William HainesFilmography

Young and Beautiful

Actors: William Haines, Judith Allen, Joseph Cawthorn, John Miljan

Synopsis: Produced by small-scale Mascot Pictures, this behind-the-scenes look at a now forgotten annual Hollywood event, the WAMPAS Baby Star selection, starred former MGM light leading man William Haines in his penultimate film role. Well cast as Bob Preston, the brash publicity director of Superba Read More

Fast Life

Actors: William Haines, Madge Evans, Conrad Nagel, Arthur Byron, Cliff Edwards

Synopsis: In this comedy-adventure, an enterprising young man devises a new kind of speedboat motor. The trouble begins when he tries test out his new invention in the big race and finds he needs a sponsor. Fortunately, the beautiful but haughty daughter of a prominent shipwright is around to help and Read More

Are You Listening?

Actors: William Haines, Madge Evans, Anita Page, Karen Morley, Neil Hamilton

Synopsis: "Are you listening?" was the catchphrase of early-1930s radio personality Tony Wons. Though Wons does not appear in the 1932 MGM programmer Are You Listening?, the film is concerned with the burgeoning broadcast industry. William Haines plays a wise-cracking radio writer who is tricked into Read More

A Tailor Made Man

Actors: William Haines, Dorothy Jordan, Joseph Cawthorn, Marjorie Rambeau, William Austin

Synopsis: Previously filmed in 1922, the 1917 stage farce The Impostor was reheated in 1931 as the William Haines vehicle A Tailor Made Man. Essaying his usual brash wisecracker, Haines plays John Paul Bart, a pants-presser who tries to crash High Society by borrowing the dress suit owned by millionaire Read More

Wallingford

Actors: William Haines, Jimmy Durante, Ernest Torrence, Leila Hyams, Guy Kibbee

Synopsis: Officially released as The New Adventures of Get-Rich-Quick Wallingford, this William Haines vehicle was snappily adapted by Charles MacArthur from the "Wallingford" short stories by George Randolph Chester. Haines of course plays the title character, a breezy con artist in league with personable Read More

Just a Gigolo

Crew: Art Director

Actors: William Haines, Irene Purcell, C. Aubrey Smith, Charlotte Granville, Lillian Bond

Synopsis: Though silent-screen favorite William Haines wasn't able to sustain his popularity into the talkie era, he insisted upon honoring his MGM contract in such forgettable fare as Just a Gigolo. Based on a weather-beaten David Belasco play, the film casts Haines as Lord Robert Brummell, a footloose Read More

Free and Easy

Actors: Buster Keaton, Anita Page, Trixie Friganza, Robert Montgomery, Fred Niblo

Synopsis: Buster Keaton's talkie debut (discounting his non-speaking guest appearance in Hollywood Revue of 1929) was Free and Easy, an uneven but generally amusing comedy with a Hollywood setting. When pretty Elvira (Anita Page) of Gopher City, Kansas wins a beauty contest, her prize includes a trip to Read More

The Girl Said No

Actors: William Haines, Leila Hyams, Polly Moran, Marie Dressler

Synopsis: Screenland magazine summed up the William Haines vehicle The Girl Said No thusly: "The star plays another of his cut-up roles that make the critics gnash their teeth and the audience chortle." Had this review been printed in the 1990s, the character played by Haines might have been labelled a Read More

Navy Blues

Actors: William Haines, Anita Page, Karl Dane, J.C. Nugent, Wade Boteler

Synopsis: MGM house director Clarence Brown's first all-talkie, this pleasantly innocuous comedy drama stars William Haines as Jack Kelly, a carefree sailor picking up innocent Alice Brown (Anita Page) at a Ladies' Uplift Society Dance. Their whirlwind romance, however, ends abruptly when the girl's mother (Edythe Chapman Read More

Way Out West

Actors: William Haines, Leila Hyams, Cliff Edwards

Synopsis: A pleasant enough western parody starring one of the victims of sound, William Haines, Way Out West is the story of a carnival huckster forced to work on a western ranch in order to repay a couple of cowboys he once fleeced. There's a sandstorm, a fist-fight with the ubiquitous crooked foreman (Charles Middleton Read More

Remote Control

Actors: William Haines, Mary Doran, John Miljan, Polly Moran

Synopsis: In this comedy, a radio announcer works at the same station as a bogus psychic who while ostensibly answering fan letters on the air, is actually sending encoded messages to his gang concerning upcoming bank robberies. The clairvoyant is a real slick fellow and wins the love of the girl, the Read More

Hollywood Revue of 1929

Synopsis: With the arrival of talkies, every major studio hopped on the musical bandwagon by turning out lavish "revues," spotlighting their top stars performing specialty numbers. MGM's entry in this all-star genre was Hollywood Revue of 1929, which, though a box-office smash and a "Best Picture" Oscar Read More

A Man's Man

Actors: William Haines, Josephine Dunn, Sam Hardy, Mae Busch

Synopsis: Adapted from a 1925 play by Patrick Kearney, A Man's Man was popular MGM leading man William Haines' final silent film (albeit released with a musical score and sound-effects track). Haines is his usual bright-and-breezy self as Mel, a likable soda jerk in love with would-be actress Peggy (Josephine Dunn Read More

Speedway

Actors: William Haines, Anita Page, Karl Dane, Ernest Torrence, John Miljan

Synopsis: This cookie-cutter William Haines vehicle was filmed in part at the Indianapolis Speedway. As usual, Haines plays a fresh young braggart, in this instance a cocky racecar driver. Somewhere along the line, he falls in love with Anita Page, the daughter of an airplane manufacturer. After a dash in Read More

The Duke Steps Out

Actors: William Haines, Joan Crawford, Karl Dane, Tenen Holtz

Synopsis: Directed by James Cruze, this silent drama stars William Haines as Duke, a wealthy young heir who takes up prizefighting in order to prove that he doesn't need his father's money to make it in life. However, when he meets a beautiful college co-ed named Susie (Joan Crawford), he decides to halt Read More

West Point

Actors: William Haines, Joan Crawford, William Bakewell, Ralph Emerson

Synopsis: Reteamed with his favorite director Edward Sedgwick, William Haines once again plays the braggart-who-makes-good in West Point. Upon his arrival at the fabled military academy, Brice Wayne (Haines) alienates everyone with his wise-guy attitude and disregard for the rules. Only heroine Betty Read More

Telling the World

Actors: William Haines, Anita Page, Eileen Percy, Frank Currier, Polly Moran

The Smart Set

Actors: William Haines, Jack Holt, Alice Day, Hobart Bosworth

Synopsis: Having played an egotistical baseball player in Slide, Kelly, Slide, an egotistical golfer in Spring Fever, and an egotistical football star in West Point, can it be any surprise that William Haines was cast as a you-know-what polo player in The Smart Set? While touring Europe, Tommy van Buren Read More

Show People

Actors: Marion Davies, William Haines, Dell Henderson, Paul Ralli, Tenen Holtz

Synopsis: This Marion Davies vehicle was loosely inspired by the career of Gloria Swanson. Davies plays would-be starlet Peggy Pepper, who arrives at the gates of MGM Studios with her dad Colonel Pepper (Dell Henderson) in hopes of becoming a great dramatic actress. Instead, she a scores a hit as an ingenue Read More

Excess Baggage

Actors: William Haines, Josephine Dunn, Ricardo Cortez, Neely Edwards, Kathleen Clifford

Synopsis: MGM star William Haines was at the peak of his popularity when he starred in Excess Baggage. Haines plays Eddie Kane, a juggler-acrobat whose specialty is a dangerous high-wire act. While playing small-time vaudeville, he marries aspiring actress Elsa McCoy (Josephine Dunn). She goes on to fame Read More

Alias Jimmy Valentine

Actors: William Haines, Lionel Barrymore, Leila Hyams, Karl Dane, Tully Marshall

Synopsis: After holding out for several months, MGM decided to take the talking-picture plunge with Alias Jimmy Valentine. Actually, the film is 90% silent, with a few arbitrarily inserted talkie sequences. Digressing but little from the oft-filmed O. Henry original, the plot concerns a reformed Read More

Slide, Kelly, Slide

Synopsis: One of the most popular baseball films ever made, Slide, Kelly, Slide also solidified the stardom of MGM leading man William Haines. In his usual brash, cocky manner, Haines is cast as Jim Kelly, a self-styled baseball whiz who talks himself into a job with the New York Yankees. Though his Read More

A Little Journey

Actors: Claire Windsor, William Haines, Harry Carey, Claire McDowell, Lawford Davidson

Synopsis: Because of his impressive work in Brown of Harvard and Tell It to the Marines, William Haines had just achieved stardom when he was featured in this simple little comedy, based on the play by Rachel Crothers. But he's nearly upstaged by Harry Carey who, without his usual Western gear, makes a Read More

Spring Fever

Actors: William Haines, George K. Arthur, George Fawcett, Eileen Percy

Synopsis: Another of William Haines' sports-oriented vehicles, Spring Fever casts the star as lowly shipping clerk Jack Kelly. Falling in love with heiress Allie Monte (a young Joan Crawford), Jack bluffs his way into Allie's country club, posing as a champion golfer. By the time he realizes that Allie Read More

Thrill Hunter

Synopsis: On the verge of his greatest success with MGM, personable young William Haines starred in the energetic Columbia programmer The Thrill Hunter. Haines plays an irresponsible fellow who overdoses on a health tonic named "Peppo" and dreams he has been spirited off to the mythical country of Grecovia. Read More

Tell It to the Marines

Actors: Lon Chaney, William Haines, Eleanor Boardman, Eddie Gribbon, Carmel Myers

Synopsis: A tough-as-nails Marine sergeant sets about training a rag-tag group of boys into men. Though sporting a rough and gruff exterior, the sergeant is really a caring, gentle sort. During training, he is especially rough on a smart-alecky young man, whom he hones into a first rate fighter. More Read More

Lovey Mary

Actors: Bessie Love, William Haines, Mary Alden, Vivian Ogden

Synopsis: The frequently filmed Alice Hegan Rice novel Lovey Mary was given the slick MGM treatment in 1926. Bessie Love plays the title character, a 17-year-old orphanage runaway. Taken in by poor-but-kindly Mrs. Wiggs (Mary Alden), Lovey Mary spreads good cheer wherever she goes, even "curing" the town's Read More

Brown of Harvard

Actors: Jack Pickford, Mary Brian, Mary Alden, David Torrence

Synopsis: While the mid-1920s were deluged with films about college life, and Brown of Harvard is probably the ultimate silent film in this genre, even more significantly it is an early example of the buddy film. Never mind the romance between Harvard undergrad Tom Brown (William Haines) and professor's Read More

Memory Lane

Actors: Eleanor Boardman, Conrad Nagel, William Haines, John Steppling

Synopsis: Memory Lane is a vehicle for stars-in-the-making Eleanor Boardman and William Haines, both winners of an extensive MGM talent search. Boardman plays Mary, in love with poor-but-honest working stiff Joe Field (William Haines). But when Joe leaves town to seek his future in the Big City, Mary Read More

Mike

Actors: Sally O'Neil, William Haines, Charlie Murray, Ned Sparks

Synopsis: Sally O'Neil is "Mike," the hoydenish daughter of railroad-construction foreman Charles Murray. Our heroine tries to help out Harlan (William Haines), who's been having trouble finding work since serving a prison term for a crime he didn't commit. She arranges for Harlan to get a job on her dad's Read More

A Fool and His Money

Actors: Madge Bellamy, Stuart Holmes, Alma Bennett, Eugénie Besserer, Carrie Clark Ward

Synopsis: Author George Barr McCutcheon, who breathed life into many a mythical kingdom, wrote the story for this action-adventure. Although he was not yet a star, William Haines' swashbuckling performance proved that he was definitely on the rise. John Smart (Haines) is a struggling writer who inherits a Read More

Sally, Irene and Mary

Actors: Constance Bennett, Joan Crawford, Sally O'Neil, William Haines, Henry Kolker

Synopsis: Based on a musical comedy by Edward Dowling, this picture was Joan Crawford's breakthrough film. Her Charleston in this and other films would be defining moments for the 1920s. The worldly Sally (Constance Bennett), dreamy Irene (Crawford), and naïve Mary (Sally O'Neill) are friends who have risen Read More

Who Cares

The Tower of Lies

Actors: Norma Shearer, Lon Chaney, Ian Keith, Claire McDowell, William Haines

Synopsis: Director Victor Sjostrom and stars Lon Chaney and Norma Shearer made an impressive team on He Who Gets Slapped. They came together again for this dour and less interesting film, based on the novel The Emperor of Portugallia by the Swedish author Selma Lagerlof. Jan (Chaney) is a farmer whose hard Read More

Fighting the Flames

Actors: David Torrence, William Haines, Dorothy Devore, Sheldon Lewis, Frankie Darro

Synopsis: Horatio "Racy" Manly (William Haines) spends his time partying, much to the dismay of his father, Judge Manly (David Torrence). The frustrated judge finally disowns him. Racy befriends a young boy, Mickey (Frankie Darrow), whose father, Big Jim (Sheldon Lewis), is a criminal who is currently Read More

Slave of Fashion

Actors: Norma Shearer, Lew Cody, William Haines, Mary Carr, James Corrigan

Synopsis: Norma Shearer stars in this routine light comedy. Katherine Emerson (Shearer) decides to leave her small hometown in Iowa to make good in New York. The train taking her East is involved in a wreck and she winds up with a handbag belonging to Madeline (Miss Dupont), one of the fatalities. In the Read More

Little Annie Rooney

Actors: Mary Pickford, William Haines, Walter James, Gordon Griffith, Carlo Schipa, Hugh Fay

Synopsis: Thirty-two year old Mary Pickford returned to form as America's Sweetheart as Little Annie Rooney, a tough teenager from the streets who gets into mischief with her little gang of ruffians. She has a boyfriend, Joe Kelly (William Haines), whom she is sweet on. But when her father (Walter James) is Read More

Denial

Actors: Claire Windsor, Bert Roach, William Haines, Edward Connelly, Lucille Ricksen

Synopsis: When Dorothy (Lucille Ricksen) wants to marry Bob (Robert Agnew), her mother, Mildred (Claire Windsor), forbids the match. Dorothy angrily asserts that Mildred might reconsider if her own mother had forbid her marriage. The rest of the film is a flashback, as Mildred recalls her own youth Read More

Wine of Youth

Actors: Eleanor Boardman, James Morrison, Johnny Walker, Niles Welch, Creighton Hale

Synopsis: Based on the play Mary the Third by Rachel Crothers, Wine of Youth concerns Mary (Eleanor Boardman), a flapper whose mother (Eulalie Jensen) and grandmother (Gertrude Claire) were also named Mary. The first two Marys worked all their feminine wiles to snare their husbands, but the youngest Mary Read More

Circe the Enchantress

Actors: Mae Murray, James Kirkwood, Tom Ricketts

Synopsis: Mae Murray's pictures were the ultimate in jazz-era extravagance. This one is based on the novel by Vicente Blasco Ibanez, the same author who wrote the book on which The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse was based. Cecilie Brunner (Murray) was raised in a convent, but after her mother's death, she Read More

Gaiety Girl

Actors: Mary Philbin, Joseph J. Dowling, William Haines, Grace Darmond, Otto Hoffman

Synopsis: Mary Philbin, whose performance in The Merry-Go-Round had earned her critical raves, stars in this rather lightweight Universal "Jewel." William Tudor (Joseph J. Dowling) is so overloaded with debt that he is forced to give up the family castle, Pencarreg. After selling it to John Kershaw (Dewitt Jennings Read More

Wife of the Centaur

Actors: Eleanor Boardman, John Gilbert, Aileen Pringle, William Haines, Kate Price

Synopsis: John Gilbert was on the brink of superstardom when he appeared in this routine domestic drama -- his fame would explode within a year, when he starred in The Merry Widow and The Big Pararde back-to-back. Even though The Wife of the Centaur (based on the novel by Cyril Hume) wasn't a brilliant Read More

True As Steel

Actors: Aileen Pringle, Huntly Gordon, Cleo Madison, Eleanor Boardman, Norman Kerry

Synopsis: Centering a story on the dilemmas of a "modern business woman" seemed like a fine idea in 1924, so Rupert Hughes (whose nephew was a teenager named Howard R. Hughes) wrote and directed this drama for MGM. Aileen Pringle stars as the businesswoman in question, Eva Boutelle, whose husband, Harry (Norman Kerry Read More

Three Weeks

Actors: Aileen Pringle, John St. Polis, Helen Dunbar, Stuart Holmes

Synopsis: Aileen Pringle plays the Queen of Sardalia (one of your average, everyday mythical European principalities), who is unhappily married to the brutish King Constantine II (John Sainpolis). She takes a break from her duties to vacation in Switzerland, where she meets Englishman Paul Verdayne (Conrad Read More

The Midnight Express

Actors: Elaine Hammerstein, William Haines, George Nichols, Lloyd Whitlock, Edwin Booth Tilton

Synopsis: This railroad melodrama, featuring fading star Elaine Hammerstein, gave up-and-coming actor William Haines his first notable role (he was on loan to Columbia from Goldwyn). As Jack Oakes, the wastrel son of a railroad magnate, Haines actually has more to do than Hammerstein. Jack's father (George Nichols Read More

Three Wise Fools

Actors: Eleanor Boardman, William H. Crane, Alec B. Francis

Synopsis: Eleanor Boardman and William Haines came to Hollywood when they were winners in the same contest held by the Goldwyn studios. While Boardman's star rose faster than Haines' (with Brown of Harvard, he would eventually catch up), they appeared together in this comedy-drama adapted from the play by Read More

Souls for Sale

Actors: Eleanor Boardman, Mae Busch, Barbara La Marr, Richard Dix, Frank Mayo

Synopsis: This comedy-melodrama, based on the novel by Rupert Hughes (who also directed), blends fiction and reality to tell the story of a young woman's rise in Hollywood; the film uses real stars and productions (even Charles Chaplin filming A Woman of Paris) as its backdrop. Eleanor Boardman plays Read More