Sullivan's Travels (1941)

Director:

Preston Sturges

Writer:

Preston Sturges (written by)

Release Date:

December 1941 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Comedy | Drama | Romance

Tagline:

A Happy-Go Lucky Hitch-Hiker on the Highway to happiness! He wanted to see the world . . . but wound up in Lover's Lane!

Plot:

A director of escapist films goes on the road as a hobo to learn about Life...which gives him a rude awakening.

Plot Keywords:

Director | On The Road | Hobo | Poverty | Tramp

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Joel McCrea	...	John L. Lloyd 'Sully' Sullivan
Veronica Lake	...	The Girl
Robert Warwick	...	Mr. Lebrand
William Demarest	...	Mr. Jones
Franklin Pangborn	...	Mr. Casalsis
Porter Hall	...	Mr. Hadrian
Byron Foulger	...	Mr. Johnny Valdelle
Margaret Hayes	...	Secretary
Robert Greig	...	Burroughs (Sullivan's butler)
Eric Blore	...	Sullivan's valet
Torben Meyer	...	The doctor
Victor Potel	...	Cameraman
Richard Webb	...	Radio man
Charles R. Moore	...	Colored chef (as Charles Moore)
Almira Sessions	...	Ursula Kornheiser

Runtime:

90 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Mirrophonic Recording)

Certification:

Australia:PG | South Korea:12 (2004) | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:11 (re-release) | Sweden:15 | UK:A (original rating) | UK:PG (re-rating) (2000) | USA:Approved (PCA #7382)

Filming Locations:

Bob Hope Airport - 2627 Hollywood Way, Burbank, California, USA

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

Director Cameo: [Preston Sturges]Studio director, on the set of 'The Girl's period movie. He is seen in the background when she reads the newspaper and throws up her hands in delight.

Goofs:

Continuity: In the scene where Sullivan is in bed with a cold the girl sits next to him on the bed, she shifts between being at higher level with him and then same level as him from shot to shot. (This happens more than once in same scene.)

Quotes:

Burrows: You see, sir, rich people and theorists - who are usually rich people - think of poverty in the negative, as the lack of riches - as disease might be called the lack of health. But it isn't, sir. Poverty is not the lack of anything, but a positive plague, virulent in itself, contagious as cholera, with filth, criminality, vice and despair as only a few of its symptoms. It is to be stayed away from, even for purposes of study. It is to be shunned.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "The Simpsons: Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? (#2.15)" (1991)

Soundtrack:

Let My People Go

A celebration of the healing power of comedy

As a professional circus clown for twenty years,I think that Sullivan's Travels is the best, most lucid, explanation of what comedy is all about that has ever been made. Sure it's hokey, corny, contrived, and meandering. But so is all great comedy, from Shakespeare to Seinfeld! If you want your comedy to be tightly constructed, meaningful, unambiguous, and logical, then you do not want comedy at all -- you want some stuffy college professor's idea of What is Comedy for a term paper.

The glorious truth is that you cannot domesticate great comedy. It occurs on no regular basis, from no reliable source, and is accountable to no one for what it says and does. Preston Sturges wanted to make that point in Sullivans Travels and he does so exceedingly well with everything from slapstick frolics in the land cruiser to fleas in the bed to hectoring soliloquies about poverty from the butler.

Ten years before Chaplin tried to explain the same thing in his movie Limelight, Sturges tells a tale meant to both hearten and cozen us. It heartens us to know that a cynical, moneygrubbing place like Hollywood will continue to spin out comedies, because they make money. And it cozens us into thinking there is something magical about comedians. Anyone who has ever actually known or been married to a professional funnyperson knows they are by turns grumpy, lazy, tempermental, stubborn, and always insecure. Not the life of the party. But so what? They're clowns, god bless 'em, and that's all that counts.

You'll never understand the craft of humor if you don't watch, and love, Preston Sturges Sullivan's Travels!