Charley and the Angel

Charley and the Angel
Directed by	Vincent McEveety
Produced by	Bill Anderson
Written by	Will Stanton (book author) Roswell Rogers (film writer)
Starring	Fred MacMurray Cloris Leachman Harry Morgan Kathleen Cody Kurt Russell
Music by	Paul J. Smith Buddy Baker
Cinematography	Charles F. Wheeler
Edited by	Bob Bring Ray de Leuw
Production company	Walt Disney Productions
Distributed by	Buena Vista Distribution
Release date	March 23, 1973 (1973-03-23)
Running time	93 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

Charley and the Angel is a 1973 Disney family/comedy film set in an unidentified small city in the 1930s Depression-era Midwestern United States and starring Fred MacMurray in one of his final film appearances and his last movie for Disney. The film, directed by Vincent McEveety, is based on The Golden Evenings of Summer, a 1971 novel written by Will Stanton.

Charley Appleby is a hardware store owner whose frugality and commitment to his job have enabled his family to avoid poverty during the Great Depression and Prohibition. However, his relationship with his children and wife Nettie (Cloris Leachman) is strained. They especially want to go to see the Chicago World's Fair. His growing sons Willie and Rupert (Vincent Van Patten and Scott Kolden) manage to find work in a junkyard owned by a man named Felix with ties to bootleggers, and his teenage daughter Leonora (Kathleen Cody) decides to elope with a young man named Ray (Kurt Russell), who seems untrustworthy.

Charley is visited by a shabby-looking angel (Harry Morgan) who appears visible only to him. The angel tells Charley that his time will soon be up, and the shopkeeper decides to become religious, patch relations with his family, sell his business, and do the best he can to be a good father and husband before he dies. Charley's angel appears intermittently throughout the film, occasionally helping Charley, and occasionally causing mischief. The angel reveals his name as Roy Zerney.