TCM Schedule for Thurs, Jan 23, 2025: Conrad Veidt / New Voices of Cinema

Every year, the passing of time ages the beloved movies from Hollywood’s studio era. With the expansion of space between the then and now, a trove of films is lost to time while even more are rediscovered. As these films age, so does its audience, giving rise to a younger fanbase whose love of old Hollywood keeps its legacy, and that of TCM, alive for newer generations to enjoy and share.

On January 23 starting at 8pm, Dave Karger will be joined by three digital creators who are sharing their love of classic movies with new audiences in creative and unique ways. These New Voices in Cinema will share a film of their choice and discuss how they are bringing renewed interest and awareness of the classics to a new generation.

Merrily We Go to Hell (1932)

Journalist and West Coast Editor for Letterboxd, Mia Vicino kicks off the night with her pick Merrily We Go to Hell (1932).

Directed by one of the few female directors in cinema’s early history, Dorothy Arzner would become the only woman director working in Hollywood by 1932. Fredric March and Sylvia Sidney lead this pre-Code drama as a married couple whose relationship is affected by the husband’s growing alcoholism. After he embarks on an affair with a former flame, his newlywed wife declares she will become a “modern” wife with modern privileges that afford her to have affairs as well. Their relationship is further strained when a major life event affects them both, forcing the couple to reconsider matrimony and their love for one another. Cary Grant is featured in the film, marking it as one of his earliest appearances on screen. Like many pre-Code films of the 1930s, Merrily We Go to Hell feels fresh due to its frank conversations around taboo themes of open marriages, alcoholism and adultery.

A Foreign Affair (1948)

Content creator Izzy Custodio follows up, moving our night into the 1940s with her pick A Foreign Affair (1948).

Directed by Billy Wilder, who also co-wrote the script with Charles Brackett, Richard L. Breen and Robert Harari, the film is an adaptation of a story by David Shaw. Jean Arthur stars as a congresswoman investigating the moral corruption of American troops occupying post-war Berlin in 1947. Her investigation is impeded by a military captain, played by John Lund, who is having an affair with a German nightclub singer and Nazi sympathizer, played by Marlene Dietrich. Danger arises along with dark secrets as the three become entangled in a complicated love triangle.

All That Heaven Allows (1955)

TikTok video creator Brandon Johnston closes out our night with his pick from 1955, All That Heaven Allows.

Directed by Douglas Sirk, the film is among the apogee of 1950s melodrama. Jane Wyman stars a lonely widow with two college-aged children in a small New England town. Though she’s expected to marry an older, “safe” man, she falls in love with Rock Hudson, who plays a handsome arborist several years her junior, causing in-town gossip that complicates their blossoming relationship. Although Sirk’s works are considered canon among classic film enthusiasts today, his films, particularly All That Heaven Allows, were initially written off by critics as women’s pictures or “weepies” due to their themes of domestic issues and heavy focus on emotions. However, attitudes began to change in the late 1960s when French critics of the notable “Cahiers du cinema” publication delivered influential reprisals of Sirk's work.

MORE: https://www.tcm.com/articles/Programming%20Article/021957/new-voices-of-cinema



Hans Walter Conrad Veidt (22 January 1893 – 3 April 1943) was a German, later naturalized British actor.

He attracted early attention for his roles in the films Different from the Others (1919), The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), and The Man Who Laughs (1928). After a successful career in German silent films, where he was one of the best-paid stars of UFA (German film production company), Veidt and his new Jewish wife Ilona Prager left Germany in 1933 after the Nazis came to power. The couple settled in Britain, where he took citizenship in 1939.

Veidt subsequently appeared in many British films, including The Thief of Bagdad (1940). It was after emigrating to the United States around 1941 that he was cast in the role that would define his career -- Major Strasser in Casablanca (1942).

Full bio: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrad_Veidt




--- DAYTIME (EST) ---

7:15 AM | The Beloved Rogue (1927)
François Villon, the French poet, is also a prankster, occasional criminal, and patriot.
Dir: Alan Crosland | Cast: John Barrymore, Conrad Veidt, Marceline Day

9:00 AM | The Spy in Black (1939)
A German submarine is sent to the Orkney Isles in 1917 to sink the British fleet.
Dir: Michael Powell | Cast: Conrad Veidt, Sebastian Shaw, Valerie Hobson

10:30 AM | Escape (1940)
A Nazi officer's mistress helps an American free his mother from a concentration camp.
Dir: Mervyn Leroy | Cast: Norma Shearer, Robert Taylor, Conrad Veidt

12:15 PM | The Thief of Bagdad (1940)
A young thief faces amazing monsters to return Bagdad's deposed king to the throne.
Dir: Ludwig Berger | Cast: Conrad Veidt, Sabu, June Duprez

2:15 PM | A Woman's Face (1941)
Plastic surgery gives a scarred female criminal a new outlook on life.
Dir: George Cukor | Cast: Joan Crawford, Melvyn Douglas, Conrad Veidt

4:15 PM | All Through the Night (1942)
A criminal gang turns patriotic to track down a Nazi spy ring.
Dir: Vincent Sherman | Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Conrad Veidt, Kaaren Verne

6:15 PM | Nazi Agent (1942)
An Allied sympathizer discovers his twin brother is a Nazi spy.
Dir: Jules Dassin | Cast: Conrad Veidt, Ann Ayars, Frank Reicher


--- PRIME TIME ---

8:00 PM | Merrily We Go to Hell (1932)
Dir: Dorothy Arzner | Cast: Sylvia Sidney, Fredric March, Adrianne Allen

9:30 PM | A Foreign Affair (1948)
Dir: Billy Wilder | Cast: Jean Arthur, Marlene Dietrich, John Lund

11:45 PM | All That Heaven Allows (1955)
Dir: Douglas Sirk | Cast: Jane Wyman, Rock Hudson, Agnes Moorehead


--- LATE NIGHT ---

1:30 AM | Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)
A White couple's attitudes are challenged when their daughter brings home a Black fiancé.
Dir: Stanley Kramer | Cast: Spencer Tracy, Sidney Poitier, Katharine Hepburn

3:45 AM | To Sleep with Anger (1990)
A charismatic old acquaintance stirs up trouble for a mild-mannered family.
Dir: Charles Burnett | Cast: Danny Glover, Paul Butler, Devaughn Nixon, Mary Alice