“...if you miss The Working Man you have missed Arliss at his best.” — Washington Post
Directed by John G. Adolfi
In the 1930s, as MGM produced glossy cinematic extravaganzas for middle-class audiences and Paramount focused on films with continental elegance for the sophisticated, Warner Bros. churned out movies for the working class. Even the studio’s most prestigious leading men (George Arliss and Paul Muni), both known for “costumers” and historical dramas, were often assigned to low-budget potboilers and comedies. Adapted from Edgar Franklin’s 1916 short story Adapted Father, John Adolfi’s The Working Man seemed to be the perfect proletarian situation comedy to humanize stagy George Arliss for Depression-era audiences, casting him as a bored tycoon who takes over his deceased rival’s company in order to become the righteous benefactor to the rival’s irresponsible children.
Arliss was one of the few actors at Warner Bros. who was contractually able to oversee many aspects of the production of his films, including the selection of cast and crew. With an unassuming background in B-pictures, director John Adolfi may seem an unexpected Arliss choice. However, Adolfi had directed Arliss in most of his prominent films at Warner Bros. until he died quite unexpectedly in 1933 at the age of 52.
Touted as Hollywood’s “hottest new star” during this period, Bette Davis made seven films for Warner Bros. between January 1933 and April of 1934. After Arliss snatched Davis from bit-player obscurity for The Man Who Played God (1932), the two were paired again the next year in The Working Man. Observing Davis’ new sense of creative self-assertion, Arliss stated on set “my little bird has flown, hasn’t she?” Still, it wasn’t until Jack Warner relented to Davis’s demands that she be loaned to RKO for Of Human Bondage (1934) that Hollywood began to notice such a richly complex and compelling actress.
Even though The Working Man was a typical Warner Bros. “programmer” (taking only eighteen days to shoot), the critical reception was respectfully positive, particularly for Arliss and Davis. Fox would adapt the Franklin short story just three years later as Everybody’s Old Man (1936).
The Working Man was preserved from the 35mm nitrate original picture and track negatives held at the Library of Congress. Given that the picture negative had damaged sections and missing footage, the Archive replaced sections in the new dupe negative with dupe negative made from a 35mm acetate fine grain master positive belonging to Warner Bros., and from a 35mm nitrate composite print in the Warner Bros. collection at the Archive.
Todd Wiener
Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc. Screenwriters: Charles Kenyon and Maude T. Howell. Based on a story by: Edgar Franklin. Cinematographer: Sol Polito. Editor: Owen Marks. With: George Arliss, Bette Davis, Theodore Newton, Hardie Albright, Gordon Westcott.
35mm, b/w, 78 min.
Preserved in cooperation with Warner Bros. and Library of Congress Packard Campus for Audio-Visual Conservation from the 35mm nitrate original picture and track negatives, a 35mm acetate composite fine grain master positive, and a 35mm nitrate composite print. Laboratory services by The Stanford Theatre Film Laboratory, Audio Mechanics, DJ Audio. Special thanks to Ned Price.
