Pat and Mike
Theatrical-release poster
Directed byGeorge Cukor
Screenplay byRuth Gordon
Garson Kanin
Produced byLawrence Weingarten
StarringSpencer Tracy
Katharine Hepburn
William Ching
Aldo Ray
Jim Backus
Sammy White
Charles Bronson
CinematographyWilliam H. Daniels (as William Daniels)
Edited byGeorge Boemler
Music byDavid Raksin
Production
company
Distributed byLoew's Inc.
Release date
  • June 14, 1952 (1952-06-14)
Running time
95 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$1,618,000[1]
Box office$2,696,000[1]

Pat and Mike is a 1952 American romantic comedy film starring Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. The movie was written by Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin, and directed by George Cukor. Cukor directed The Philadelphia Story (1940) with Hepburn, and Cukor, Gordon and Kanin teamed with Hepburn and Tracy again for Adam's Rib (1949). Gordon and Kanin were nominated for the 1952 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for their work on Pat and Mike. (They had been similarly honored for Adam's Rib.)

Hepburn was nominated in the Best Actress category at the 10th Golden Globe Awards, while Ray was nominated for "New Star of the Year".[2]

Plot

Pat Pemberton (Katharine Hepburn) is a brilliant athlete who loses her confidence whenever her charming but overbearing fiancé Collier (William Ching) is around. Women's golf and tennis championships are within her reach; however, she gets flustered by his presence at the contests. He wants her to give up her goal and marry him, but Pat does not give up on herself that easily. She enlists the help of Mike Conovan (Spencer Tracy), a slightly shady sports promoter. Together they face mobsters, a jealous boxer (Aldo Ray), and a growing mutual attraction.

Cast

Sports Stars

Production

Development

Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon were friends with Hepburn and Tracy, and had the idea of writing a film to showcase Hepburn's athletic abilities. She was an avid golfer and tennis player, and indeed performed all the sports footage in the film herself.

Filming

Pat and Mike was filmed partly on location in California. The golfing scenes were filmed at the Riviera Country Club and Ojai Valley Inn. Tennis scenes were filmed at the Cow Palace in Daly City, near San Francisco. The opening scenes were filmed at Occidental College, standing in as fictional Pacific Technical College.

Casting

Many notable athletes appear in cameo roles as themselves in the film, including golfers Babe Didrikson Zaharias, Betty Hicks, and Helen Dettweiler, and tennis champions Don Budge, Gussie Moran and Alice Marble. Other notables in the cast include Charles Bronson (credited as Charles Buchinski) in his second credited movie role, Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer, Jim Backus, and, in his acting debut, former athlete Chuck Connors, later known as the star of The Rifleman television series.

Music

The score for the film was composed and conducted by David Raksin, with orchestrations by Robert Franklyn and Ruby Raksin.[3] Of his music, Raksin said "My music was sly and a mite jazzy, and despite the fact that everyone seemed to like it, so did I."[4]

The complete score was issued on CD in 2009, on Film Score Monthly records.

Reception

According to MGM records the film earned $2,050,000 in the US and Canada and $646,000 elsewhere, resulting in a profit of $74,000.[1]

In his June 19, 1952 review in The New York Times, Bosley Crowther praised the film as “a pleasing blue-plate of al fresco warm-weather fare… a shaky combination of, let us say, Woman of the Year and (if you can imagine without music) the theatrical Guys and Dolls. But, withal, it is a likable fable about a highly coordinated dame who moves in upon and takes over a positive, authoritative guy, with slight overtones of honor triumphing over shadiness and greed. And it is smoothly directed by George Cukor and slyly, amusingly played by the whole cast, especially by its due of easy, adroit, experienced stars. Mr. Ray, as a dumb, moody fighter; Sammy White, as a shifty hanger-on, and William Ching, as the stuffed-shirt fiancé, are outstanding in support. George Mathews and Charles Buchinski are also fun as "the kind of types that have been known to act very hot-headed in their day and age." (They are neatly manhandled by Miss Hepburn, using judo, in one scene.) And, as for the real professional athletes and the exhibitions they give, they are credible, colorful and exciting. That's enough in these hot summer days.”[5]

Variety wrote: “The smooth-working team of Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn spark the fun… Hepburn is quite believable as a femme athlete taken under the wing of promoter Tracy. Film settles down to a series of laugh sequences of training, exhibitions and cross-country tours in which Hepburn proves to be a star. Tracy is given some choice lines in the script and makes much of them in an easy, throwaway style that lifts the comedy punch.”[6]

Gordon and Kanin were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. TCM notes: “Husband and wife screenwriters Kanin and Gordon wrote Pat and Mike specifically for their actor friends, tailoring the script to the streak of devilish humor lurking beneath Tracy's solid, consummately male persona and taking advantage of Hepburn's natural athletic abilities as a superior golfer and one of the best tennis players in Hollywood…. The combination of Tracy's gruff, working-class demeanor and Hepburn's ladylike, patrician bearing provides Pat and Mike with some of its best comic moments, as when Mike, watching Pat walk across a golf course green, remarks to his partner in a thick Brooklyn accent “There's not much meat on 'er, but what there is, is cherce." (The American Film Institute says it is a Bronx accent.)[7] Such earthy humor endeared Pat and Mike to both critics and audiences and undoubtedly helped win...(the) nomination.... (The) witty script also took great advantage of the cozy, intimate rapport between Hepburn and Tracy who were an off-screen couple as well, and played upon the apparently mismatched but sizzling chemistry between the two lovers...As with Adam's Rib, Pat and Mike is an honest, amusing account of the battle between the sexes, but also a celebration of male-female chemistry made all the more exciting when the romantic leads are also equals, a specialty of the Kanin-Gordon writing style.”[8] On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an aggregate score of 85% based on 23 positive and 4 negative critic reviews. The website's consensus reads: "Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy take competition to a romantic-comic highpoint in this elegantly directed sports comedy by George Cukor."[9]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 The Eddie Mannix Ledger, Los Angeles: Margaret Herrick Library, Center for Motion Picture Study.
  2. ↑ Aldo Ray
  3. ↑ Bettencourt, Scott (2009). David Raksin. "David Raksin at MGM (1950-1957)". Film Score Monthly (CD online notes). Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. 12 (2).
  4. ↑ Bradford, Marilee (2009). David Raksin. "David Raksin at MGM (1950-1957)". Film Score Monthly (CD liner notes). Los Angeles, California. 12 (2): 18.
  5. ↑ Crowther, Bosley (1952-06-19). "' Pat and Mike,' With Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, New Film at Capitol". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2021-07-12.
  6. ↑ Variety Staff; Staff, Variety (1952-01-01). "Pat and Mike". Variety. Retrieved 2021-07-12.
  7. ↑ "AFI|Catalog". catalog.afi.com. Retrieved 2021-07-12.
  8. ↑ "Pat and Mike". www.tcm.com. Retrieved 2021-07-12.
  9. ↑ "Pat and Mike". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved November 13, 2022.
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