Christmas Holiday
| Christmas Holiday | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Robert Siodmak |
| Produced by | Felix Jackson |
| Screenplay by | Herman J. Mankiewicz |
| Based on |
Christmas Holiday by W. Somerset Maugham |
| Starring |
Deanna Durbin Gene Kelly |
| Music by | Hans J. Salter |
| Cinematography | Woody Bredell |
| Edited by | Ted J. Kent |
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Production
company |
Universal Pictures
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| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
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Release date
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Running time
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93 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Christmas Holiday is a 1944 film noir crime film directed by Robert Siodmak starring Deanna Durbin and Gene Kelly. Based on the 1939 novel of the same name by W. Somerset Maugham, the film is about a woman who marries a Southern aristocrat who inherited his family's streak of violence and instability and soon drags the woman into a life of misery. After he is arrested, the woman runs away from her husband's family, changes her name, and finds work as a singer in a New Orleans dive. The film received an Academy Award nomination for Best Musical Score for Hans J. Salter.
Army officer Charlie Mason meets beautiful Maison Lafitte hostess Jackie (her real name is Abigail Manette). She tells him the story of the decline of her marriage with the charming but unbalanced Robert Manette. When her husband kills a bookie his controlling mother tries to cover it up. When he is caught she and her son blame Abigail. Abigail, feeling guilty when her husband receives a life sentence, becomes a bar hostess. Meanwhile, Robert escapes from jail and comes to see Abigail, but he is shot by police and dies in her arms, leaving her to start again with Charlie Mason.
Producer Walter Wanger first planned to make W. Somerset Maugham's novel Christmas Holiday into a film in 1939, but the Hays Office rejected his proposal as they felt the novel's story about an Englishman meeting a beautiful Russian prostitute was too sordid. In 1943, Durbin's future husband Felix Jackson gained permission to film the novel provided he change the characters. Universal optioned the book rights in March 1943. Screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz changed the setting from a Paris brothel to a nightclub in New Orleans and the main character was changed from a prostitute to a more ambiguous nightclub singer and hostess. Mankiewicz considered the screenplay among his 1940s successes of which he was most proud.
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