The Shocking Miss Pilgrim is a 1947

1947 in film

The year 1947 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*May 22 - Great Expectations is premiered in New York.*November 24 : The United States House of Representatives of the 80th Congress voted 346 to 17 to approve citations for contempt of Congress against the "Hollywood Ten".*November 25...

 American

Cinema of the United States

The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...

 musical

Musical film

The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...

 comedy film

Comedy film

Comedy film is a genre of film in which the main emphasis is on humour. They are designed to elicit laughter from the audience. Comedies are mostly light-hearted dramas and are made to amuse and entertain the audiences...

 written and directed by George Seaton

George Seaton

George Seaton was an American screenwriter, playwright, film director and producer, and theatre director.Born George Stenius in South Bend, Indiana, Seaton moved to Detroit after graduating from college to work as an actor on radio station WXYZ. John L...

, starring Betty Grable

Betty Grable

Elizabeth Ruth "Betty" Grable was an American actress, dancer and singer.Her iconic bathing suit photo made her the number-one pin-up girl of the World War II era. It was later included in the LIFE magazine project "100 Photos that Changed the World"...

 and Dick Haymes

Dick Haymes

Richard Benjamin "Dick" Haymes was an Argentine actor and one of the most popular male vocalists of the 1940s and early 1950s. He was the older brother of Bob Haymes, who was an actor, television host, and songwriter....

. The film's noted for being Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, singer, model and showgirl who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s....

's "film debut" (although she's only on screen for a matter of seconds).

The screenplay, based on a story by Frederica Sagor Maas

Frederica Sagor Maas

Frederica Alexandrina Sagor Maas is an American playwright, screenwriter, memoirist and author, the youngest daughter of Russian immigrants. Maas is best known for a detailed, tell-all memoir of her time spent in early Hollywood. She is one of the rare supercentenarians known for reasons other...

 and Ernest Maas

Ernest Maas

Ernest Maas was a silent-era screenwriter.Maas first worked on silent films in 1920 when he created the scenario for Uncle Sam of Freedom Ridge, a pro-League of Nations film in the aftermath of World War I. He also was the first to film the almost unbelievable crush of commuters during the rush...

, focuses on a young typist who becomes involved in the Women's Suffrage movement

Women's suffrage

Women's suffrage or woman suffrage is the right of women to vote and to run for office. The expression is also used for the economic and political reform movement aimed at extending these rights to women and without any restrictions or qualifications such as property ownership, payment of tax, or...

 in 1874. The songs were composed by George

George Gershwin

George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...

 and Ira Gershwin

Ira Gershwin

Ira Gershwin was an American lyricist who collaborated with his younger brother, composer George Gershwin, to create some of the most memorable songs of the 20th century....

.

Plot

Cynthia Pilgrim is the top student of the first graduating class of the Packard Business College in 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...

, and as such she is offered a position with the Pritchard Shipping Company in Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

. There she finds an office of men overseen by office manager Mr. Saxon. When Cynthia introduces herself to company co-owner John Pritchard, he tells her he thought all expert typists were male and his policy is to hire only men. Cynthia asks for an opportunity to prove she's as efficient as her male counterparts, but John refuses and offers her train fare back to New York.

John's aunt Alice, an avowed suffragette, has controlling interest in the company and insists Cynthia be given a chance. Cynthia finds accommodations at Catherine Dennison's boarding house

Boarding house

A boarding house, is a house in which lodgers rent one or more rooms for one or more nights, and sometimes for extended periods of weeks, months and years. The common parts of the house are maintained, and some services, such as laundry and cleaning, may be supplied. They normally provide "bed...

, where she meets an eclectic group of tenants, including poet Leander Woolsey, artist Michael Michael, and musician Herbert Jothan.

John invites Cynthia to dinner but she prefers not to socialize with her employer. She does allow him to escort her to one of his aunt's rallies, where she impresses the other women. When John's mother asks her to dine with them on the evening of the Regimental Ball, Cynthia feels she won't fit in with the woman's social circle, so her rooming house companions coach her on how to behave like a snob. Cynthia is delighted to discover their efforts were unnecessary, because Mrs. Pritchard proves to be down-to-earth and a supporter of Cynthia's desire to be treated equally in the workplace.

John begins to date Cynthia, and eventually they become engaged. He tries to persuade her to give up her involvement in the suffrage movement, but she insists she cannot abandon such a worthy cause. They break their engagement and she is fired from her job, but none of the people hired to replace her please Mr. Saxon. He and John go to a local school to find yet another candidate for the position. There he discovers its general manager is Cynthia, and the two are reunited in business as well as in love.

Production

In 1941, husband-and-wife screenwriting team Ernest Maas and Frederica Sagor collaborated on Miss Pilgrim's Progress, a story about a young woman who enters the business world by demonstrating the newly invented typewriter in the window of a Wall Street

Wall Street

Wall Street refers to the financial district of New York City, named after and centered on the eight-block-long street running from Broadway to South Street on the East River in Lower Manhattan. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, or...

 establishment. When she tries to fend off the unwanted advances of one of the firm's clerks, her employer comes to her rescue but is killed when he falls down the stairs in the ensuing altercation. Abigail Pilgrim becomes the focus of a murder trial that attracts widespread coverage by the media and the attention of Susan B. Anthony

Susan B. Anthony

Susan Brownell Anthony was a prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States. She was co-founder of the first Women's Temperance Movement with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as President...

 when the concept of women working in offices comes under fire.

Acting as their agent, Paul Kohner

Paul Kohner

Paul Kohner . The native of Bohemia in Austria-Hungary came to Hollywood in 1920 after having been a news reporter in Prague...

 brought the story to several studios. RKO

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...

 and MGM

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...

 expressed some interest, but both eventually passed. 20th Century Fox

20th Century Fox

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...

 finally purchased the screen rights, but the outline remained filed away until Darryl F. Zanuck

Darryl F. Zanuck

Darryl Francis Zanuck was an American producer, writer, actor, director and studio executive who played a major part in the Hollywood studio system as one of its longest survivors...

, searching for material for Betty Grable

Betty Grable

Elizabeth Ruth "Betty" Grable was an American actress, dancer and singer.Her iconic bathing suit photo made her the number-one pin-up girl of the World War II era. It was later included in the LIFE magazine project "100 Photos that Changed the World"...

, remembered it and decided to tailor it to his leading lady's talents. After it underwent several rewrites, Zanuck assigned the task of whipping the screenplay into shooting shape to George Seaton, who would also direct. Working with Kay Swift

Kay Swift

Kay Swift was an American composer of popular and classical music, the first woman to score a complete musical. Written in 1930, Fine and Dandy includes some of her best known songs; the title song has become a jazz standard. "Can't We Be Friends?" was another important hit...

, Ira Gershwin sorted through songs he and his brother George had written but never used and selected eleven for the film's musical numbers. Frederica Sagor was unhappy with the tunes and later observed, "Not even if they had scraped the very bottom of the barrel could they have come up with something so unmelodious." Displeased with the treatment her and her husband's original story was given, she called the end result "another stupid boy-meets-girl Zanuck travesty."

Cast

• Betty Grable
  Betty Grable
  Elizabeth Ruth "Betty" Grable was an American actress, dancer and singer.Her iconic bathing suit photo made her the number-one pin-up girl of the World War II era. It was later included in the LIFE magazine project "100 Photos that Changed the World"...
  
   ..... Cynthia Pilgrim
• Dick Haymes
  Dick Haymes
  Richard Benjamin "Dick" Haymes was an Argentine actor and one of the most popular male vocalists of the 1940s and early 1950s. He was the older brother of Bob Haymes, who was an actor, television host, and songwriter....
  
   ..... John Pritchard
• Anne Revere
  Anne Revere
  Anne Revere was an American stage, film, and television actress.-Early life:Born in New York City, Revere was a direct descendant of American Revolution hero Paul Revere. Her father, Clinton, was a stockbroker, and she was raised on the Upper West Side and in Westfield, New Jersey...
  
   ..... Alice Pritchard
• Gene Lockhart
  Gene Lockhart
  Eugene "Gene" Lockhart was a Canadian character actor, singer, and playwright. He also wrote the lyrics to a number of popular songs.-Early life:...
  
   ..... Mr. Saxon
• Elizabeth Patterson
  Elizabeth Patterson (actress)
  Elizabeth Patterson was an American film and television character actress remembered for her portrayal of elderly neighbor Matilda Trumbull on I Love Lucy.-Career:...
  
   ..... Catherine Dennison
• Allyn Joslyn
  Allyn Joslyn
  Allyn Joslyn was an American stage, film and television actor.-Biography:Allyn Joslyn was born in Milford, Pennsylvania, the son of a mining engineer...
  
   ..... Leander Woolsey
• Arthur Shields
  Arthur Shields
  Arthur Shields was an Irish stage and film actor.Born into an Irish Protestant family in Portobello, Dublin, he started acting in the Abbey Theatre when still a young man. He was the younger brother of Oscar-winning actor Barry Fitzgerald. An Irish nationalist, he fought in the Easter Rising of...
  
   ..... Michael Michael
• Charles Kemper
  Charles Kemper
  Charles Kemper was an American stage-trained film character actor born in Oklahoma. The heavy-set film actor had memorable roles in films including The Southerner , Scarlet Street , Gallant Journey , The Shocking Miss Pilgrim , and his last film role as Pop Daly in the film noir On Dangerous Ground...
  
   ..... Herbert Jothan
• Elisabeth Risdon
  Elisabeth Risdon
  Elisabeth Risdon was an English film actress. She appeared in over 140 films between 1913 and 1952. An attractive beauty in her youth she usually played in society parts...
  
   ..... Mrs. Pritchard
• Marilyn Monroe
  Marilyn Monroe
  Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, singer, model and showgirl who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s....
  
   ..... Telephone Operator (uncredited)

Song list

• Sweet Packard ..... Ensemble
• Changing My Tune ..... Betty Grable
• Stand Up and Fight ..... Anne Revere, Betty Grable, Dick Haymes, and Ensemble
• Aren't You Kinda Glad We Did? ..... Dick Haymes and Betty Grable
• The Back Bay Polka ..... Ensemble
• One, Two, Three ..... Dick Haymes and Ensemble
• Waltzing is Better Sitting Down ..... Dick Haymes and Betty Grable
• Demon Rum ..... Ensemble
• For You, For Me, For Evermore
  For You, For Me, For Evermore
  "For You, For Me, For Evermore" is a song composed by George Gershwin, with lyrics by Ira Gershwin.Written around 1936-7, it was rediscovered by Ira Gershwin when he was preparing music for The Shocking Miss Pilgrim , where it was introduced by Dick Haymes.-Notable recordings:*Ella Fitzgerald -...
  
   ..... Dick Haymes and Betty Grable
• Sweet Packard ..... Ensemble
• Changing My Tune ..... Betty Grable

Critical reception

Bosley Crowther

Bosley Crowther

Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...

 of the New York Times felt in a few of the songs "a certain exuberance is momentarily achieved," but he thought "the bulk of the music is as sticky as toothpaste being squeezed out of a tube." He added, "Miss Grable and Mr. Haymes are neither given nor deserve a script if the caliber of their performances is a valid criterion, and several other minor actors behave ridiculously in silly roles. There is no more voltage in The Shocking Miss Pilgrim than in a badly used dry cell."