With: Joel McCrea (John L Sullivan), Veronica Lake (The Girl), Robert Warwick (Mr LeBrand), William Demarest (Mr Jones), Franklin Pangborn (Mr Casalsis), Porter Hall (Mr Hadrian), Byron Foulger (Mr Valdelle), Margaret Hayes (Secretary)
Writer/Director: Preston Sturges 
Production Co: Paramount 
Associate Producer: Paul Jones 
Photography: John Seitz
Editor: Stuart Gilmore 
Music: Charles Bradshaw, Leo Shuken
Production Design: Hans Dreier, Earl Hedrick
Costume Design: Edith Head

REVIEW



“Tired of churning out lightweight comedies, Hollywood director John L Sullivan (Joel McCrea) decides to make 
O Brother, Where Art Thou? — a serious, socially responsible film about human suffering. After his producers point out that he knows nothing of hardship, Sullivan hits the road disguised as a hobo. En route to enlightenment, he encounters a lovely but no-nonsense young woman (Veronica Lake) — and more trouble than he ever dreamed of.” — Criterion

“'Make 'em laugh' is hardly an adequate summation for a story in which the most memorable and affecting sequence is a prayer meeting in a rural black church, led by an uncredited Jess Lee Brooks. Talk about leaving the preaching to the preachers. The lesson of Sturges's peculiar gospel may ultimately be the communion of all humanity in the need for laughter, but by the time you reach this revelation, you have witnessed one of the most striking and conscience-laden episodes of social realism in classic American cinema. Other films of the 1930s and early '40s are certainly more outspoken and sustained in their criticisms of the established order — I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang comes to mind as an obvious model — but only Sullivan's Travels shows you the face of poverty, protests against legalized brutality, and puts to shame America's racial division all at once, in full seriousness. And it does so as the high point of its story. That the film is determined to sell this story as comedy does not diminish the seriousness but rather makes it all the more wonderful.”  – Stuart Klawans

AUCKLAND FILM SOCIETY FUNDRAISER
Special Extra Public Screening
​All tickets $20
​(members & public)

Auckland   
Monday, 02 March, 6:30pm 
​Tickets available now at Eventbrite 
​and at Academy Cinemas 
​Download Sullivan's Travels poster