Fay BainterFilmography

The Children's Hour

Actors: Audrey Hepburn, Shirley MacLaine, James Garner, Miriam Hopkins, Fay Bainter

Synopsis: Based on the 1934 play by Lillian Hellman, The Children's Hour is set at an exclusive girl's school managed by best friends Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine. When student Karen Balkin is punished for one of her many misdeeds, the mean-spirited youngster rushes to her wealthy aunt Fay Bainter Read More

Studio One: Black Rain

The President's Lady

Actors: Susan Hayward, Charlton Heston, John McIntire, Fay Bainter, Ralph Dumke

Synopsis: The President's Lady is an historical drama starring Charlton Heston as Andrew Jackson and Susan Hayward as his wife Rachel, Jackson marries Rachel after she divorces her unfaithful first husband (Whitfield Connor), with scandal resulting when the ex-husband refuses to finalize the divorce. Read More

Close to My Heart

Actors: Ray Milland, Gene Tierney, Fay Bainter, Howard St. John, Mary Beth Hughes

Synopsis: Paramount's Ray Milland and 20th Century-Fox's Gene Tierney star in Warner Bros.' Close to My Heart. The stars play, respectively, journalist Brad Sheridan and his wife Midge. Unable to have children of her own, Midge opts for adoption, thereby subjecting her husband and herself to the very Read More

June Bride

Actors: Bette Davis, Robert Montgomery, Fay Bainter, Betty Lynn, Tom Tully, Barbara Bates

Synopsis: June Bride is based on Feature for June, a play by Eileen Tighe and Graeme Lorimer. Bette Davis plays the businesslike editor of a fashionable woman's magazine, who plans a feature on a "typical" midwestern marriage. She assigns her aide (and former fiance) Robert Montgomery to cover the story, a Read More

Give My Regards to Broadway

Actors: Dan Dailey, Charles Winninger, Nancy Guild, Fay Bainter, Charlie Ruggles

Synopsis: Charles Winninger plays the head of a vaudevillian family who, when jobs become scarce, takes a humble factory job. He dreams of sustaining a show-biz dynasty with his grown children, but none of them show any real interest in trodding the boards. Realizing that the golden days are past, Winninger Read More

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

Actors: Danny Kaye, Virginia Mayo, Boris Karloff, Fay Bainter, Ann Rutherford

Synopsis: James Thurber wasn't too happy with the Sam Goldwyn film adaptation of his 1939 short story The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, but the Technicolor musical comedy proved to be a cash cow at the box office. Danny Kaye stars as Walter, a milquetoast proofreader for a magazine publishing firm. Walter is Read More

Deep Valley

Actors: Ida Lupino, Dane Clark, Wayne Morris, Fay Bainter, Henry Hull

Synopsis: Just as she had in High Sierra (1941), Ida Lupino enjoys a brief moment of bliss with a man on the run in this highly emotional drama from Warner Bros. She plays Libby, a mountain girl nearly deprived of speech due to her rather hostile environment in general and repressive home life in Read More

The Virginian

Actors: Joel McCrea, Brian Donlevy, Sonny Tufts, Barbara Britton, Fay Bainter

Synopsis: Owen Wister's 1902 novel was made into a movie several times, most notably in 1929, with Gary Cooper starring. This 1946 remake of the often-filmed saga gave Joel McCrea the title role as the standing-tall cowboy in Wyoming. The Virginian and his best friend Steve (Sonny Tufts) are rivals for the Read More

The Kid from Brooklyn

Actors: Danny Kaye, Virginia Mayo, Vera-Ellen, Steve Cochran, Eve Arden

Synopsis: Danny Kaye's The Kid From Brooklyn is a virtual scene-for-scene remake of Harold Lloyd's The Milky Way (1936), with music and Technicolor added to the proceedings. Kaye is cast as timid milkman Burleigh Sullivan, who through a fluke knocks out prizefighting champion Speed McFarlane (Steve Read More

State Fair

Actors: Jeanne Crain, Dana Andrews, Dick Haymes, Vivian Blaine, Charles Winninger

Synopsis: Twentieth Century-Fox couldn't make a film version of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein's Oklahoma in 1945--that particular Broadway musical would remain a "hot ticket" until the end of the decade--so the studio did the next best thing by hiring Rodgers & Hammerstein to pen the score for the Read More

Three is a Family

Actors: Marjorie Reynolds, Charlie Ruggles, Helen Broderick, Arthur Lake

Synopsis: Based on a play by Phoebe and Henry Ephron, Three Is a Family is a 1940s farce that frequently substitutes noise for humor. Charlie Ruggles plays a hubby whose bungled business schemes force his wife Fay Bainter to enter the workplace. The couple's daughter Marjorie Reynolds shows up with her twin Read More

Dark Waters

Actors: Merle Oberon, Franchot Tone, Thomas Mitchell, Fay Bainter, Rex Ingram, John Qualen

Synopsis: Adapted from a Saturday Evening Post serial by Frank and Marian Cockrell, Dark Waters stars Merle Oberon as heiress Leslie Calvin, a woman with a neurotic aversion to water. This stems from the fact that in her childhood, Leslie was one of four survivors of a torpedoed steamship. Preying upon Read More

The Heavenly Body

Actors: William Powell, Hedy Lamarr, James Craig, Fay Bainter, Henry O'Neill

Synopsis: In this light romantic comedy, William B. Whitley (William Powell) is an astronomer who is very excited about his latest discovery, a comet that has been named after him. However, Whitley has been so busy tracking the course of his comet as its path leads straight into the moon that he's been Read More

Cry Havoc

Actors: Margaret Sullavan, Ann Sothern, Joan Blondell, Fay Bainter, Marsha Hunt

Synopsis: Allen R. Kerward's flagwaving stage play Proof thro' the Night was vastly improved in its screen adaptation, which was retitled Cry Havoc. Margaret Sullavan (making her first screen appearance in two years), Joan Blondell and Ann Southern are among the appropriately deglamorized actresses playing Read More

The Human Comedy

Actors: Mickey Rooney, Frank Morgan, Fay Bainter, James Craig, Marsha Hunt, Ray Collins, Van Johnson

Synopsis: Author William Saroyan's corn-shucking brand of sentimentality works wonders in this 1943 filmization of his novel. Narrator Ray Collins is dead before the film begins; thus he is able to provide an all-seeing overview of the tiny community of Ithaca, California. The principal character, played by Mickey Rooney Read More

Presenting Lily Mars

Actors: Judy Garland, Van Heflin, Fay Bainter, Marta Eggerth, Richard Carlson, Spring Byington

Synopsis: A Booth Tarkington novel was the source for the so-so Judy Garland musical Presenting Lily Mars. Garland plays the title character, a small-town girl with big-city ambitions. She heads to Broadway hoping for stardom, but after a series of disappointments the best she can manage is an understudy Read More

Salute to the Marines

Actors: William Lundigan, Wallace Beery, Fay Bainter, Reginald Owen, Keye Luke, Ray Collins

Synopsis: In this wartime comedy drama an ultra-macho but aging Marine sergeant does all he can to keep his men intimidated and towing the line while they are stationed in the Philippines at the beginning of WW II. The tough-as-nails jarhead does have a terrible secret though--he has never been involved in Read More

The War Against Mrs. Hadley

Actors: Edward Arnold, Fay Bainter, Richard Ney, Jean Rogers, Sara Allgood

Synopsis: In this WW II propaganda piece a wealthy American society matron refuses to sacrifice her material comforts to aid the war effort until she realizes that her selfishness is cheating the boys overseas who are fighting for her freedom. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch

Actors: Fay Bainter, Carolyn Lee, Hugh Herbert, Vera Vague, John Archer

Synopsis: So far as W.C. Fields fans are concerned, Ann Hegan Rice's sentimental 1901 novel Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch was definitively filmed in 1934. After seven reels' worth of a lachrymose plot about the impoverished Mrs. Wiggs (Pauline Lord) holding her large family together while her husband was Read More

Journey for Margaret

Actors: Margaret O'Brien, Robert Young, Laraine Day, Fay Bainter, Nigel Bruce

Synopsis: This wartime weeper could just as well have been titled Stardom for Margaret, inasmuch as it solidified the popularity of that remarkable child actress Margaret O'Brien. While visiting London, American married couple Robert Young and Laraine Day are caught in the middle of the 1940 blitz. Read More

Woman of the Year

Actors: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Fay Bainter, Reginald Owen, William Bendix

Synopsis: Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn costarred for the first time in the delectable romantic comedy Woman of the Year. Tracy plays New York sportswriter Sam Craig, who becomes incensed at comments about the uselessness of sports made by foreign correspondent Tess Harding (Hepburn). Sam and Tess Read More

Love Crazy

Actors: William Powell, Myrna Loy, Gail Patrick, Jack Carson, Florence Bates

Synopsis: William Powell and Myrna Loy re-team for this (literally) crazy screwball comedy about a happily married couple who, thanks to a visit from mother, find their marriage on the rocks and the husband committed to a mental institution. Poised to celebrate their fourth wedding anniversary, Steven (William Powell Read More

Babes on Broadway

Actors: Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Richard Quine, Fay Bainter, Virginia Weidler, Ray McDonald

Synopsis: Advertised as a sort of sequel to MGM's Babes in Arms (1939), Babes on Broadway reunites the two stars of the earlier film: Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland. Rooney is the guiding force of a group of young showbiz hopefuls who are trying to make it on Broadway. When things look darkest, he goes into Read More

Maryland

Actors: Walter Brennan, Fay Bainter, Brenda Joyce, John Payne, Charlie Ruggles

Synopsis: The success of 1938's Kentucky prompted 20th Century-Fox to come up with the similar (though not entirely identical) horse-racing opus Maryland. After her husband (Russell Hicks) is killed during a fox hunt, Maryland matriarch Charlotte Danfield (Fay Bainter) forbids her son Lee (John Payne) from Read More

Our Town

Actors: William Holden, Martha Scott, Fay Bainter, Beulah Bondi, Thomas Mitchell

Synopsis: Thornton Wilder's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Our Town is given the Hollywood treatment in this adaptation directed by Sam Wood featuring an evocative score by Aaron Copland and outstanding production design by William Cameron Menzies. Frank Craven is Mr. Morgan, the narrator and our guide through Read More

A Bill of Divorcement

Actors: Maureen O'Hara, Adolphe Menjou, Fay Bainter, Herbert Marshall, Dame May Whitty

Synopsis: A creaky remake of the 1932 film of the same name, Bill of Divorcement tells of the effect an emotionally disturbed father's homecoming has on this household. Adolphe Menjou, a longtime mental patient, is released after 20 years' confinement and returns home. Only vaguely aware of the time lapse, Menjou Read More

Young Tom Edison

Actors: Mickey Rooney, Fay Bainter, George Bancroft, Virginia Weidler, Eugene Pallette

Synopsis: This film follows the teenage years of brilliant inventor Thomas Alva Edison (Mickey Rooney) as the young man troubles his family and his school teachers with his great quest for knowledge. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide Read More

Yes, My Darling Daughter

Actors: Priscilla Lane, Jeffrey Lynn, Roland Young, Fay Bainter, May Robson

Synopsis: In this comedy, a young woman is determined to spend a weekend with her lover before he takes off to Europe for his new job. Her mother, a devout feminist, disapproves of her daughter's plan. When her daughter learns that her mother had a similar youthful affair with a poet years before, she uses Read More

Daughters Courageous

Actors: John Garfield, Claude Rains, Fay Bainter, Donald Crisp, May Robson

Synopsis: This family drama features the same cast and crew from the highly successful Four Daughters, but it isn't actually a sequel. Whereas the first film was a chronicle of the Lemp family, this one centers on the Masters family. This film is also characterized by a much happier ending than its Read More

Our Neighbors the Carters

Actors: Fay Bainter, Frank Craven, Edmund Lowe, Genevieve Tobin, Mary Thomas

Synopsis: The Carter Family finds itself in serious financial difficulty when its patriarch, druggist Doc Carter (Frank Craven), is all but forced out of business by a neighboring chain store. Doc isn't worried so much for himself and his wife Emma (Fay Bainter) as he is for his five children, played by Read More

The Lady and the Mob

Actors: Fay Bainter, Ida Lupino, Lee Bowman, Henry Armetta, Warren Hymer

Synopsis: How could anyone dislike a film with the title Lady and the Mob? Sweet Fay Bainter stars as eccentric dowager Hattie Leonard, who takes it upon herself to smash a dry-cleaning racket. When the crooks and the cops laugh at her efforts, the resourceful Hattie sets about to organize her own Read More

The Arkansas Traveler

Actors: Fay Bainter, John Beal, Jean Parker, Lyle Talbot

Synopsis: In its never-ending efforts to find a "rustic" screen personality to replace the late Will Rogers, Hollywood turned to popular radio humorist Bob Burns. In Paramount's The Arkansas Traveller, Burns plays the nameless title character, who wanders in out of the nowhere to settle down in a dusty Read More

Mother Carey's Chickens

Actors: Anne Shirley, Ruby Keeler, James Ellison, Fay Bainter, Walter Brennan

Synopsis: Katharine Hepburn's association with RKO Radio Pictures came to an abrupt end when she refused to star in the studio's adaptation of Kate Douglas Wiggins' sentimental novel Mother Carey's Chickens. Hepburn was replaced by musical-comedy favorite Ruby Keeler, who though woefully miscast did her Read More

White Banners

Actors: Claude Rains, Fay Bainter, Jackie Cooper, Bonita Granville, Henry O'Neill

Synopsis: Based on another of Lloyd C. Douglas' "better living through faith" short stories, White Banners stars Claude Rains as a chemistry professor who invents an icebox that requires no ice. The invention is stolen, throwing Rains and his faithful young assistant Jackie Cooper into a deep depression. Rains Read More

Jezebel

Actors: Bette Davis, Henry Fonda, George Brent, Margaret Lindsay, Donald Crisp, Fay Bainter

Synopsis: In 1938, Jezebel was widely regarded as Warner Bros.' "compensation" to Bette Davis for her losing the opportunity to play Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With the Wind. Resemblances between the two properties are inescapable: Jezebel heroine Julie Marsden (Davis) is a headstrong Southern belle not unlike Read More

The Shining Hour

Actors: Joan Crawford, Margaret Sullavan, Robert Young, Melvyn Douglas, Fay Bainter

Synopsis: Frank Borzage directed this doomed romance starring Joan Crawford as Olivia Riley, the young bride of Henry Linden (Melvyn Douglas), an upper-crust conservative. Olivia is a show girl in a New York nightclub and when Henry brings her home to his family -- his brother David (Robert Young) and Read More

Make Way for Tomorrow

Actors: Victor Moore, Beulah Bondi, Fay Bainter, Thomas Mitchell, Ray Mayer

Synopsis: While not a box-office success, this drama, directed by Leo McCarey, developed a potent reputation among film critics and movie buffs for its sensitive and perceptive treatment of the problems of the elderly. When McCarey won the Oscar for Best Director the same year for The Awful Truth, he Read More

The Soldier and the Lady

Actors: Anton Walbrook, Elizabeth Allan, Margot Grahame, Akim Tamiroff, Fay Bainter

Synopsis: Based on a story by Jules Verne and featuring battle footage from a French film version of the tale, this epic action-adventure follows a courageous courier of the Czar Alexander II as he struggles to deliver vital information to Russian troops fighting a losing battle against the invading Tartar Read More

Quality Street

Actors: Katharine Hepburn, Franchot Tone, Eric Blore, Fay Bainter, Cora Witherspoon

Synopsis: Previously filmed with Marion Davies in 1927, the lightweight James M. Barrie play Quality Street proved an ideal vehicle for Katharine Hepburn ten years later. The setting of the Barrie original was switched from 1805 Scotland to 1815 Regency England, to avoid a preponderance of brogues and to Read More

This Side of Heaven

Actors: Lionel Barrymore, Fay Bainter, Mae Clarke, Tom Brown, Una Merkel

Synopsis: This Side of Heaven is an early, muted example of what would refine itself into the "screwball comedy" genre. Lionel Barrymore plays an accountant, who's also the head of a large family consisting principally of dizzy buffoons. Not only that, but the Barrymore clan is selfish, totally Read More