaurant scene. So there's a bit where Felix asks. He hears the word catastrophe and he asks a black waiter what catastrophe means. And the black waiter character gives him a, like, perfect definition, even saying from the Greek. And so this is an example. This movie had, like, much better racial politics than movies at the time. I mean, on it, like, there's not A lot of representation in this movie, but it does have two black actors with speaking roles, which for the 1940s was sadly more than you got most of the time. And both of them were portrayed with dignity, as intelligent and outgoing people.
[01:01:14] Speaker C: The.
[01:01:15] Speaker A: The actress who plays the person who delivers the mink coat, I could not find a listing for what her name was anywhere. But according to the AV Club, the black waiter was played by Emmett Smith.
And that article also mentioned that director Peter Godfrey had his start in experimental theater in London, and he had once directed Paul Robison in a play about the Haitian revolution. So this is a. Is a director who, like, obviously is more enlightened than many people of that era. So good. Good to see. Yeah.
Yeah. Felix's waiter is all giving him this perfect definition. And then Felix goes around saying, catastrophe the rest of the movie.
[01:01:56] Speaker C: That's still a line I will quote to myself when something like, when a life plot twist happens, I'll just be like, catastrophe.
[01:02:06] Speaker A: That's great.
[01:02:07] Speaker B: And we should say that Elizabeth does accept John's proposal.
[01:02:11] Speaker A: Yep.
[01:02:12] Speaker B: And she does. She's like, well, okay.
[01:02:15] Speaker A: And as.
[01:02:16] Speaker B: As a strategic thing. She's afraid she's losing her job here or about to. And. And then. And then when does she realize. And when does the editor realize that John has a farm in Connecticut?
[01:02:31] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:02:32] Speaker B: Is it in this moment?
[01:02:34] Speaker C: Yeah, it is. And she says it'll be nice to spend the whole holidays at the farm, since I've written so much about it. Like, I'll actually get to experience it. And then the editor has this light bulb moment, and, you know, shenanigans ensue.
[01:02:48] Speaker A: Yeah. The editor basically begs Elizabeth and John to let him to, like, host a sailor so that he won't lose his job.
And I'm pretty sure Elizabeth would like not to lose her job, too, but she mostly does it for the editor. So at the time, I think she is going to marry John as much as she doesn't want to.
And then, of course, they decide Felix is going to come to cook. And now all they need is a baby.
Just a baby. No big deal.
All right, so I want to just talk about some other little topic here before we keep going with the plot. So this movie has a lot in it about food, and I think food is such a part of most people's Christmas celebrations. Really quickly, I'm going to run through Elizabeth Lane's Christmas menu, and I want you guys and also the people in the audience like to decide to think about, is this a meal that you would want? So the Menu starts off with a fresh fruit cup, olives and bouillon.
We move on to roast gooseburnoise with walnut dressing, giblet gravy, cranberry orange relish, buttered green beans, candied sweet potatoes. This is, this part is like bewildering to me. It says tomatoes and celery souffle. I don't know.
Hot rolls, lettuce with Russian dressing, mince pie, pumpkin pie, ice cream, old fashioned plum pudding. And then afterwards, fresh fruit, mixed nuts, mint and coffee.
So what do you think? Would you want to eat Elizabeth's menu?
[01:04:18] Speaker B: It actually does sound really yummy and I don't think I'd eat goose walnut dressing. Sounds interesting. Cranberry orange relish. My mother in law does make a cranberry relish either for Thanksgiving or Christmas. It's like a family recipe that comes out butter green beans, candied. Yeah, yum. I don't know about a celery souffle.
[01:04:40] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't know either. I don't know what's going on there.
[01:04:43] Speaker C: I, I would be tempted to try it just because the way it's described is almost like, you know, there's all this sublimated eroticism in this movie and I think they talk about food and you know, even, even down to like the cocktails and the drinks, that there's all this like desire. So by the end of the film, for sure want to sit at the table with them and just know like, what is it that makes this so delicious?
At the same time, I'm looking at some of this and it's especially the tomato and celery souffle. That's. That sounds very 1945. And if you look at old cookbooks or cooking magazines like I do, some of that stuff just looks painfully dated. It reminds me of like the kind of marshmallow jello things people would make for the, for the holidays.
[01:05:33] Speaker A: Oh, I've eaten a marshmallow jello. I was a child of the 80s.
[01:05:36] Speaker C: It was still around, as was I. We finally retired it a few years ago. But you know, what about what is.
[01:05:43] Speaker B: In the 70s or something when everything had pimento in it and gross. Like ham and pimento and.
Yeah, yucky.
[01:05:52] Speaker A: Yeah, like, I don't know, like I said, I'm vegan. So like I let like, I, I could veganize some of these things, but I probably wouldn't choose to like my Christmas. We have to have twice baked potatoes. They're my grandma's recipe, but I switched to these vegan ingredients. They are fantastic. You gotta have that.
[01:06:08] Speaker C: Sounds good.
[01:06:08] Speaker A: I would try the candied sweet potatoes, but honestly, I don't think it would be my jam.
If I were at Elizabeth's meal, I'd probably be stuck with like the fresh fruit cup and, I don't know, the nuts.
[01:06:20] Speaker C: With Russian dressing.
[01:06:23] Speaker A: I don't know, man.
So how about for you guys? I mentioned my twice baked potatoes. Are there foods that you always have or dream of at Christmas?
[01:06:32] Speaker C: Yeah, well, in New Mexico, you know, it's always pozole, which is like a hominy based stew with lots of red chili.
It's tamales.
It's biscochitos, which is like an anise cinnamon sugar cookie.
Fresh tortillas.
Yeah, those. I mean, the second you smell that in the air, you're like, it's Christmas. And we make it all on Christmas Eve. So it's like perfume.
[01:07:00] Speaker A: Is the house very nice?
[01:07:02] Speaker B: Lovely.
[01:07:04] Speaker A: Sophia's ready to come over?
[01:07:06] Speaker B: I am.
[01:07:08] Speaker C: Party starts at seven.
Thank you.
[01:07:12] Speaker B: What do we do? My. My mother in law does things like she makes a lasagna family recipe.
[01:07:20] Speaker A: Yum.
[01:07:23] Speaker B: What else? Oh, there's a. There's a chance cheese ball that gets made with nuts around it and it's a bunch of different cheeses smashed into a ball. I don't know how she does it.
[01:07:32] Speaker C: She. She does.
[01:07:33] Speaker B: It's great. And then that's with my mother in law, but with my folks, it's usually, I mean, everything has a Greeky taste to it. There's oregano and olive and lemon and some kind of meat. And mom will make like a tomato and. And green bean. Greek side and salads. Greek salad, you know, so there's really no like traditional American thing for, I mean, my mom's family. Yeah.
[01:08:00] Speaker A: What even is a traditional American thing? I mean, we've listed like three different.
[01:08:03] Speaker B: It's not cute. It's not like, it's not the sweet potatoes with the mushroom on top. Like, none of that. And it's not a turkey and it's whatever. It's probably.
Oh, standing rib roast. That's what my mom will make. I tried to do that the first time we hosted in our house, and it was a disaster.
I'd never done it before. I'm like, mom, what do I do? She's like, well, a standing rib roast, of course. I'm like, oh, of course. So it was, it was a bit of a fiasco.
[01:08:29] Speaker A: Oh. My family's other Christmas tradition was always we would get Chinese food on Christmas Eve because, like, yay. We were cooking the next day. And so we didn't want to cook two days in a row. And, you know, we're. It's fun, so. Yeah, it is fun. I like Chinese food.
[01:08:43] Speaker B: That's cool.
[01:08:44] Speaker C: One thing I think this movie does really well, and I think we see this in a lot of, like, influencer sort of lifestyles and made for TV holiday movies, is it really shows you all, like, the fantasy aspect of a perfect domestic holiday scene without the labor.
Everything's done up to the nines. Like, the food's amazing. Even the scenes where it's like we have to cook or whatever, the labor is really minimal.
And so you get to partake in this fantasy of abundance without actually having to do any of the work.
[01:09:18] Speaker A: You know, when I'm thinking about it, though, what food do we actually see? We. We're hearing about the food all the time, but we don't actually. But we don't actually see them sit down to eat, do we? Except for, like, the pancakes. And then there's, like, some liver that the publisher eats at one point.
[01:09:32] Speaker B: The cold turkey. The guy. It's the publisher.
[01:09:34] Speaker A: Okay. The leftovers. We do see them with the leftovers.
[01:09:37] Speaker C: Okay.
[01:09:38] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're not sitting down to a grand meal at all. You're right. Where's the dining room? There's just that small kitchen, and now that I think about it, so where's.
[01:09:48] Speaker C: Everyone supposed to eat? Interesting that they gloss over that, too. You would think that would be a big scene, like the dinner table, right.
[01:09:55] Speaker B: That Felix has come up special to do. I mean, there's a freaking housekeeper there. She could have. Well, that's a cute scene when the housekeeper and Felix yell about the stew.
[01:10:05] Speaker A: Yeah. She's making the Irish.
[01:10:07] Speaker B: Irish stew. And then he puts paprika. He's like, now it's goulash. That's hilarious to me.
[01:10:12] Speaker C: It was so funny, you know that.
[01:10:14] Speaker A: A modern romantic comedy remake of this would try to make Nora and Felix get together, too. 100.
[01:10:20] Speaker C: Yes.
[01:10:21] Speaker B: Yes.
[01:10:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:10:23] Speaker B: And I love that. I love. I ship that. I ship that.
[01:10:26] Speaker A: Oh, you do? I don't.
[01:10:27] Speaker C: Yes. 100.
[01:10:30] Speaker A: Okay.
[01:10:31] Speaker B: And they could both just be fighting their whole lives about who gets who's to be in the kitchen.
[01:10:36] Speaker A: But. But I don't think it would work out because Felix hates the country. As he says, like, I don't like cows and horses. Don't like me either, or something like that.
[01:10:45] Speaker B: Well, I think he was just saying that. I think if he and Nora, you know, had had googly eyes for each other, they would all he. You know, compromises would be made.
[01:10:57] Speaker A: We'll see.
[01:10:57] Speaker C: I think he says it because he also doesn't like John, so he's trying not to, like, condone.
[01:11:03] Speaker A: Right.
[01:11:04] Speaker B: Well, and Nora's insulted that they brought a chef, and she's. As if she couldn't handle it.
[01:11:10] Speaker A: Yeah, true, true. She's really not clued in on this situation at all. She does not know anything about this ruse they're doing, which I think probably would have been helpful if they had kind of told her more about it. But, you know, whatever.
Nora's doing everything, too. She's not only cleaning and cooking. Like, she's also taking care of these babies that are brought in. Like, so I question that they just.
[01:11:35] Speaker B: The babies.
[01:11:35] Speaker C: That's true. On the bed.
[01:11:37] Speaker A: And I'm like, yeah, actually, I did notice that this time, I'm like, they just keep leaving a baby on the middle of a bed that it could roll off of.
[01:11:44] Speaker B: Yeah, right.
[01:11:45] Speaker C: And they keep calling the babies it just Elizabeth.
[01:11:50] Speaker A: Just Elizabeth.
[01:11:51] Speaker C: Well, a few.
[01:11:52] Speaker B: A few other John does, too.
[01:11:54] Speaker A: Oh, really?
[01:11:55] Speaker C: And it was so funny because, you know, I watched it a couple times in the theater with people, and, like, each and every time, the whole audience was like, it's like, talk about times have changed.
[01:12:07] Speaker B: Well, it. Yeah. I mean, it's Elizabeth.
[01:12:10] Speaker C: And then it's hard to know is like. Is this because it's Elizabeth's personality? Yes. She's like, I don't know anything about babies. Or it's like, yeah, they just refer to babies as it.
[01:12:19] Speaker A: I think it's. I think it's just trying to highlight, like, how divorced she is from, like, domesticity and, like, she probably didn't have any younger brothers or sisters that she had to take care of or something like that.
[01:12:29] Speaker B: Clearly not. Clearly not.
[01:12:31] Speaker A: All right, so.
[01:12:31] Speaker B: So, yeah, we jumped ahead a little. We're.
[01:12:34] Speaker A: We're already moving in, so let's start introducing this. So we arrive at the idyllic farmhouse, John's farm farmhouse in Connecticut, and horses are pulling a sleigh right up to the door. I really. This. This whole movie gave me sleigh envy. I was just like, come on.
Yes.
[01:12:48] Speaker B: The jingling bells when everyone's pulled up in a sleigh. Yeah. No cars. Well, some cars, but.
[01:12:56] Speaker C: And of course, you have your spare sleigh on hand, you know? Sure.
[01:13:00] Speaker A: We also. We also learned quickly that John is a bad tipper. I love how they highlight John and Jefferson's slayer tipping habits.
[01:13:08] Speaker C: Yes. Yeah.
[01:13:09] Speaker A: It's a little subtle thing that tells you about their character. So that's Great.
[01:13:13] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:13:14] Speaker A: We talked about Felix meeting Nora already, and now we find out that John has arranged for the fake baby they need. So Nora has been watching a baby while the mom of the baby works in a war plant, which is another allusion to World War II and also women having different roles during World War II. So that's pretty cool. And it is the cutest baby. Oh, my gosh.
[01:13:35] Speaker B: That is a cute baby. Yeah. They really, really are real babies. And not like a fake thing, like a. Just holding a wrapped up, you know, blankets or whatever. They're really working with those.
[01:13:47] Speaker A: Yeah. The only fake thing is when one of the babies goes, mama.
[01:13:51] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure, for sure.
[01:13:56] Speaker A: Yeah. Now we have a kiss between Elizabeth and John, and it's very perfunctory. And then he immediately starts talking about some plumbing work that he did because he's an architect, to which Elizabeth says, when you're kissing me, don't talk about plumbing.
[01:14:10] Speaker B: Yeah, I appreciate that she says that, you know, like, this is what I need.
[01:14:15] Speaker A: And.
[01:14:16] Speaker B: But he's oblivious, like, oh, that's awful.
[01:14:21] Speaker A: He calls her quaint. He calls her quaint for caring about this.
[01:14:24] Speaker C: It's like, you know, you have a sweet little thing.
[01:14:26] Speaker A: Yes.
[01:14:27] Speaker C: Oh, my God. This is so. In my lecture, I really focused on this scene because I love it. And I think it's an example of a romantic comedy giving you really good romantic advice, which is like, don't get with someone that talks about plumbing when you're kissing.
That is like.
Yeah. You know, if he's. If he's cheap or stingy, you know, he doesn't tip well if he talks about plumbing when you should be having a romantic moment. I mean, these are all signs that this person is not for you. And in some ways, it makes me wonder how much John really loves Elizabeth. Because when you're passionate about someone, you're not thinking about plumbing.
[01:15:16] Speaker A: Yeah. It really. It feels like sort of like he wants somebody to hold the place of hostess justice in his life. You see a similar thing in the movie, like Design for Living with Edward Everett Horton's character, where he kind of just wants the woman to. Miriam Hopkins's character, to fulfill a role rather than being passionate about her. So there's. There's often this type in these classic movies.
Yeah, sorry, I'm just referencing other awesome rom coms that everybody should watch.
[01:15:46] Speaker C: I do. She love the way she likes. Gently corrects him here, where she's like, you know, don't talk about plumbing. And he's like, what Should I talk about. And she's just like, well, do you have to talk?
[01:15:59] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:16:00] Speaker C: And like, that's the moment. And this is where Stanwick's acting is so incredible, where she's so clearly regretting marrying him.
[01:16:08] Speaker A: She's.
[01:16:08] Speaker C: She's wondering, should I go through with this? This is what our marriage will be like.
[01:16:13] Speaker A: And it's kind of good that this happens, this kiss happens, because that's when the judge arrives to marry them. And this judge is going to keep coming in and out of this house and completely failing to marry these two.
And sometimes it'll be because of Elizabeth's delays, and sometimes it'll be because of Felix's delays. And that really is part of the screwball comedy aspect of this movie. These shenanigans with this poor judge and people being in one place when they should be in a different place. Fantastic stuff.
[01:16:40] Speaker B: Yes, yes. This judge is pretty great, too. Like, he's just Mr. Chipper.
[01:16:44] Speaker A: And.
[01:16:45] Speaker B: And, hey, I gotta, you know. No problem. And. Oh, but then he.
[01:16:49] Speaker A: Okay, wait, wait. My husband noticed that this last time, too. He was saying, this judge is always laughing.
I hadn't noticed it before, but it's totally true.
[01:16:59] Speaker C: He's like. My theory is that he's, like, perpetually a little tipsy and just having time.
[01:17:04] Speaker B: But, you know, he talks about. He's like, I can't. I can't stay all day. I gotta go home and hang my stocking.
[01:17:10] Speaker A: What was that?
What is he referring to there?
[01:17:14] Speaker C: Yes, I thought that hang my.
[01:17:17] Speaker B: I mean, maybe if he was like, get my stocking up or something.
[01:17:20] Speaker C: But I'm like.
[01:17:21] Speaker B: The innuendo didn't quite work for me.
[01:17:23] Speaker A: Sounded suggestive.
[01:17:25] Speaker B: Yeah, totally.
[01:17:26] Speaker A: The way he said it sounded suggestive. You're right.
[01:17:29] Speaker C: Yeah, for sure.
Yes.
[01:17:32] Speaker A: I guess this is a mystery that we haven't solved for you. Sorry, listeners.
So this time, the. The judge marrying them gets interrupted by Jefferson Jones arriving early. Thank you, Jefferson Jones. And Elizabeth goes to greet him at the door. And the way they look at each other, the way it's filmed, it's telegraphing to the audience that they have instant attraction. And incidentally, he also leaves a good tip for the. The ubiquitous. Ubiquitous. Ubiquitous sleigh driver. Or is it a taxi? I can't remember who comes in that scene.
[01:18:01] Speaker C: I think it's like a huge tip. It's like too much almost.
[01:18:05] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[01:18:07] Speaker A: But, yeah, this instant attraction between them is quite great.
[01:18:12] Speaker B: Yeah, it's awesome. Oh, yeah. Lightning.
Lightning. When they see.
[01:18:16] Speaker C: And he mistakes her for, like, the daughter and not like, yeah.
Which.
And I don't know, it's like his whole image of who Elizabeth Lane is is very different from Barbara Stanwyck, which I think is a lot of fun.
[01:18:34] Speaker A: Another interesting thing about that is I feel like a magazine would have had, like, at least an illustration or maybe a photograph of the columnist, but it doesn't. So this allows a lot of things to be covered up. Really. Yes. Yes.
[01:18:47] Speaker C: Well. And it's just such a really interesting metaphor they play with of, like, her external Persona for work and who she is as a person.
And there's a line later, I don't know if I'm jumping too far ahead, but she says, you know, if I'm making fun of anyone, it's Elizabeth Lane. She knows everything, and she has all the right answers. And it's just such a heartfelt moment where she's realizing, like, there's also a human being and a woman underneath all that who is just trying to get by and is all mixed up in the. Whatever's going down and she has no idea what she's doing. And that's just such a lovely, lovely moment.
[01:19:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
All right. So soon after Jefferson arrives, we hear a baby crying, and he has read all her back articles, so he realizes that this must be time for the baby's bath.
So they go. This bath scene is hilarious. Like, first of all, Elizabeth just decides that the baby's. Why didn't anyone tell her this baby's name, by the way? But she decided to decides the baby's name, Robert, and tells him that. And then, of course, Robert turns out to be a girl. Yeah.
[01:19:48] Speaker B: A little baby girl.
[01:19:51] Speaker A: And Jefferson has come along because he wants to help her bathe the baby, which is kind of weird, but, like, But. But Dennis Morgan makes it charming.
[01:19:58] Speaker B: Yeah, he does make it charming. And he does say, I. I did this for my nieces and nephew, for my sister's kids. And that something you're like, okay, that, you know, he's Uncle. He's Uncle Jefferson.
[01:20:10] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:20:11] Speaker B: And it's adorable.
[01:20:13] Speaker C: Well, and it's, like, really shows that he's actually more domestic than she is.
[01:20:18] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:20:18] Speaker C: Which is, again, like, he's been a sailor, he's a war hero. And you see this really soft side to him.
And that's so interesting because they are very compatible in that way. They balance each other out. And I love that his desirability is tied to his domesticity.
[01:20:38] Speaker A: Yeah. For sure. She says what? She says, you'd make a wonderful father.
You'd make a wonderful father, Mr. Jones. And then she's asking if he has a girl, and he says, every time I meet a girl I like, it turns out she's already married.
Yep, yep.
[01:20:58] Speaker B: I was going back to that cute baby.
All her little chunky rolls. That's how my baby was. And I was like, I miss, I miss a cute baby.
[01:21:06] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, A little fatty baby. And then she like, splashes the water when they're giving her the bath and everything. It's very cute.
Elizabeth is so relieved that Jefferson knows how to do this stuff too, because she has no idea how to wash the baby. She has no idea how to diaper the baby.
[01:21:23] Speaker B: Very cute. Bit of comedy with her trying to like, fold the, the, the, the nappy and then try to put it on. Yeah, very cute.
[01:21:33] Speaker A: I wonder if I'd still remember how to do that. I, I did it for my brother when I was, when he was young. We had cloth diapers.
[01:21:38] Speaker B: But wow, that's intense. I mean, I guess there was like a rubber diety that went over the cloth part, but gross.
Cloth diapers have come a long way. Like, they were a whole different, like, snap in system.
[01:21:53] Speaker A: And it's not too bad. It's not too bad. It wasn't bad. Yeah, we had a diaper service. So anyway, we won't get too deep into that.
So before now the baby washed and ready to be fed.
I think they attempt to have this wedding again, but then the publisher arrives early too. Like, Yardley also arrives early. And meanwhile, Felix has managed to get rid of the judge and he actually sends him out the window instead of the front door.
[01:22:22] Speaker B: And the judge thinks it's great. He's like, oh, it's a game. And I'm like, wow, way to be accommodating. Okay.
[01:22:31] Speaker A: He's like, oh, it's a shortcut. Yeah.
Really?
[01:22:35] Speaker B: Must be drunk the whole time.
[01:22:38] Speaker A: Yeah. Gotta love the judge.
Oh, I just love how, like, Felix.
[01:22:44] Speaker C: Is scheming the whole time to event when he sees, you know, Jefferson Jones and Elizabeth Lane and they have that moment. He's like, I like this for you.
[01:22:53] Speaker A: Okay.
[01:22:55] Speaker C: Like, that's a good friend right there.
[01:22:57] Speaker A: He. He should.
[01:22:58] Speaker B: He's got a fairy godfather vibe, you know? Oh, yeah, yeah, that's true.
[01:23:04] Speaker A: That's true.
Okay. And then we also get this other element where Jon, as soon as Yardley arrives, is busy, she showing off his home designs to Yardley, which actually I'm a little impressed by his, like, double insulated walls. I was like, it's really cold in Wisconsin. Like the last few days we could Use that. I'd be into that.
[01:23:20] Speaker B: Impressed with that, too. I'm like, oh, very cool.
[01:23:24] Speaker A: It's cold in Minnesota, too.
He's good at his job. He's good at his job. I mean, maybe if you were kissing me, you could talk about that instead of the plumbing and I might insulate it.
[01:23:35] Speaker B: Say it slower.
[01:23:39] Speaker A: I'll keep you warm, baby. Yeah, he should have led with that the whole time.
[01:23:45] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:23:49] Speaker A: All right.
[01:23:50] Speaker C: But.
[01:23:50] Speaker A: Yeah, but that also introduces John as a little bit, you know, focused on himself and ambitious as well, which is fine. But, like, I don't think he's aware of that being a character trait the way he's aware of it in Elizabeth, because men are supposed to do that and women are supposed to be be. Da, da, da. I'm your wife. Yeah, whatever.
Anyway, so we get in more into the love story. Now we have a scene, this really beautiful scene. So if you look for gifs for this movie on Twitter, you can find, like, this is the most common one where you see Elizabeth is trimming the tree while Jefferson Jones is playing the piano. It's just. Just idyllic Christmas scene. Like, there's a thing about this movie where, like, it's in black and white, but it feels like it's in color to me. It has that vividness to me. I don't miss color at all. Like, I actually think black and white is a great art form, but there are some black and white movies where I'm like, oh, I would have liked to see this in color. Like, when I think about Roman Holiday, which Wyler wanted to film in color but couldn't because of budgetary reasons. I wish that was in color, but this one, it's like, I don't miss it. It's weird.
[01:24:52] Speaker B: Yeah, it's true.
[01:24:54] Speaker A: Sorry, that was a bit of an aside, but I just feel it feels so cozy, though.
[01:24:59] Speaker C: And you have that classic, like, Christmas tinsel. You know, the. The trees in the shop around the corner are decorated in very much the same way. And it's. It just feels like very shiny and glittery and abundant.
[01:25:13] Speaker A: Yes.
Elizabeth has another great outfit here, too. I think she's wearing a little shrug jacket or something like fur maybe. I don't know which.
[01:25:22] Speaker C: Which, like, John points out, like, her clothes are way too chic chic for, you know, this, like, farm.
Farm wife, trad wife, you know, influencer.
But she's just sort of like, you know what? This is what I feel most comfortable in, and I'm gonna go for it. And it's so fun.
[01:25:42] Speaker A: And yeah, and we hear Jefferson Jones singing. He does a Little Town of Bethlehem. And I'm wishing that I made. I'm wishing that I might. His little. The Wish that I Wish Tonight song. He's playing the piano.
Elizabeth is like mooning over him and she ends up dropping and breaking an ornament when this happens.
Yep.
And let's see. Oh, and then John and Yardley are having this conversation where Yardley's telling John about a rival housekeeping columnist from a different magazine who's about to have a baby. And he's telling John that Elizabeth and him have to have another baby to improve circulation.
Like what? Oh my God. Terrible.
[01:26:20] Speaker B: So bad. Yeah, I was like, well, well, you know, later on Elizabeth says to him, wow, you, you fix everything, don't you? You know, you, you're quite the fixer. And it's all for his own benefit.
[01:26:34] Speaker A: Also. He wants them to have a baby first. But that baby's due like about, I think, nine months later or something or even less. And I'm like, well, that's going to be tricky, dude.
[01:26:43] Speaker C: Yeah, you can't, you can't time it quite like that.
It's also interesting because it really points to domesticity in this movie as something that's like commodified and commercialized. So like, that's why I think it's so linked to like trad wife culture that we see now or influencer culture. It's like, oh, the simpler life and simpler times.
But, you know, know, it's a big industry. It's a big money making industry and there's a lot of things that go into making things look cozy and domestic and warm, much of which is economic and, you know, business based.
[01:27:27] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. In this case, he was talking about how all the baby food and baby clothes and other companies wanted to advertise in their magazines when the bait. When Elizabeth had her first fake baby that she didn't really have.
[01:27:40] Speaker B: There's nothing glamorous about being like a, like a housewife. Like, if you're really, if I were really, really going to keep up on my home, I would be dressed like a cleaning lady and I would be in rubber gloves with my hair up in a bandana because I, it's filthy. I like do the bare minimum, y', all, and it's.
[01:28:07] Speaker A: Do you know what I mean?
[01:28:08] Speaker B: Like to keep it all sparkly is, is awful work that you don't get paid for. You know, It's. Yeah.
[01:28:17] Speaker C: Or the idea of creating that whatever it is, that five course meal or all Those dishes by herself. I mean, you would think with that and all the other things she has to attend to. I mean, mean, she just must be exhausted by the time she sits down to dinner.
[01:28:32] Speaker B: For sure. Okay, so cleaning everything head to toe, like for real. Then the cooking. I always say I don't cook traditional Greek meals. I really don't. Once in a blue moon. And I don't, because they take forever. And I'm like, that's why my yaya was in the kitchen all day long, you know? So, again, yes. The cooking and then the cleaning, all of that up and the do it again again, immediately gross. No ass.
None of that, please.
[01:29:01] Speaker A: We can talk about that a little more, too. We have a little section where we talk about these lifestyle columnists. Like below.
[01:29:05] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. They're liars.
[01:29:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
So let's see. Oh, John once again tries to get married to Elizabeth. He's gotten the judge back again. And he's trying to get everyone to go to bed early so that he and Elizabeth can get married. Because nobody, of course, can know that they're not already married.
But this plan is then foiled when Yeardley and Jefferson come down for a midnight snack. And they're sitting in the kitchen just chowing down. And then we have.
Elizabeth finds them there. And then a cow arrives at the window.
So I have a clip of Elizabeth that is helping Jefferson. Jefferson accompanies Elizabeth to put the cow back in the barn. Of course, she has no idea where this freaking cow goes or anything, anything about the cow. But here's a little bit of their flirtation while they are dealing with this cow. So I'm going to play a clip here.
[01:29:56] Speaker E: What a night.
[01:29:57] Speaker D: What a night.
[01:29:59] Speaker E: Moonlight, snow and the cow.
Do all animals take to you, Mrs. Sloan?
[01:30:05] Speaker D: Oh, yes, of course. Some more than others.
[01:30:08] Speaker E: Yes, they have their likes and dislikes, just like human beings.
[01:30:11] Speaker D: Yes.
[01:30:12] Speaker E: Myself, I like most people.
Some more than others, of course.
[01:30:15] Speaker D: Is there anyone you like more than the others at the moment?
[01:30:20] Speaker E: Definitely.
A girl?
Yes.
[01:30:25] Speaker D: Are you in love with her?
[01:30:28] Speaker E: Well, in a way, yes.
[01:30:31] Speaker D: In what way?
[01:30:33] Speaker E: Well, I.
I admire her very much.
I think she. About the swanest person I ever met.
[01:30:39] Speaker D: Is that as far as it goes?
[01:30:42] Speaker E: She's. She's married.
[01:30:44] Speaker D: Oh.
Does.
Does she like animals?
[01:30:52] Speaker E: Yes.
[01:30:54] Speaker D: Do animals like her?
[01:30:57] Speaker E: Oh, yes.
[01:30:59] Speaker D: Does she live on a farm?
[01:31:04] Speaker E: Yes.
[01:31:04] Speaker D: Jefferson Jones, are you flirting with me?
[01:31:06] Speaker C: Oh, no.
[01:31:07] Speaker D: I would apologize. I'm flattered. It's always intriguing to a married woman to find she's still attractive to the opposite sex.
[01:31:14] Speaker E: But I. I.
[01:31:17] Speaker A: Do.
[01:31:17] Speaker D: I attract You?
[01:31:21] Speaker E: Yes, but you see, you were so different from what I expected. I, I was not for a loop.
[01:31:27] Speaker D: You said, oh, how nice.
[01:31:31] Speaker E: But I, I shouldn't have told you, your being married and all that. I.
But you know, I find it hard to believe you are married.
[01:31:38] Speaker D: I find it pretty difficult myself.
[01:31:41] Speaker E: You, you don't act as if you were married.
[01:31:44] Speaker D: I don't feel as if I was married.
[01:31:47] Speaker E: Really?
[01:31:48] Speaker D: Uh huh.
[01:31:49] Speaker E: Must be the moonlight and the snow and the cow.
[01:31:54] Speaker A: So, yeah, the clip we just heard, of course, Elizabeth is trying to get Jefferson to talk about any girl that he likes in particular.
And of course it turns out that the girl he likes is married and animals like her and she lives on a farm.
And there's just flirtation throughout this scene as they both basically admit they have feelings for each other without completely saying it. And then the whole thing about, oh, I wish I was the kind of man who kissed married women.
[01:32:25] Speaker B: Yeah, naughty for the time.
[01:32:29] Speaker C: And in the lines he's like, you don't act married. And she says, I don't feel married. And it's, it's so taboo.
Even in like sort of remakes or movies that kind of riff off this plot, they leave that element out of it and it. So I think it's still taboo to date.
[01:32:49] Speaker B: Yeah, no cheating, no cheaters. You know, you don't want your, your, your hero and heroine to be cheaters. Those are the bad guys.
[01:32:57] Speaker A: I mean, we started out with Moonstruck Sophia.
[01:33:01] Speaker B: I guess she does cheat, doesn't she?
[01:33:02] Speaker A: Yeah, we had a whole discussion about that. We talked about.
[01:33:06] Speaker B: That was a whole different thing.
It was different.
[01:33:09] Speaker A: Also, also, keep in mind this one woman is not actually married.
[01:33:12] Speaker B: This is true.
Yes. It's all, well, it's all duplicitous, isn't it?
[01:33:18] Speaker C: Yeah, I think that that's the saving grace, right? She's not actually married. And then when there is that moment when they might kiss, Jefferson Jones pulls away even though he wants to kiss her. And she was like, no, you're not the type. And as, as much as she like, regrets that they can't kiss, she's also like, yeah, you're too good a man. And I actually really admire you for that. And I'm deeply attracted to you even more because you're not a cad or a jerk or someone who would cross the line in that way.
[01:33:50] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, True, true.
[01:33:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
And yeah, after this little bit where they're sitting down, they actually go and find the cow again. They put the cow in the barn and Jefferson starts talking about the cow, like, nice brown eyes. And then Elizabeth doesn't realize she's talking about the cow. She's like, they're gray, actually. And then she bends over and he's patting the cow's butt. Nice firm romp.
And for a moment she thinks she's still talking about her, which is amazing.
Yeah. And then like such a perfect, perfect.
[01:34:21] Speaker C: Moment of physical comedy.
[01:34:23] Speaker A: Yeah. And then as they exit the barn, they get hit by a snow drift as they close the door hard and they fall down together and get covered in snow. John comes out and finds them and he asks how she's doing. He says, oh, I feel wonderful, Darlene, how are you? While she's hugging Jefferson Jones.
So that, I mean, this. You're right. Like, Maria, you brought up, like when we were doing early notes for this, how, how close this plays with the hays code, how much sexual innuendo there actually is. And actually in Variety magazine, their July 17, 1945 issue said the sex motif is on a tightrope throughout and constantly threatens to, but never quite does topple into Hay's office disfavor. So, yeah, this, this scene in particular, like, she's all over him.
[01:35:11] Speaker C: Well, in the way the snow covers them, it looks like they're. They're in bed.
[01:35:15] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:35:18] Speaker C: You know, it's almost post coital because she's like, oh, it's wonderful, darling. You know.
[01:35:26] Speaker A: You'Re right. I hadn't thought about that. But that image. Yeah, it does look like they're in bed. That's interesting.
[01:35:31] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:35:32] Speaker A: But the nice firm rump and all this. Oh, my goodness. Yeah.
[01:35:36] Speaker C: I also love, like, if we're moving into hays coat stuff, there's all this metaphor surrounding the rocking chair and.
[01:35:44] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, we totally skipped that scene where he brings her the rocking chair.
[01:35:48] Speaker C: Yeah. And so in the movie, you know, she writes, I'm looking for the perfect rocking chair in her column. And so all her fans are sending her these rocking chairs. And so Jefferson Jones brings her a rocking chair as like a hospitality gift.
And, you know, then he's like, well, let me show you how to rock in it. And it's like, you know, he's just moving his hips pretty hard back and forth and all the, all the ways you can move a rocking chair.
And in my talk at the theater, I pointed out how physical it is. And at a certain point you just realize, like, we're not talking about furniture anymore.
And there's, you know, the, the rocking chair is such a stand in for all this sexual innuendo. And Jefferson Jones Physicality and body confidence that John Sloan doesn't have.
And you see it in their chemistry. You know, they're both like gazing at each other over the rocking chair while touching the rocking chair, but not each other when they first meet.
And then after this moment where they are left in the snow and they come in and Elizabeth Lane is getting warmed up, there's a scene where she's just alone on the rocking chair, like rocking back and forth and she has like a very sexy hooded look. And you know, she's singing Jefferson Jones as she's rocking back and forth. And so that too is like very sexually suggestive.
So the rocking chair is just like this huge sexual metaphor for them.
[01:37:22] Speaker A: You know, I hadn't looked at that, but that's very interesting. And when I watch the movie again, I'll be sure to like be looking for the rocking chair and that. Yeah, that's cool. These movies always have so much you can like see in them. Like when you watch them, you can unearth new ideas about them. And that's one of the reasons I love classic movies so much.
[01:37:40] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, absolutely.
[01:37:43] Speaker A: All right, so I wanted to talk a little bit about Elizabeth Lane's relationship to early lifestyle columnists and modern influencers. So first of all, let's reiterate what Elizabeth Lane is like. She's positioned as being the mother of an eight month old baby who cooks elaborate dinners, has a perfectly decorated home, a garden and a farm. You know, no, no pressure, right.
Her column is kind of carrying on though a tradition of homemaking advice for women that had roots at least as far back and I think farther back than the Victorian era. But in the Victorian era, there were a lot of popular books that instructed middle and upper class women, particularly on everything from cooking to table manners to decoration to like home brewing.
And many of the authors were men, but there were women authors as well, including apparently Catherine Beecher, who is the sister of Harriet Beecher Stowe. So that's interesting. I learned that from Smithsonian website.
And then after these books, you know, these homemaking books magazines carried on the traditional both women's magazines and then cooking and homemaking columns, which would be in other general interest make newspapers and magazines. I found an article from AtlasObscura.com that actually suggests several possible early 20th century inspirations for Elizabeth Lane. So Gladys Tabor is one possible inspiration for Elizabeth Lane. She wrote a column called Diary of Domesticity for Ladies home journal from 1937 to 1930. 57. She also wrote 50 books, including five cookbooks and indeed Lived in a farmhouse in Connecticut. And she was at the height of her popularity the year Christmas in Connecticut was released. And her gr. Her granddaughter firmly believes she was the inspiration for Elizabeth Laid. But unlike Lane, Tabor actually could cook. And she did live the life she portrayed in her column and books. So she wasn't a faker.
Tabor had begun writing as a way to support her family during the Depression and when her husband lost his hearing and subsequently lost his job as a music teacher. So kind of an inspirational figure, really.
So another possible inspiration for Elizabeth was Clementine Paddleford. She wrote food columns for the New York Herald Tribune and the publication this week. She also had a home in Connecticut.
She could cook, but she wasn't primarily known for her cooking. She would go and report on other cooks, like kind of an Anthony Bourdain or something.
She'd travel across the country and write about their cooking styles. So that's kind of cool.
And then Jane Nickerson is another suggestion. She was the first food editor of the New York Times from 1942 to 1957.
So I just thought that was interesting. The article bothered to kind of try to find who were some of the women who could have inspired Elizabeth Lane's character. It's probably more of an amalgamation of different people, but it's. It's good to know that this was an actual type of product person working at the time.
When you see people introduce this movie these days, a lot of people will reference Martha Stewart. They'll call Elizabeth Lane kind of the Martha Stewart of her time. I. I did a lot of research into Martha Stewart. I've decided I'm not going to reiterate it all here, other than Martha Stewart built, basically, as we all know, a lifestyle empire, became incredibly rich, ended up going to jail because of some possible issues with insider trading.
And then after jail, she managed to continue her work. I think one thing that's interesting about Martha Stewart, she clearly knows how to do a lot of these things that she is writing about. And, you know, kind of like she can cook, she can decorate, etc. She ran a catering company actually early in her career. But she's not trying necessarily to prove to. She's not representing necessarily perfect domesticity in her own life. I mean, she was actually divorced pretty early on in her career. Career. So she hadn't had the freedom that maybe somebody in Elizabeth Lane's position didn't have to be an independent and a single or divorced woman and still represent domesticity, which I do think is interesting. So, Sophia, you said you're waiting to talk about. What do you have to do you have something to say about Stewart or other stuff?
[01:41:44] Speaker B: A little bit about Martha Stewart in like, you know, my sister's a really great cook. She's a great baker. She's a great cook. She does do these elaborate decorations and, and she's, she enjoys doing that. She's good at that. And I guess she was making like a something, whatever and, and once again it was a Martha Stewart recipe.
[01:42:08] Speaker C: She's like, damn that Martha Stewart.
[01:42:10] Speaker B: Like it just kind of hangs over her head a little bit like as far as like the, the creation of like beautiful food and the presentation, presentation of it and whatnot.
[01:42:22] Speaker A: Like it's an ideal she wants to achieve and finds difficult to achieve or.
[01:42:26] Speaker B: Maybe, I don't know. No, she can achieve it. It's the thing. I mean I was ever.
[01:42:32] Speaker A: We were.
Well you had. You said, she said she's, you said, she said damn that Martha Stewart.
[01:42:37] Speaker D: Yeah.
[01:42:37] Speaker A: So why was she cursing her? Like what is it about? I don't know.
[01:42:39] Speaker B: I think Martha, I don't know, her recipe was a little more entailed or something like that and it didn't turn out that the same and so she cursed Stewart about it or something. It was kind of cute and funny and there. But they're like, do have one of my favorite and best lemon kind of cookie that I make and it is a Martha recipe and it's easy just, just saying. And when I shared this with my co workers, you know, I shared the link and my co worker wrote back, well Martha, because the cookie was so good and I'm like, it's an easy one though. It's easy. If it were hard, I wouldn't do it.
[01:43:17] Speaker C: I think Martha Stewart is interesting too for me because I grew up reading her magazine.
She has a couple really great recipes. I love, I love some of her home tips. I love to cook. I'm very domestic. I love, you know, the aesthetics, the artful arrangement of things.
But my mom and I were talking because periodically we're like maybe we should subscribe to her magazine again.
And we stop each other because there's also this pressure for perfection with Martha Stewart or this sense of like it's never good enough. Whereas like in a garden is like store bought's fine if you can't do this. You know, here's a shortcut. Whereas like Martha Stewart demands this element of perfection. And I was reading in the New York Times, I guess they're re releasing her first cookbook and they looked at the history and how much of it was like she presented herself as, look at what I've done and look at how I cook this and arranged it. But she had a whole staff.
[01:44:20] Speaker A: Okay.
[01:44:21] Speaker C: And so I think it really hides the labor and the people doing the labor. And so for the typically women at home doing it, and they're like, why can't I achieve this gorgeous, you know, five course meal? Well, it's because she doesn't have a whole staff.
[01:44:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:44:41] Speaker C: Helping her.
Or you'll see Martha, you know, she'll do these, like, I'm just your average person. And you'll see her around her farm and it's like, okay. But she has like an entire crew in that farm, in that garden, in these spaces.
So because she's the face of it, we kind of forget that. Like, there's actually all these people doing the majority of that labor.
[01:45:05] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. She's not a. She's not a faker like Elizabeth Lane, but she's also not really. She's also not really doing all of this either.
[01:45:14] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And Elizabeth Lane is fun because I think she kind of allows us to be a little more human when we know that she's not someone who can cook or can do all those things. She's just got a vivid imagination. It's almost like relieving for the audience to be like, okay, I don't have to live that lifestyle or have it all figured out.
[01:45:39] Speaker A: You can also feel pretty good if you know how to diaper a baby or wash a baby.
[01:45:43] Speaker C: Yeah, just scramble some eggs.
[01:45:46] Speaker B: But here's. And then we also do see a bit of a contrast with those ladies who work at the war Factory.
Like, they have to leave their baby at the neighbor's house to go work. And I don't think they're coming home then and making five course meals and they're working late.
Oh, sorry. My dog. My dog and my kid. Come on, out you go, all of you.
Anyway, Mommy's busy. Mommy's podcast.
See, what was I supposed to do? Feed them and like, walk them and do them all at the same time? No, no, that's what my husband's for downstairs.
[01:46:30] Speaker A: Should I leave this part in and not cut it out this time?
[01:46:33] Speaker B: Maybe leave it in. It's just fine.
Let's tell the truth, what domestic life really looks like.
[01:46:42] Speaker A: Sometimes Mommy has to podcast. Yes, that's right.
[01:46:46] Speaker C: That's right.
[01:46:48] Speaker A: Now, this is not something I follow on social media, but of course I'm aware of this sort of thing today. Like, you see on Instagram, on YouTube and tick tock. They're like kind of lifestyle influencers of all different types. I mean, I have followed minimalists, so there's like, one end is like sort of minimalist. Like, you've got Marie Kondo or something. I did get into that for a while because the easiest way for me to keep things clean is by not having as many things.
[01:47:12] Speaker C: That's just 100.
[01:47:13] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[01:47:14] Speaker C: But.
[01:47:14] Speaker A: But we also have these days, the trad wives are. Or people who are doing housewife stuff. But, like, maybe they don't identify as trad wives, maybe they're not all affiliated with conservatism, but we have this, you know, trend of trad wives also. One other thing I did see, though, that I liked when I was looking into this are the people who teach people how to make cheap dinners with items from the dollar tree. That's the kind of a lifestyle influencer I can get behind. People who are trying to help out, people who need to be on a budget. That's. That's kind of cool. Yeah.
[01:47:42] Speaker C: Or like, meals that are. You can make in 20 minutes. I love those ones. I used to have aspirations of, like, it's Saturday. I'm going to spend six hours making this cake. And now I'm like, nope, don't have.
[01:47:55] Speaker A: The time or the energy.
[01:47:56] Speaker B: Yeah, cakes are hard.
[01:47:58] Speaker A: Mm.
I started, though, looking into, like, some of these, like, more trad wife or like, lifestyle influencers who try to like, make it look like they're super homemaker person with their farm, sort of the modern equivalent. And I found an article from Stellar IE which was critiquing Nara Smith. And she is a very popular influencer. She has 12.3 million followers on TikTok, 4.9 million followers on Instagram. Have either of you heard of her?
[01:48:24] Speaker B: No.
[01:48:25] Speaker A: No.
[01:48:26] Speaker C: Is she the ballerina?
[01:48:27] Speaker A: No, that's a different one. No. Okay, but. So Nara Smith. The article is critiquing her and it points out that far from being a regular housewife, she earns millions of dollars off her videos and says, along with many other trad wife content creators, her videos are her real job, not her trad wife skills. Nara and the majority of trad wives online rarely show themselves doing daily tasks such as cleaning. It's always more romanticized fun jobs like baking sourdough. The majority of people simply do not have the time or resources to milk their own cows whenever their kids are craving a milkshake.
Some context for that is like, one of her videos is actually, my husband was craving a milkshake this morning. And so I made homemade peanut butter and then I made homemade ice cream. And then I put it all together. It's like, how long did it take to make this milkshake? She did another one where she. Her. My toddlers woke up sick this morning. And so I don't keep modern medicine in the house. So I made them cough drops. Like, I'm not kidding, I might have seen this.
[01:49:29] Speaker B: I might have seen her make it. Like, like make homemade Mac and cheese or something. And she made the macaroni and the.
And I'm like, no.
[01:49:39] Speaker A: But the cough drops for the toddlers really took me out though because, like, I'm sorry, if your toddlers wake up sick, you're going to go take care of your toddlers immediately. You're not going to spend like an hour in the kitchen making homemade cough drops. Not to mention somebody pointed out that like, toddlers can choke on cough drops potentially. So probably you should have just given them cough syrup. But like, and who has like a cough drop mold sitting around their kitchen? So there's, there's levels of insanity to this business. It's. It's like, I don't mean to pick on just Nara Smith particularly, but she. I found several articles about her and when I watched her channel, I was like, what is going on here?
[01:50:15] Speaker C: Is she the one that does the. Like, my. My kids wanted to color, so I made homemade paper and homemade crowns. And I'm like, if you've ever watched spent time with kids, you know that like, if you don't have those supplies ready in 20 minutes, they'll get and move on to something else.
[01:50:31] Speaker A: Exactly.
[01:50:32] Speaker C: So in the like three hours it took her to make that, they moved on.
[01:50:36] Speaker A: Like, maybe, maybe if you had the kids help you make the paper and it would turn into like, we're doing paint paper making today instead. But yeah, no, no. Right.
[01:50:44] Speaker B: That would be the project and it would be disgusting and messy and. And if you want perfection, like, that's definitely a thing that mommies let go of or hopefully let go of. Like, if you want to do the fun craft, if you're looking for it to end up perfect, like, you gotta let go and like, you're gonna let your kid make crap or whatever or cut things not on the line and draw outside the line. So if you're about them, like doing it perfectly now you've created a child with problems and they'll be in therapy later versus just learning to cut or color or express themselves. So, yeah.
[01:51:24] Speaker A: So I think it's Interesting. Like it's like this is a different version, a modern version of sort of what Elizabeth Lane is doing and presenting this like perfect vision of a life that probably is impossible without help, you know, of some kind, without, without money, you know, without being able to have that as your full time thing. And even then you're not going to be necessarily because this Nara Smith also wears these very elegant dresses like, like, like evening gowns practically. Like at least in Christmas in Connecticut, when Barbara Stanwick's in the kitchen, she's wearing kind of a gingham sort of house. Like, like a comfortable looking dress, right, with an apron. I don't know.
Do you like. I don't think I felt a ton of pressure from these types of influencers in my life, but I watched. My mother had felt intense pressure to perform and she worked full time. She was the main child raiser rear in our house. But. And she would also subscribe to like every magazine. She subscribed to all the fashion magazines, the health magazines, the beauty magazines, the working women's magazines, and she subscribed to Country Living and Metropolitan Living, both of them. And she had like a whole row of them of the back issues in the kitchen. And she, I could tell she always felt such insane pressure to like live up to this image of a woman that doesn't really exist. You know, I know she felt deep regret that we didn't have really nice looking rooms in our house. She had like her one room that didn't get kind of messed up by my dad and the kids. She tried to keep it really nice but like we didn't have a lot of money. So she always kind of felt this lack of. I'm wondering if like either you or people in your life have experienced that kind of pressure maybe coming from some of these lifestyle magazines or influences or just from our society, which, you know, of course these influencers reflect our society.
[01:53:10] Speaker C: Well, my mom for sure could have been a total Martha Stewart. I mean she was always planning the parties like she was and she was.
[01:53:17] Speaker A: Really good at it.
[01:53:18] Speaker C: Like she was like queen supreme of the domestic world. But you know, as we got older and you know, family dynamics changed and also as they were raising us, my parents kind of decided they didn't want to do that anymore. So as my mom let go of it, the more casual we got. I mean she's still like amazing cook. We still organize everything, but we just do it on a smaller scale and we're much more relaxed about things. There's not a lot of pressure and There was a time where my mom did give away all her old Martha Stewart cookbooks.
And we had a moment when they were re releasing, you know, the new Martha Stewart. We're like, should we get that just as a collector's item? And, you know, the same way we were, we were like, should we get the magazines again? And we were just both like, no. I think it's actually really good that we're not trying to, like, overperform domesticity anymore. Like, let's just keep it fun.
[01:54:14] Speaker A: Very cool.
And how about you, Sophia? Have you felt those pressures on yourself or have you seen them in the lives of people you know?
And if you haven't, don't worry. More power to you.
[01:54:26] Speaker B: No, my mom is just a practical person. She just works. She does what she gotta do.
She cooks because she's a good cook. And feet, you know, we gotta eat. And there you go. Like, I don't know. There was no, like, she decorated the way she wanted to or what was ever within her means.
She might have felt commentary from, like, her mom and sister, but also didn't give a crap too. You know, I know that, I know that they judged. I know that they judged and wanted her to have, like, a big house, nice thing, the blah, blah, blah. She also just doesn't. It also didn't care. You know, like I said, practical, not sentimental or anything. And I would say that I, you know, surround myself with other women, men, families who are kind of in the same boat of, like, we do what we can. Some people. Yeah. Like my, like I said, my sister, she loves to do it up and loves to do the decoration and, and the spread and make it all pretty power to her. I, I really don't. I, I, it stresses me out, so I, I don't bother. You know, I'm glad that that hasn't.
[01:55:37] Speaker A: Been a factor for you. Like, yeah, I definitely inherited my mom's perfection, but it's in more things, like researching the podcast.
[01:55:45] Speaker B: Sure, sure.
But no, like, we're all, no, everyone's like, we're just trying to keep it together, get the kids, make sure the kids are alive. Yay.
Everyone ate.
[01:55:58] Speaker A: Yay. Yeah. They were really less concerned with keeping those kids alive than anything else in this movie. Yeah, totally.
[01:56:06] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:56:07] Speaker A: So let's see. So I did have one quote I wanted to read out from Caroline Sita for the A.V. club. She wrote a really good article about Christmas in Connecticut, which I'll put in the show notes. She said on the pages of Smart Housekeeping, Elizabeth Lane paints a Breezy portrait of how easy it is for women to have it all. To run a farmhouse, take care of an eight month old baby, cook three meals a day, pretty herself up for her husband, and of course, still find time to write an ongoing series of articles about it all.
Elizabeth's real life, however, reveals that having it all is just a glossy illusion. Christmas in Connecticut essentially argues that conventional gender roles are a mass delusion based on an ideal that likely never even existed in the first place. And I just, I really liked her article and it really shows how Christmas in Connecticut is actually kind of more feminist in a lot of ways, more progressive than a lot of the movies we see today. Day, which we can talk about.
[01:57:01] Speaker C: Oh, my gosh. Yes.
[01:57:02] Speaker A: In a little bit. Yeah, but first let's get to like, we'll try to wrap up the plot here. Okay, so we're going to go into our spoiler section now. So if you have not seen Christmas in Connecticut and you don't want to be spoiled on the rest of the movie, please go ahead and watch the movie now and then come back and listen to the rest of the episode.
So more in the plot. Like, we have the pancake flipping scene.
Yardley, for some reason, is obsessed, obsessed with wanting to see Elizabeth flip a pancake.
Felix is trying to teach her and she is failing in various ways.
[01:57:35] Speaker C: And.
[01:57:36] Speaker A: Yeah, like, what do you guys think about the ultimate pancake flipping scene?
He's just gross.
[01:57:41] Speaker B: He's like, I mean, he even says it like, oh, you pretty little lady or something like that. Show me how you flip a pancake. He is, he's obsessed with watching her do the, these domestic things. Things. And she's just, it's, it's a little ridiculous. It's very over the top.
[01:57:59] Speaker C: It's such a good example of like this performance of domesticity. You know, she's wearing the gingham.
She, she's a pretty little lady. And all the men looking at her doing something domestic and dainty and it's just like hysterical. Then when she actually does flip the flapjack, Felix is so relieved. He's, he's like, oh, my God, she did it.
[01:58:24] Speaker A: And she closes her eyes when she successfully flips it. That's so funny.
[01:58:28] Speaker C: What does Felix say?
[01:58:30] Speaker B: He keeps using a term.
[01:58:32] Speaker A: Hunky dunky.
[01:58:33] Speaker B: Hunky dunky. That's it. And I love it.
[01:58:37] Speaker A: I don't know if he says it in that scene though. But yes, when he says but yeah, when everything. I think it's supposed to be like hunky dory, but he says, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[01:58:47] Speaker C: So funny.
[01:58:48] Speaker A: Okay. In addition to the pancake flipping scene, we have a scene where a totally different baby arrives at the house because a different mom has brought her baby to be watched by Nora.
And Yardley appropriately notices that this baby is different.
Fortunately, they hide the baby from Jefferson, who I'm sure would be like, sorry, that's a different baby.
[01:59:12] Speaker C: Right.
[01:59:13] Speaker A: Meanwhile, the judge arrives again to marry them, but Felix manages to disrupt this wedding by saying that the baby swallowed his watch. This did not happen, which we find out. But this ends up sending them all looking for the doctor and sending the judge home.
At this point, John is really annoyed and threatens to tell the truth to Yardley about what's going on. Until Yardley turns around and offers him a column on home home design, which is based on his connection to Elizabeth.
[01:59:40] Speaker B: Always business with that Yardley.
[01:59:42] Speaker A: Yep, a lot of stuff is going on. So now we get to the Christmas dance scene. They've been invited to community dance.
Anything anybody wants to say about the dance scene? I love it.
[01:59:52] Speaker B: And I want to go, I want to do fun dancing.
And it's hilarious. That is it Yardley that can't do, like, he can't do it. And that's a bit of fun comedy where they, you know, do a star thing and he can't. It's all messed up. I thought that was really cute and funny.
[02:00:10] Speaker C: I also. I thought of you, Jennifer, when in this scene, because, you know, in your essay, you talk about how Fred is stare and Ginger Rogers when they dance. It's like, you know, suggestive. And so when I see how compatible Elizabeth Lane and and Jones are dancing, I mean, they dance really well together. And you're like, oh, wow. This is like all the physical stuff. They want to get out but can't. So it's happening through dance. And it's one of my favorite motifs in romance.
And then when he, like, just dances her outside, well, Yardley's looking on like, oh, something's going on between those two. Yeah, it's just such a perfect scene.
[02:00:51] Speaker A: Yeah. And they go outside and they sit in this one horse open sleigh and. And the horse is just like, all right, people are in here. I'm leaving.
And so the horse rides them off. They have another little flirtatious conversation where they basically admit their feelings to each other again, but Elizabeth still doesn't tell them the truth about what's going on.
So they're off in the sleigh. They get arrested for stealing the sleigh. Oh, sorry. Does anybody Want to say anything about the sleigh ride scene before we.
[02:01:18] Speaker C: I just love that it's like an escape, you know, they're. They're just trying to get away from everything. And literally the horse offers them a way out.
[02:01:29] Speaker A: Yeah. First the cow and now the horse. Yes.
The animal kingdom is on their side.
[02:01:37] Speaker C: Really? For real?
[02:01:40] Speaker A: Yeah. And now and then other hijinks are ensuing. Everybody else has come home from the dance, or at least Yardley's come home from the dance. And he sees the mother of the baby from the war plant. Mother comes back to get her baby. Yardley sees this mother run off with the baby and he thinks that, you know, the baby's been kidnapped. He gets the police, the news are all involved.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth and Jefferson return the next morning. And finally Yardley discovers the truth. I think it might be when both moms show up with both babies.
[02:02:11] Speaker B: Oh, yes. Yes.
[02:02:13] Speaker A: And the jig is up.
[02:02:13] Speaker C: All is revealed. Oh, my gosh.
[02:02:15] Speaker B: Yes.
[02:02:17] Speaker A: Yeardley then fires Elizabeth, but she's quickly rehired. When he gets hungry, it's always about his stomach. And Felix refuses to feed him unless, because he was mean to Elizabeth. And then Felix also insinuates that the rival publication that he's all concerned about is going to hire Elizabeth away from him.
[02:02:37] Speaker B: Yep. It's a blatant lie. He gets a telegram from his. His restaurant that they need, like, more beef for kidneys and stuff like that. And he reads it as if it's the. The competitor offering her a job on Christmas Day.
[02:02:51] Speaker C: Like, really?
[02:02:52] Speaker B: Would that telegram really have gone up?
[02:02:55] Speaker A: Yeah. But anyway, she gets hired back with a raise.
John breaks off the engagement with Elizabeth and Elizabeth is happy. But now Mary Lee, the nurse from the first scenes, shows up. Like she's introduced as his fiance.
But then we find out quickly that she has actually gone and married Sinky. Or as Felix says, stinky.
Then Felix tells Jefferson Elizabeth isn't actually married, tells him the whole deal and that Mary Lee married Sinky. And then we get this scene where they're in the room kissing. The guys are all outside listening.
So. Yeah. So I'm going to play the clip of this scene and then we can just talk about it.
[02:03:36] Speaker D: Why did you do that?
[02:03:37] Speaker E: I changed my type.
[02:03:38] Speaker D: What do you mean?
[02:03:39] Speaker E: Now I'm the type that does kiss married women.
[02:03:41] Speaker D: Oh.
[02:03:42] Speaker E: And I like it.
[02:03:42] Speaker D: Well, I don't like it. No.
There's only one thing to do with you.
[02:03:46] Speaker E: Yes, let's do it.
[02:03:48] Speaker D: No, no. Now, don't you come near me.
[02:03:49] Speaker E: You attract me, remember?
[02:03:51] Speaker D: Well, you Forget.
[02:03:52] Speaker E: Oh, no, I don't. You're a married woman, but you don't feel like a married woman, remember?
[02:03:56] Speaker D: Well, it's not fair.
[02:03:57] Speaker E: Oh, there are rules to this game, are there? You must teach me.
[02:04:01] Speaker D: Well, men who are engaged must play the game.
[02:04:04] Speaker C: Yes.
[02:04:05] Speaker E: Well, let's play.
[02:04:07] Speaker A: Well.
[02:04:09] Speaker E: You'Ve stopped talking. That's good. Mr. Yardley, have you noticed the even.
[02:04:13] Speaker A: Temperature in this room? That's due to the triple wall insulation. Oh, shut up.
Excuse me.
[02:04:21] Speaker D: Good heavens, it's just little me.
[02:04:23] Speaker E: Oh, I forget all about you. Your breakfast is in the kitchen. I want you to join us and wait.
[02:04:29] Speaker D: What are you waiting for?
[02:04:30] Speaker E: Only Uncle Felix knows.
[02:04:32] Speaker D: Well, I'm powerful hungry.
[02:04:35] Speaker E: Oh, I'll show you where the kitchen is, my dear.
[02:04:36] Speaker A: Thank you.
[02:04:46] Speaker D: Don't you come near me, you se wolf. After the way you deceived me.
[02:04:50] Speaker C: I deceived you?
[02:04:51] Speaker D: Yes.
[02:04:51] Speaker A: You're engaged.
[02:04:51] Speaker E: You are married.
[02:04:52] Speaker D: That has not to do with it.
[02:04:53] Speaker E: Nor has my engagement.
[02:04:54] Speaker D: I warn you, if you take another step, I'll scream.
[02:04:56] Speaker E: Go ahead and scream. Scream the house down. Perhaps your husband will come to your rescue.
[02:05:02] Speaker D: I haven't got a husband.
[02:05:04] Speaker E: You haven't?
[02:05:05] Speaker B: No.
[02:05:07] Speaker E: And Felix was telling the truth.
Felix told you everything.
[02:05:12] Speaker D: Then you knew all the time?
[02:05:14] Speaker E: Yes.
I know something you don't know.
I'm not engaged anymore.
[02:05:20] Speaker A: You're not?
[02:05:22] Speaker E: She married my shipmate.
[02:05:24] Speaker B: She did?
[02:05:27] Speaker E: I'm as free as a bird.
[02:05:29] Speaker D: Oh, that's what you think.
[02:05:37] Speaker E: Is that talking? What?
[02:05:39] Speaker B: Again?
[02:05:40] Speaker A: But this.
[02:05:41] Speaker E: Service for keeps.
Now I bring the judge. Yes, but definitely.
[02:05:47] Speaker C: Yes, please.
[02:05:48] Speaker E: Well, young man, I suppose you know what you're doing.
But I warn you, she can't cook. She can't cook?
[02:05:55] Speaker D: No, I. I can't cook.
[02:05:57] Speaker E: She can't cook, but what of a.
I hope you'll be very happy.
[02:06:04] Speaker D: Thank you.
[02:06:07] Speaker E: What a Christmas.
[02:06:10] Speaker A: What a Christmas.
So, what do you guys all think about this scene? This. This scene where the romance is resolved?
[02:06:17] Speaker C: I love it so much because it's the exact opposite of the talking about plumbing while kissing scene.
Mr. Yardley says, no one's talking. I don't hear anything. And Uncle Felix is like, that's good. Because, you know, the silence is that they're kissing and they're just letting the passion take over.
And I think that's a lot of fun because it tells you how much in a relationship, chemistry really does matter. And sometimes you just have to let the kissing speak for itself.
[02:06:46] Speaker A: So to speak. Yeah. Yeah, totally.
My favorite part is just the line, she can't cook, but what a wife that Felix Says once they revealed to Jefferson that Elizabeth can't cook, he's like, she can't cook, but what a wife.
[02:07:04] Speaker C: Yes.
[02:07:06] Speaker A: But it does make me wonder, like, what is Jefferson? You know, how much of what he was attracted to was her domestic ability. Like, it is a little worrisome. You know, they've got their chemistry. But, like, what about this aspect?
I know, I know.
[02:07:20] Speaker B: He. The whole thing. He's like, you're wonderful and everything. He just.
He just can't love her enough and whatnot. And it's like. But on what guy, like, you thought she was this domestic? You know, he fell in love with this person in the magazine even though he thought she was older.
And here she is in real life. Yeah, I worry about them, too.
[02:07:46] Speaker A: I hope they'll be okay.
[02:07:47] Speaker B: Do they have a future?
[02:07:48] Speaker C: For me, it was that their chemistry, like, overrides everything else.
[02:07:54] Speaker A: Yeah, we're gonna have to.
[02:07:57] Speaker C: You're not what I expected. You're not who I was thinking of. And so he's, like, trying to grapple with this flesh and blood woman versus this, like, almost matronly figure he had set up in his head.
[02:08:10] Speaker A: Sure.
[02:08:10] Speaker C: Which is very confusing.
[02:08:13] Speaker A: Yeah, No, I think they'll be okay because of the chemistry, like you said, and because she's Barbara Stanwyck. I mean, come on. Yeah, yeah.
[02:08:20] Speaker B: He's got that beautiful singing voice.
[02:08:22] Speaker A: They'll be okay.
[02:08:24] Speaker C: And he's domestic enough for the both of them, I feel like.
[02:08:26] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. It also, there's a throwaway line or at the beginning, near the beginning of the movie where he talks about how he's an artist and so. So he'd probably be okay in New York.
[02:08:37] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[02:08:40] Speaker C: I think there's, you know, something really interesting too, at the end when, like, Yardley fires Elizabeth Lane. And then he comes back and he's like, oh, double whatever American Housekeeping is giving you. And he's trying to get her back, and she's just like, I am. And she sort of shuts him down and gives him a talking to. And you think that's such a big deal for her. And even though it seems like she's been, you know, beat up by this whole experience, it's like she still has two guys who really kind of want to be with her. I mean, John would, but he's. He's trying to think about his own business interests now with things. She's like, well, I lost a husband. I lost a job. But there she is, still empowered, saying, like, no, we're. If we do this, it's on my terms.
And I always think the big revelation that she can't cook and she can't do all this, that feels relatively small by the end of the film. When you think about issues of, like, infidelity, children out of wedlock, like, kidnapped babies, like, way the whole lie just keeps spiraling and getting worse and worse. And then when you realize, like, oh, she's just a good writer, but she can't cook, well, that's actually not a big deal, comparatively.
[02:09:51] Speaker A: I guess that's true. Yeah.
Well.
[02:09:54] Speaker B: And that she's not the biggest, like, deceiver of this whole thing. Because as I pointed out earlier, you know, Yardley, you know, he's like. When he finds out the competitors after her, he's like, forget it. It's okay if it's all a lie, just as long as you stay with me. And she says that, boy, you really fix everything, don't you? You know, and it's all for his. And I like how you pointed that out, that, yeah, she tells him, no, my terms. And even if she has lost all of her prospects, as it were, she.
[02:10:23] Speaker C: Gets the guy that she wants. Right. And they're gonna get married quick because it's war time.
[02:10:27] Speaker A: Yeah.
[02:10:27] Speaker C: But it's also, which. That felt more real to me than, like, you know, some of the TV holiday ones where it's like, oh, yeah, for two weeks and now we're married.
[02:10:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[02:10:36] Speaker C: It doesn't hold up, but wartime romance does.
[02:10:39] Speaker A: Yeah. If you're about to go out on another boat. Yeah, that's.
[02:10:41] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, exactly. So it's like she gets the guy, but she also gets this huge pay raise and the relief of not having to, like, hide who she is to her employers.
[02:10:51] Speaker A: That's true. Yeah.
[02:10:52] Speaker C: She's winning at life by the end of the film.
[02:10:55] Speaker A: That's true. It's a very good ending for her. Yep.
So now let's. We're going to briefly talk about this film's relationship to sort of modern movies.
First, I watched the 1992 TV movie remake, so you don't have to.
It was directed by Arnold Schwarzenegger, and it includes a Terminator reference at one point. Just so.
Yep.
[02:11:17] Speaker C: Probably the best part of the film.
[02:11:19] Speaker A: No, no, no. It stars Diane Cannon and Kris Kristofferson, and I would say their chemistry, or actually, I don't know if they had a huge amount of chemistry, but they did what they could with the dialogue. You know, they. They were both decent in their parts. They're probably the best part of the movie. And then Tony Curtis plays, like, Diane Cannon's, like, TV editor. She's a TV cook in this one. Tony Curtis is, like this really weird, so slimy character in this movie, and it's like, sort of like he's trying to get with her for some reason.
And there's a sex toy that comes out at one point that is never shown again. I don't know what's going on there.
Anyway, yeah. In this version, Elizabeth is the host of a cooking show who can't cook, and she's pressured to do a live Christmas special with her cooking for the 1990s version of Jefferson Jones, who is a park ranger who's recently performed a heroic rescue of a kid who is caught in a snow drift, which is really jankily done, by the way. It does not seem at all dangerous or realistic. It's just silly. The whole movie. The whole movie really misses the point of what was charming about Christmas in Connecticut. It has a lot of slapstick and prat falls, but it doesn't have a lot of stakes and it doesn't have a lot of, like, I don't know, build up to the romance.
It's. It just. It. It was not a good movie, put it that way. I don't really want to spend a whole lot of time talking about it because I think we have more fruitful discussions. And I know you guys haven't seen it. I would only recommend it if you're kind of a Christmas in Connecticut completist. You know what I mean?
[02:12:48] Speaker B: Okay. Okay.
[02:12:50] Speaker A: But, Maria, you had mentioned something about how Hallmark movies, and I guess you've talked in the podcast today, too, about how some modern romance fiction has kind of remade the plot. Would you like to comment more about that? Like, how you feel it compares or anything on that topic?
[02:13:05] Speaker C: Yeah, I feel like every season you see, like, a light, like, Lifetime, Hallmark, Hulu, Netflix, you know, any. Any of those things will kind of remix it for a holiday movie. I read a historical romance anthology that was holiday based that remixed it. And it's interesting because I think one of the things they consistently leave out is, like, the infidelity plot. Plot where they're like, yeah, that's a hard sell. So the. The person she's usually pretending to be married to is her love interest. And so it's like fake relationship that turns real, like, enjoy to the world.
[02:13:43] Speaker A: Yeah, that's a 2025 movie that just came out on Hulu, by the way.
[02:13:47] Speaker C: On. On Hulu? Yeah.
[02:13:49] Speaker A: And it's.
[02:13:49] Speaker C: It's.
I think it can be really fun. The way they mix in, like, social media and. And talk about the element of, like, what you show on the screen versus what your life really is.
But I think it's really hard to pull off the charm and the stakes of the original Christmas in Connecticut, which is why I don't think a lot of the remakes are super good. I. I will enjoy elements of them, but it's hard, like, even enjoyed to the world, like, she borrows her neighbor's kids to pretend.
There's just some things where you're like, that's, that's.
[02:14:22] Speaker A: That's.
[02:14:22] Speaker C: That's a really hard thing to pull off.
[02:14:26] Speaker A: That's actually one of the only parts I liked about that movie because I like the girl. The girl seems so excited to have somebody to, like, you know, do things with. And then also she's trying to be an actress, so there's a scene where she tells about her representation is like. I don't know. It's funny.
[02:14:39] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, that's funny. And. But, like, when you think about the logistics, you're like, that's actually kind of, like, creepy.
But I did, like, enjoy to the world that she is actually a very good cook and homemaker. She just, you know, she's so busy working, she doesn't have time for relationships. And, you know, she's got some intimacy issues because of her background, so. So it's fun when they kind of play with those things.
[02:15:02] Speaker A: But that weirdly makes it sort of an inversion of Christmas in Connecticut because, yeah, like, Elizabeth is not trying to get to domesticity. She's trying to maintain her independent lifestyle, her, you know, freedom from domesticity. She does fall in love, but it's, you know, it's kind of questionable whether she's going to become any kind of perfect housewife. My. My feeling would be no.
[02:15:25] Speaker C: Yeah, and in a lot of the remakes, they do give her more domestic flair. And I think that's why the original feels so edgy, because by the end of it, she still can't cook. She's still not good at domestic stuff, and yet she's still highly desirable.
[02:15:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Like, where this differs, too, from, like, you know, Hallmark movies in general is that this is not a city girl going to the country and realizing that she belonged in the country the whole time. This is a city girl who goes to the country. You know, she has an all right time. But this girl's going to go back to the city, probably.
[02:15:57] Speaker B: Yes.
[02:15:58] Speaker C: And. And it's such a sexy film. Like, it's scandalous. It's, you Know, I, I, in my talk, I was like, it's, it's eroticism coded as, like, wholesome Americana.
And so one of the things it has that Hallmark movies don't is that hormones win the day.
It's like these two are just so attracted to each other that nothing is going to get in the way of their love.
[02:16:26] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. You don't find a lot of the modern Christmas movies, even outside of Hallmark, with a ton of just lust.
Like, we did the gay Christmas rom com dashing in December for the podcast, and that one had a little bit of heat and some of them will. But yeah, not, not, not so much. Not as much, which is too bad. This is what I want for my Christmas movie. I mean, hell, it's a Wonderful Life has an amazingly passionate kiss at one point.
[02:16:50] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. The season is perfect for, you know, there's mistletoe everywhere. It's perfect for smooching. Yeah.
[02:16:56] Speaker A: But there's no mistletoe in this movie. And they kiss anyway.
[02:16:59] Speaker C: I know.
Their chemistry is just too strong.
Yeah.
[02:17:04] Speaker A: Sophia, do you have any thoughts about, you know, the comparison of this film to sort of the modern Christmas romances?
[02:17:11] Speaker B: Just a lot of what Maria said that I think this has an edge that the other, that modern stuff doesn't.
And I don't know if it was because it was in the 40s, it seems so edgy. But even now, I would say no.
[02:17:25] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I would, I would just. I recommend this to people who want a movie to watch now for a Christmas Romance. I'm like, you know, like, you're gonna find this is one of the more progressive movies you're gonna find, and it's from 1945, so you're welcome. And learn about Barbara Stanwick and then learn to watch all her other movies, too.
[02:17:45] Speaker C: One of my friends doesn't like old movies, but she came to this for me because I was doing a lecture and she was like, you know what? I loved it. She was like, I was so invested in the characters and the sailor was handsome and I was rooting for him. And I was like, this whole thing is sexy. She's like, I think I might like old movies.
[02:18:06] Speaker A: Nice, nice, nice. Yep, there are some great ones. Like, they really get kind of a bad rap, I think. Like. And, like, if you see just a few of the wrong ones, it'll can put you off them. But if you see a few of the right ones, you can start. Yeah.
All right. And speaking of a few of the right ones, we're now going to do Our double feature recommendations. And Sophia, do you feel like starting this off? Sure.
[02:18:28] Speaker B: I recommended the bishop's wife from 1947, I think I watched Christmas in Connecticut and the Bishop's Wife to kind of together around the same time. So for me, they just. They go together. And I would also say that the Bishop's Wife is another one. That's just a delight.
Cary Grant is just charming is all. Get out.
So, yeah, that.
[02:18:52] Speaker A: And also, also, there's an element of sort of infidelity in that one. Yes.
It doesn't quite get there, but it's like on the line, you know?
[02:19:01] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
My next one is White Christmas from 1954. It has that, you know, old soldiers element. They bring the guys back from the old battalion, and it just is that they go to the Vermont this time for snow. They get out of the city and they're at the lodge. And, you know, all that charm. And that's just a classic. And one of my favorites.
[02:19:29] Speaker A: We covered it on an episode of every rom com too. And one of my favorite things about that episode is we actually talk about the history of the song White Christmas, which you want to listen to, seriously listen to that. At least that part of the podcast, because it's very illuminating.
I was so excited learning the stuff I learned about that song. Anyway. Sorry.
[02:19:47] Speaker B: Oh, real good. And then I chose the holiday from 2006. Again, this idea of going someplace else, like getting away from your frazzled life. And, you know, the two main characters, they switch houses and then the Kate Winslet character meets an old Hollywood writer and they talk about a meet cute and style from all, you know, movies.
[02:20:12] Speaker C: From the 40s and 50s.
[02:20:13] Speaker B: And it just has a fun, romantic charm. They're cozy.
Oh, and whoever directed it, was it Nora Ephron or the.
[02:20:24] Speaker C: Yes, Nora Ephraim.
[02:20:25] Speaker A: Really? Yes.
[02:20:26] Speaker C: No, no, no, no.
[02:20:29] Speaker B: Nancy Myers. That's the other one. She says in the commentary, there's this whole big scene in the beginning and Cameron Diaz is wearing pajamas, these silky pajamas. And she's like, everyone in the 40s and 50s were always running around in their pajamas. And I really wanted to bring that into this.
[02:20:43] Speaker C: And I'm like, yeah, the holiday is a huge rewatch for me every year. I saw it in the theaters when it first came out, and I watch it every year.
[02:20:53] Speaker A: So what. What are you recommending? You're not recommending the holiday? Because Sophia took that.
[02:20:58] Speaker C: Adding my. My vote to that. I would recommend the Shop around the Corner, which is 1940, so James Stewart and Margaret Sullivan, and it's a fun way to kind of bookend Christmas in Connecticut because it's Pre World War II. So you see the anxiety of the war looming on the horizon. And for as frothy and over the top and abundant and affluent as Christmas in Connecticut is, the Shop around the Corner is like the working person's romance when you're trying to get by and pay the bills and also, like, be seen as something more.
[02:21:33] Speaker A: So it's.
[02:21:33] Speaker C: It's very thoughtful and it's. It's got just some really great banter and some really lovely lines and hysterical the way they eroticize letter writing. There's some just wonderful lines and some great Hays Code stuff to watch. So check that one out. I watch it all the time.
The Lady Eve. So this is not a holiday film, but if you want just more Barbara Stanwyck being dazzling, 1941. It's her and Henry Fonda.
She is like a card shark who tries to face this man and falls in love with him.
And it's just delightful. I mean, it's. It's just two hours of her being incredible. And then my last one is Desk Set, 1957, with Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy.
And this one is in color, so the other two are in black or white.
And this is a really fun office place romance about a information desk woman. She runs sort of like the information center for an important company, media company. And Spencer Tracy is the guy who. Coming in with a machine that everyone thinks is going to replace their job. And because of the rumor mill, everything gets blown out of proportion.
And there's so much more going on in the film. But I think that's the best description I can give. It's a lot of fun because it does, I think, touch on AI anxieties that we're going through now. So there's that modern.
And it's also about being attracted to someone because they're just really smart. And there's that kind of, like, chemistry you have when you're both nerds between two people are nerds. And you're like, you're smart. That's sexy. So there's a lot of that attraction, which I think is fun. And it is a sort of holiday film in which that most of the movie takes place between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Nice. And so I like to watch it around Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving, because it gets me in the holiday spirit. And there's just really fun situational comedy. I mean, they're both hilarious. Katherine Heburn does such a fun, like, tipsy drunk in, you know, like a playful tipsy in the Christmas scenes. Like, it's just a really delightful movie.
[02:23:54] Speaker A: So that's the only one of our features that I haven't seen, and it's been on my watch list for a while, but I think you've moved it a little farther up my watch list, so.
[02:24:02] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, it's really fun. And that's a movie that I quote regularly.
[02:24:06] Speaker A: Nice.
All right, so for my three, the first one I'm going to recommend is Remember the night from 1939. And I would probably like this movie even more than Christmas in Connecticut, except that there is unfortunately a kind of racial stereotype character that is in just like the first 15 so minutes of the movie. It's really unfortunate because I think otherwise it's like a perfect movie movie in which Barbara Stanwyck plays a thief who Fred McMurray is prosecuting her, and he gets the case delayed until after Christmas because he knows that the jury will be more likely to convict if he gets the case delayed. But then he feels bad for her and tries to get her released from jail. When he finds out she has nowhere to go and that she's also from Indiana like he is, he ends up taking her home with him to Indian, Indiana to spend Christmas with his family.
And the. One of the reasons I love this movie, I mean, it's also like. Like Christmas in Connecticut. It has your cozy Christmas on in the country vibes.
There's a dance as well. But the thing I really love is Stanwick and McMurray, for me, to my mind, have the best chemistry of any actor that Stanwyck acted with. Their four films together, I wish there were like eight or ten of them.
Just love those two together. This is a really sexy film, and it also played with the Hays Code very closely. So really recommend Remember the Night. I think you had said that you'd seen this one, right, Maria?
[02:25:30] Speaker C: Yes, it's. It's a very touching, very, very thoughtful film.
[02:25:35] Speaker A: Yeah, it's got. Beulah Bondi plays Fred McMurray's mother, who also plays George Bailey's mother, and It's a Wonderful Life. So a lot of Christmas resonance there. My second double feature recommendation will be I'll Be seeing you from 1944 with Ginger Rogers and Joseph Cotton. Now, this is another wartime Christmas romance, but as I mentioned before, this one portrays Joseph Cotton's soldier character as suffering from ptsd. He is on leave from a military hospital where he's being treated for severe ptsd. Meanwhile, Ginger Rogers is on a leave from a jail, and you find out that the reason she's in jail is and really not her fault at all. But you find that out a little later. But they're both kind of keeping their weaknesses and vulnerabilities from each other.
But they're these two vulnerable people that are gradually falling in love and will they be able to, you know, reveal the truth to each other and get together? So, you know, it is a romance. So, you know, you probably can guess right what happens. But it's a really beautiful movie. It deals with some very dark topics, but manages, I think, to keep a really good balance.
Totally recommend this film.
And then my last double feature recommendation is one of my favorite Barbara Stanwyck romances, Ball of Fire from 1941, directed by Howard Hawks. And it also features uncle Felix's actor, S.C. zakal, who plays one of a variety of professors that Barbara Stanwyck ends up living with for a while while she's kind of hiding from the police on instructions from her, her mob boss boyfriend. The professors don't know this about her, by the way.
[02:27:09] Speaker C: This.
[02:27:10] Speaker A: It's screwball comedy hijinks again. And it's kind of got a Snow White and the Seven Dwarves aspect to it too. And basically she's playing this kind of outrageous dancer called Sugarpuss o' Shea and she's kind of bringing life and like fun to these professors lives. And the romance here is with Gary Cooper, who's playing a nerd, like a very virginal nerd in this movie. Gary Cooper. Gary Cooper. That was not his real life personality, but he makes a very cute, very tall virginal nerd character being seduced by Sugarpuss.
[02:27:42] Speaker C: I will say 10 out of 10 recommend. That's one of my favorite Barbara Stanwyck movies. And nice. You're just so happy when they get together at the end. Like they're. They've got good chemistry too.
[02:27:53] Speaker A: Oh yeah. Gary Cooper has become. Him and McMurray are my two Hollywood Hollywood crushes. Classic Hollywood crushes. But yeah, like, oh my God, yeah, those two together, forget about it.
All right, so we've given you our double feature recommendations.
Coming up on every rom com we're in the new year, we're going to conclude our sports rom com series with love and basketball and a variety of other sports romcoms. And can you remind us again, Maria, then where to find your work again?
[02:28:20] Speaker C: Absolutely. You can find it at my website, mariadblassi.com and, and I'm on Instagram and Facebook.
[02:28:26] Speaker A: All right. And remember, you can look in the show notes for that information, too. And thank you so much for listening and spending a bit of your holiday season with us, everybody. And goodbye.
[02:28:36] Speaker B: Goodbye. Happy holidays.
[02:28:38] Speaker C: Goodbye. Thank you so much for having me. Happy holidays.
