YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU (1938)

MORE 1001 MOVIES FROM THE 30's

(Post 16 of 20) 

 Lionel Barrymore, Jimmy Stewart, Jean Arthur, Edward Arnold

discuss politics, romance and right and wrong

in You Can't Take It With You

You Can't Take it With You is a film (based on the successful Kaufman and Hart play) that is about a man from a financial well-to-do family (Jimmy Stewart) who falls for a girl (Jean Arthur) who is from a family of eccentrics (led by the grandfather, Lionel Barrymore). There are lots of fun goings on and it isn't too hard to not picture this film as being adapted from the stage. In the end, The lovable Vanderhof family (led by Barrymore) get the best of the business minded Kirby family (led by Edward Arnold)...but no surprise there. 

This film won the 1938 Best Picture Oscar...but didn't make the 1001 movie book cut.

And the Elisha Cook Jr. supporting player award goes to...(tie) Dub Taylor and Charles Lane. There are so many supporting players I could give this award to....Banker Edward Arnold, eccentric Mischa Auer, flighty Spring Byington, the meek Donald Meek, dancer Ann Miller, the put upon H. B. Warner and future Jack Benny regular Eddie "Rochester" Anderson. But I'm giving the award to two character actors that had exceptionally long Hollywood careers.

First is Dub Taylor. You Can't Take It With You is Dub's first screen credit. He racked up over 250 more movie and television credits during his career, culminating with Maverick in 1994. I always picture Dub as a grizzled prospector, but he played a variety of roles, many times as a heavy, and almost always in just a scene or two. Dub's memorable roles includes the guy that sets up Bonnie and Clyde in Bonnie and Clyde, the Reverend giving a sermon in The Wild Bunch and one of the three saloon old-timers (with Harry Carey Jr. and Pat Buttram) in Back to the Future III.

Taylor died in 1994 at the age of 87.

I'm guessing his role in You Can't Take It With You as the former Alabama football star who plays the xylophone is his only role where he gets to show off his xylophone skills, but I haven't researched it too thoroughly.

 Dancer Ann Miller and 

Xylophonist Dub Taylor in 

You Can't Take it With You

Dub Taylor before the bullets fly 

in Bonnie and Clyde

Charles Lane had an even longer career than Taylor. In You Can't Take It With You, he plays a stern, humorless IRS agent. He also plays Potter's associate in Capra's It's a Wonderful Life. It seemed like a stern and humorless suit without a heart is about the only part he ever played. He may be remembered best for the recurring role of Homer Bedlow on the sitcom Petticoat Junction, where he plays a stern, humorless suit (as always) who just wants to shutdown the train because...why does he always want to shut that train down again? Lane's sixy-five year career included 365 movie credits. About the only sympathetic part I can ever remember seeing him in was an episode of L. A. Law where he played an elderly bank robber. Lane died in 2007 at the ripe old age of 102.

No respect for the character actor: On the DVD extra for You Can't Take It With You, Frank Capra Jr. says something to the effect of "my dad always liked this actor, he used him often" during Lane's scene. You get that? Lane didn't even get his name mentioned in the commentary by the director's son even while praising his work!...Ah, the life of the character actor.

Lionel Barrymore gets the best of  I. R.S. worker

Charles Lane in You Can't Take It With You

Homer Bedlow (Charles Lane) schemes to shut down

the Hooterville train in an episode of Petticoat Junction.

I still can't remember why he wants to shut down

that damn train!