HIS GIRL FRIDAY
I had forgotten to add this 1940 adaptation of the 1928 play "The Front Page" directed and produced by Howard Hawks. His Girl Friday is an example of the Hollywood practice identified by film historian David Bordwell as "the switcheroo" and consisting of changing the gender of one character in a successful play or film. Hawks is famous for his genre versatility and for giving actors license to improvise. Stanley Cavell wrote the best criticism of this famous film in his 1979 book "Pursuits of Happiness" which concerns the genre of remarriage comedy. It has many instances of precise, intricate blocking and choreography of actors' movement. His Girl Friday has been called "slapstick" because of the fast and overlapping delivery of dialogue but the term undersells its deep reservoir of wisdom and inspiration.