Featurette
Plot summary
Adam Bonner is an assistant district attorney in New York, and his wife Amanda practices defense law on her own. The morning after Doris Attinger shoots her husband Warren in the shoulder, the Bonners read about the case and disagree. Amanda points to the double standard applied to men and women over adultery, while Adam considers Doris guilty of attempted murder. Adam is assigned to prosecute, and Amanda becomes Doris's lawyer. Amanda argues that men and women are equal and that Warren's adultery and abuse drove Doris to the shooting, which Adam regards as contempt for the law. The two fight the case in court by day and carry the quarrel home.
Cast
Show all 20 cast
- Elizabeth Flournoyas Dr. Margaret Brodeigh
- Charles Bastinas Young District Attorney
- Harry Baumas Commuter
- Harris Brownas Court Attendant (uncredited)
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Adam's Rib (1949)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The plot came from the real lives of married lawyers Dorothy and William Dwight Whitney, friends of writer Ruth Gordon: they took opposing sides in actor Raymond Massey's divorce from actress Adrienne Allen, then divorced each other so they could marry the clients they had represented.
- Judy Holliday at first turned down the role of Doris Attinger. According to co-writer Garson Kanin, she objected because the script called her character "fatso."
- Cole Porter refused to write a song for Hepburn's character while she was named Madelaine; once the name was changed to Amanda he reworked "So Long, Samoa," a tune he had written in the South Pacific in 1940 and discarded as mediocre.
- The song, rechristened "Farewell, Amanda," brought in money that went to cancer research: in June 1949 the Hollywood Reporter said Porter and MGM had agreed to donate all profits from it to the Runyon Cancer Fund.
- Columbia Pictures president Harry Cohn treated Judy Holliday's supporting performance as a screen test for Born Yesterday, the Kanin play she had starred in on Broadway. Her notices for Adam's Rib won her the film role, and with it the Academy Award for Best Actress.
