The late-night/early-morning spot for Cubs fans asks if the Cubs hot Spring Training means anything for the regular season.
It’s Wednesday night here at BCB After Dark: the coolest club for night owls, early risers, new parents and Cubs fans abroad. Please come in from the cold. We’ve got a fire going on in here. Let us take your coat. There are still a few tables available. Bring your own beverage.
BCB After Dark is the place for you to talk baseball, music, movies, or anything else you need to get off your chest, as long as it is within the rules of the site. The late-nighters are encouraged to get the party started, but everyone else is invited to join in as you wake up the next morning and into the afternoon.
Last night I asked you for your thoughts about a contact extension of Pete Crow-Armstrong. Thirty-nine percent of you thought that it was a good idea to sign him to a deal similar to what the Braves’ Michael Harris II signed. Another 27 percent thought it would cost more than that and 28 percent want to wait until you see how PCA does this season.
Tonight we’re joined by bassist and vocalist Esperanza Spalding playing the Blue Note in New York this past Saturday. This is the entire concert, You can listen to parts or all of it. Playing with Spalding is Matthew Stevens on guitar, Morgan Guerin on sax and keyboards and Eric Doob on drums. On the final number, Spalding is joined by saxophonist Joe Lovano.
This is the Night is a 1932 pre-Code romantic comedy directed by Frank Tuttle that is best-remembered today for being Cary Grant’s film debut. The most surprising thing about it is that Grant isn’t very good in it. There’s no indication that a star is being born here. But of course, he wasn’t the star of the film and luckily, French actress Lili Damita turns in a winning performance as the lead in a stock role as a woman hired to pretend to be someone’s wife.
Grant plays Stephen Mathewson, an Olympic javelin thrower living in Paris who is married to Claire (Thelma Todd). Claire is planning to take advantage of the opportunity of Stephen going to the Los Angeles Olympics to go off on a romantic adventure to Venice with her lover, Gerald (Roland Young). But Stephen decides to skip the Olympics and comes home early to catch Claire with Gerald. (I mean, there were some top athletes who did skip the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics because it was the Great Depression and they couldn’t afford it. But Stephen and Claire are clearly not hurting for money. So yeah, it makes no sense.)
Stephen interrupts Gerald’s friend Bunny (Charles Ruggles) delivering the tickets for two to Venice. Bunny insists that the tickets are not for Gerald and Claire, but for Gerald and his (non-existent) wife. Stephen doesn’t believe the story and insists that the four of them all go to Venice together to prove it. Gerald tries to hire an actress to play his wife for the trip, but she won’t do it. Instead, her dresser Germaine (Damita) agrees to do it for her instead.
So the rest of the film is Grant’s character trying to prove that his wife is really cheating on him and Gerald and Germaine (who is going by the actresses’ stage name of Chou-Chou) have to pretend to be really married.
So This is the Night is a pretty standard farce concept for the era. It’s pre-Code sensibility comes from Damita and Todd constantly being in states of undress, albeit with every sensitive area strategically covered. Damita has to do what amounts to a striptease for Gerald to convince him that she’s up for the part. Then there’s a running joke that Gerald’s chauffeur (Irving Bacon) keeps doing something that gets Thelma Todd’s dress caught on something and ripped off her body. That’s funny in the way David Letterman used to tell a joke that bombed 20 more times in an attempt to finally get a laugh—at which point you’re laughing at the idea that they’re still trying to get a laugh out of that joke.
Damita was a reasonably big star in the late-silent and pre-Code era, but she retired from acting in 1935 when she married a then-little-known actor named Errol Flynn. But she’s certainly charming and appealing in this role as an honest but poor girl serving as a rent-a-wife to a wealthy man. It’s a role we’ve seen many times in many films and television shows, but Damita does it well. She’s funny and adorable.
Ruggles was a strong comedic actor who had a long career that dated from the silent era to sitcoms in the 1960s. His comedic timing is probably the best of anyone in the movie, which is to be expected. Thelma Todd is just there to be the cheating wife/villain of the movie, and I suppose her getting stripped multiple times is the film’s way of giving her her comeuppance.
Young and Grant are the weaker elements, with one running joke about the wisdom of cheating with the wife of a man who can throw spears a long way and with great accuracy. To be fair, Grant’s part is poorly-written and Grant reportedly wanted to give up on Hollywood and return to the stage after this film because he hated it so much. Luckily, someone talked him into giving Hollywood one more chance.
This is the Night is a solid example of a pre-Code comedy, saved mostly by Damita and Ruggles. This entire storyline would be forbidden in Hollywood in just two years time, and it’s certainly a lot more risqué than what would be allowed after the Code went into effect in 1934.
There are about six or seven copies of This is the Night on YouTube at the moment, including one that’s been colorized if that’s what you’re into. Here’s a colorized scene where Thelma Todd loses her dress. As I said, there are several scenes where Thelma Todd loses her dress.
Welcome back to everyone who skips the music and movies.
The news has been really slow around baseball recently, so I’m just going to ask you how you are feeling about this spring. In particular, how do you feel about the Cubs record in the Cactus League.
The Cubs are in first place in the Cactus League with a record of 9-2, percentage points ahead of the Colorado Rockies. Obviously, we’re all enjoying the winning. But does it mean anything?
So far, the Cubs look like a good team that is clicking on both offense and defense. Michael Busch is hitting everything in sight. Both starting catchers, Miguel Amaya and Carson Kelly, are having good springs and Pete Crow-Armstrong is already giving us highlight-reel plays. Shōta Imanaga and Justin Steele look good on the mound and the bullpen hasn’t had any embarrassing meltdowns. Yes, Kyle Tucker is struggling, but I would hope no one is worried about him.
On the other hand, it’s Spring Training. If you think the Cubs good play is a sign of better things to come, all you have to do is note that the Rockies are just percentage points behind the Cubs in the standings. No one thinks the Rockies will finish anywhere but last in the regular season standings.
So which is it. Do you think that this good play in Spring is a sign of a good team or just a fluke of exhibition games where no one is really trying very hard?
Thank you for stopping by this evening. I hope that you’ve had as good a time being here as we’ve had hosting you. Please get home safely, Stay warm and dry. Recycle any cans and bottles. Tip your waitstaff. And join Sara Sanchez tomorrow evening for more BCB After Dark.