Ball of Fire
Overview
 
Ball of Fire is a 1941 American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 romantic comedy film
Romantic comedy film
Romantic comedy films are films with light-hearted, humorous plotlines, centered on romantic ideals such as that true love is able to surmount most obstacles. One dictionary definition is "a funny movie, play, or television program about a love story that ends happily"...

 directed by Howard Hawks
Howard Hawks
Howard Winchester Hawks was an American film director, producer and screenwriter of the classic Hollywood era...

, and starring Gary Cooper
Gary Cooper
Frank James Cooper, known professionally as Gary Cooper, was an American film actor. He was renowned for his quiet, understated acting style and his stoic, but at times intense screen persona, which was particularly well suited to the many Westerns he made...

 and Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck was an American actress. She was a film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong screen presence, and a favorite of directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang and Frank Capra...

. The RKO Pictures
RKO Pictures
RKO Pictures is an American film production and distribution company. As RKO Radio Pictures Inc., it was one of the Big Five studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chains and Joseph P...

 film is about a group of professors laboring to write an encyclopedia
Encyclopedia
An encyclopedia is a type of reference work, a compendium holding a summary of information from either all branches of knowledge or a particular branch of knowledge....

 and their encounter with a nightclub performer who provides her own unique knowledge. The supporting cast includes Oskar Homolka, S. Z. Sakall, Henry Travers
Henry Travers
Henry Travers was an English actor. His most memorable role was that of the angel, Clarence, in the 1946 motion picture It's A Wonderful Life.-Early life:...

, Richard Haydn
Richard Haydn
Richard Haydn was an English comic actor in radio, films and television.-Early life and career:Born George Richard Haydon in London, he was known for playing eccentric characters, such as Edwin Carp, Claud Curdle, Richard Rancyd and Stanley Stayle. Much of his stage delivery was done in a...

, Dana Andrews
Dana Andrews
Dana Andrews was an American film actor. He was one of Hollywood's major stars of the 1940s, and continued acting, though generally in less prestigious roles, into the 1980s.-Early life:...

, and Dan Duryea
Dan Duryea
Dan Duryea was an American actor, known for roles in film, stage and television.-Early life:Born and raised in White Plains, New York, Duryea graduated from White Plains Senior High School in 1924 and Cornell University in 1928. While at Cornell, Duryea was elected into the Sphinx Head Society...

. In 1948, the plot was resurrected as a musical film, A Song Is Born
A Song Is Born
A Song Is Born was a 1948 Technicolor musical film remake, starring Danny Kaye and Virginia Mayo, of 1941 movie Ball of Fire with Gary Cooper...

, starring Danny Kaye
Danny Kaye
Danny Kaye was a celebrated American actor, singer, dancer, and comedian...

 and Virginia Mayo
Virginia Mayo
Virginia Mayo was an American film actress.After a short career in vaudeville, Mayo progressed to films and during the 1940s established herself as a supporting player in such films as The Best Years of Our Lives and White Heat .Mayo remained an A-list actress into the mid-'50s, but then went...

.
A group of professors have been lived together for years in a New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 residence, compiling an encyclopedia of all human knowledge.
Quotations

I love him because he's a kind of a guy that gets drunk on a glass of buttermilk.

[about the professors' workroom] Say, who decorated this place? The mug that shot Lincoln?

Who is that guy who learned so much from watching an apple drop?

[to Sugarpuss] I shall regret the absence of your keen mind. Unfortunately, it is inseparable from an extremely disturbing body.

Category:comedy films

 
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