Alice Adams (1935) on Netflix
Alice Adams, from a struggling family, tries to appear upper class and to win the wealthy Arthur Russell. Her mother pushes her father into a risky business venture.
- Netflix3.9/5
- IMDb6.8/104,954 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes89%
Plot summary
Alice Adams lives with her family in modest circumstances. Her father is an invalid who has long worked as a clerk at Mr. Lamb's factory. Her mother is bitter about his lack of ambition and about the snubs that poverty brings her daughter. Her brother Walter gambles and cannot hold a job. Alice, like her mother, tries to climb socially. She meets the wealthy Arthur Russell at a dance hosted by Mildred Palmer, and he finds her charming despite her poverty. Her mother then urges her father to quit his job and put his savings into a glue factory.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Alice Adams (1935)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- George Stevens and Katharine Hepburn disliked the original screenplay so much that, with Stevens's friend Mortimer Offner, they threw out most of the work by Dorothy Yost and Jane Murfin and rewrote it using dialogue taken from Booth Tarkington's novel.
SPOILER
Producer Pandro S. Berman and RKO executives wanted a happy ending in which Alice wins Russell; Stevens and Hepburn fought the change, but Berman brought in George Cukor, who called the realistic ending box-office poison, and the script was altered.- Bette Davis won the Best Actress Oscar for Dangerous but said Katharine Hepburn deserved it for Alice Adams, which was also nominated for Best Picture; Hepburn drew the second highest number of votes.
- Hepburn's popularity had slid after her two 1933 triumphs, the Oscar-winning Morning Glory and Little Women, and her performance in Alice Adams made her a public favorite again.
