Sweepstakes Winner (Warner Bros.) (1939)

ADVANCE PUBLICITY — “SWEEPSTAKES WINNER” MARIE WILSON WOULD LIKE 10 KEEP WARDROBE Marie Wilson has two ambitions: She wants to get a role as a dramatic actress, and ‘‘ persuade my studio and fans that I can do other things besides the somewhat insane acts they have seen and heard me doing.’’ She will be satisfied with her status as an actress ‘‘as soon as I earn enough salary in a week to equal the value of the lovely wardrobe the studios give me to wear.’’ Marie always feels depressed, she says, when she has to give back such things as the $3,700 mink coat, coming halfway to the ankle; the scarf of six Russian sables, and the jacket of blue fox, which she wore in her latest Warner Bros. starring comedy, ‘‘ Sweepstakes Winner,’’ which opens at the Strand Theatre next Friday. Her wardrobe in that picture was by Milo Anderson, and represented $15,000 in clothes for those sequences showing Marie after she had won $150,000 on a _ sweepstakes ticket. ALLEN JENKINS’ COMEDY HINTS The thing that makes a comedian funny, according to Allen Jenkins, is the fact that he knows enough to take his time. Even the wise-cracking funny men of the stage or screen — the men like W. C. Fields, who seem to keep up a running fire of conversation all the time—only give that impression, Jenkins points out. It’s not, he explains, how funny the dialogue is, sometimes; but rather, it’s the way in which the actor helps to tip his listener otf to laugh, by giving the timely pause, or the bit of hesitation in his speech while he adds a bit of facial suggestion with ‘a raised eyebrow OY Aa, oo. wi ek glance at somebody else. Jenkins and Charley Foy tossed a lot of flip talk back and forth in ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ the Warner Bros. picture with Marie Wilson in the leading role which is now playing at the Strand Theatre, and after the picture was finished Jenkins privately confessed that he considered Miss Wilson ‘‘stiff competition.’’ Marie just let her eyes grow bigger and bigger in astonishment at some of the snappy dialogue lines Allen and Charley tossed back and forth, and, without saying a word, she would collect the biggest laugh in the scene. Mat 101—15c Allen Jenkins Story Synopsis (Not for publication). When Jennie Jones (Marie Wilson) meets up with touts Allen Jenkins and Charley Foy, while following out the terms of her Grandpa’s will, she loses her money and horse. Forced to go back to work as a waitress, she meets Mark Downey (Johnnie Davis), who falls in love with her. The touts trick her into taking a sweepstakes ticket for $10. Her number wins, just as she expected. Then she gets back her own horse, who also wins a race, his first. Things happen fast, almost faster than cook Jerry Colonna can talk. And it all ends well for everyone but the touts. Mat 202—30c GIDDYAP NAPOLEON, it's raining money, as this screwball team, Marie Wilson and Johnnie Davis, climb aboard Lady Luck, in Warner Bros.’ "Sweepstakes Winner,’ coming to the Strand Friday. Marie Wilson’s Wardrobe Chosen By Waitresses by Helen Walter If you held a winning sweepstakes ticket, what is the first thing you would buy for yourself??? That is the question Milo Anderson posed to twenty-five waitresses in the Warner Bros. Studio commissary before he began work on Marie Wilson’s wardrobe for ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ the Warner Bros. comedy opening at the Strand Theatre next Friday. In the picture Marie is a waitress who wins a small fortune and goes on a clothes binge, so Milo wanted her clothes to be authentic. Every girl voted for furs, with a mink coat, a sable scarf, and a chubby fox coat receiving the most votes. Milo accordingly, used all three for Marie in the film. The mink coat is dark and glossy, is fashioned with square shoulders, no collar and has skins ar ranged horizontally in the sleeves. A matching beret of mink tails is an additional note of luxury. The fur pieces are combined with a slate blue crepe dress having shirred bodice accented at the throat with huge pilot wheel brooch made of turquoise and brilliants. Marie’s sable scarf is worn draped over a tailored dress of moss green wool jersey which boasts the interesting accents of gold bee pins fastened in V-formation across the bodice, a wide brown alligator belt, and high gauntlet gloves of brown suede. Her brown felt hat has brief streamers of mink tails. The chubby jacket Milo selected for Marie’s blonde beauty is platinum fox. It is teamed with a black velvet bolero dress, the interesting blouse of which is periwinkle voile, shirred, and striped with narrow black velvet ribbons. All's In A Name Allen Jenkins’ name in ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ the Warner Bros. comedy with Marie Wilson, which opens Friday at the Strand Theatre, is Xerxes Bailey. But Jenkins uses the nickname of Tip Bailey through most of the picture. There is a good reason for this. Marie Wilson found it hard to pronounce ‘‘ Xerxes’’; in fact she kept mispronouncing it as ‘‘ Jerky Bailey,’’ and Allen objected. Jenkins The Dogsaver Allen Jenkins is a hero. He rescued a small dog from the surf near his home in Santa Monica one day last winter. It was only necessary for him to wade waist deep — but he did spoil a brandnew suit of clothes. Moreover — although he doesn’t want the All-Year Club to hear this!—he thought the surf was cold. Last of all, he couldn’t find the small mutt’s owner, so he had to adopt it after saving it. Local Boy Makes Good Life-size pictures of Johnnie Davis and Ivan Fuqua, 400-yard Olympic champion, adorn either end of the gymnasium of the high school which both attended in Brazil, Ind. The local theatre, however, uses pictures of Johnnie extending from floor to ceiling on its walls. Johnnie’s latest Warner Bros. picture, ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ opens next Friday at the Strand. Sweet Steaks Winner Johnnie Davis got fed up one recent week-end with meals of turkey and chicken, and he decided he wanted a thick steak, soaked in garlic sauce, and sizzled with potatoes and onions, for his evening meal. Johnnie also decided that nobody else could soak, sizzle and serve that steak as well as he could. So he invited six others in for steak dinner, soaked his cut and started it sizzling, but just at that. point Johnnie started slicing his onions, and he sliced an inch and a half strip off the side of his left forefinger nearest the knife, and his wife finished cooking the dinner. Johnnie, by the way, is a restaurant operator in his latest Warner Bros. picture ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ which opens at the Strand Theatre next Friday. Up In The Air Marie Wilson has ‘‘set foot’’ in only two of the forty-eight states in the union, and, strangely enough, the two are separated by thousands of miles. She was born and has spent all her life in California, but visited Oklahoma recently as a guest at a motion picture convention. The reason she set foot in no states between California and Oklahoma City was because she went and returned by airplane. Marie made that trip just before she started work in her latest Warner Bros. comedy ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ which opens next Friday at the Strand Theatre. [7] (Lead Story) Marie Wilson Leads Cast In Strand Comedy What would you do with the money if you won $150,000 on a sweepstakes ticket? That’s the question which isn’t coherently answered in ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ the Warner Bros. comedy opening Friday at the Strand Theatre, for it is Marie Wilson who wins the money, and Marie is hardly a safe example to follow. What Marie does both before and after she wins the fortune, however, makes an amusing tale. With the aid of such expert comedians as Johnnie Davis, Allen Jenkins, Charley Foy and Jerry Colonna, Marie’s experience are parlayed into one of the season’s most hilarious comedies. Marie is a not-so-bright waitress whose grandfather wills her $1,000 and a racehorse, Firefly. She leaves her small town and with her horse, arrives in the big city, where she meets the two touts, played by Jenkins and Foy. In a short time, the evil pair have relieved her of both her money and her horse. She goes back to her old trade, a waitress, in a cheap restaurant run by Johnnie Davis, with Jerry Colonna as cook. Jenkins and Foy continue their bilking, running up a meal bill, even getting her to give them change of $10 in return for a sweepstakes ticket. They assure her that she will win $150,000. Johnnie has fallen in love with Marie but when, presto, she finds that she holds the winning Grand National’s ticket, (imagine the touts’ surprise) Johnnie feels that her money stands between them. Marie spends the money like water on fancy clothes, a ear, furs, ete., even buying back her old racehorse from the precious pair of frauds. They get her to enter the animal in a race they think they have fixed, but Firefly crosses them up by winning! To climax her steed’s victory, Marie also wins Johnnie, who decides she’s so sweet he just must marry her, despite her wealth. The sereen play by John Krafft and Albert DeMond is based on an original story by DeMond and Hugh Cummings. The production was directed by William McGann, megaphoner of many hits. Sentimental Gesture Johnnie Davis’ gift last Christmas from his pal, Marie Wilson, who was working at the time with Johnnie in Warner Bros.’ ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ now playing at the Strand Theatre, was a handsome collection of seven sweepstakes tickets which Marie didn’t win any money on last summer. Something New, Folks Marie Wilson, star of the Warner Bros. comedy named ‘‘Sweepstakes Winner,’’ which opens Friday at the Strand Theatre, says that the most famous horse she ever heard of was named Hi-Yo Silver, but it didn’t get famous until after the government had gone off the gold standard. Mat 201—30c TWO HEADS ARE BETTER THAN ONE except, as in this case, when the heads are those of Marie Wilson and Johnnie Davis, who have leading roles in Warner Bros.’ comedy, "Sweepstakes Winner,’ at the Strand. CAST Jennie Jones MARIE WILSON Mark Downey JOHNNIE DAVIS Allen Jenkins Charley Foy Jerry Colonna Chalky Williams Frankie Burke Mrs. McCarthy Vera Lewis ‘Tip’ Bailey Pop Reynolds Granville Bates Eddie Kane Poolroom Guard Bert Hanlon George Lloyd Sidney Bracy English Announcer Charles Irwin Announcer John Harron 2nd Announcer Reid Kilpatrick 3rd Announcer Ken Niles PRODUCTION STAFF Directed by WILLIAM McGANN Screen Play by....John Krafft Albert DeMond From an Original Story by Albert DeMond Hugh Cummings Photography by Arthur Edeson, A.S.C. Art Director Stanley Fleischer Dialogue Director Harry Seymour Film Editor Gowns by Sound by Frank Magee Milo Anderson Robert B. Lee