Bad Girl (1931) on Netflix
Dorothy Haley, a store model, puts off her boss by claiming a prizefighter husband. She meets Eddie Collins, who works in a radio shop and is saving for one of his own.
- Netflix3.2/5
- IMDb6.4/101,930 votes
- Rotten TomatoesNot available
Plot summary
Dorothy Haley and Edna Driggs work as store models, and one afternoon they pose in bridal clothes at the shop. When Dorothy's boss offers her a ride, she puts him off by saying she is married to a prizefighter. The women spend the day at Coney Island, and on the steamboat back they wager over which of them can draw the notice of a man aboard; Dorothy strums a ukulele at him until he reacts. He is Eddie Collins, who works in a radio shop and is saving toward one of his own. He walks Dorothy home. When he forgets a date, she finds him at his boarding house, and they stay together until four in the morning. Dorothy fears facing her brother Jim Haley, her guardian, and Eddie proposes marriage as a way out.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Bad Girl (1931)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- A November 16, 1928 Hays Office memo said the novel might be produced as a sex hygiene picture called "Motherhood" and called it a "nauseating story of doctors, illnesses" and "cheap and shoddy writing about cheap and shoddy people". Rival studios Pathé, MGM, Paramount, Universal and Columbia were scared off by Hays Office warnings of censor cuts.
- Fox executives had little faith in Bad Girl's commercial appeal and Frank Borzage himself refused to direct it; Fox pressured him into taking the job because his contract was about to expire and was not expected to be renewed. The studio also budgeted less than $100,000 and hired unknown actors.
- Frank Borzage wanted Spencer Tracy to play Bad Girl's lead role of Eddie Collins, but Fox would not agree to it.
- Borzage chose New York stage actor James Dunn for the role of Eddie after seeing a screen test Dunn made at Fox Film's Astoria Studios in Queens, and signed him to a Fox contract. Bad Girl was Dunn's screen debut.
- Stage producer Robert V. Newman sued Fox and the Roxy Theatre after the New York premiere, arguing he had sold Fox the rights to the play on condition the film not open before September 1. The New York Supreme Court threw out the case, saying "no substantial damage" had been done.
