Chicago 50 - No. 12 - Roxie Hart Film (1942)

Ginger Rogers as Roxie Hart in 1942

Ginger Roger's writes in her autobiography of starring as the title character in the 1942 film Roxie Hart:

"On October 13, 1941, I began work on Roxie Hart for Twentieth Century-Fox. The film was based on the play Chicago, by Maurine Watkins, which in turn was based on newspaper reports of a murder. Roxie Hart was really a satire, and way ahead of its time. William Wellman was the director and Nunnally Johnson was both the producer and scenarist. Both of these gentlemen were real pros. Bill Wellman treated Nunnally's offbeat script exactly as it should have been treated, by keeping the pace lively and the sentiment at a minimum.

"Roxie Hart is a gum-chewing, wise-cracking dancer who confesses to a murder committed by her husband, just so she can get publicity. I later learned that the part of Roxie was intended originally for Alice Faye, but she had a date with the stork. That's why you saw not her, but me, in the role. Again I was surrounded by a superior cast. Adolphe Menjou really was superb as the lawyer who defends me. His main ploy was to make sure I showed my legs to the all-male jury. George Montgomery, a gorgeous hunk of man, was a newspaperman, and Phil Silvers brought fun to a film that was already a burlesque. Lynne Overman, George Chandler, Nigel Bruce, Spring Byington, and Sara Allgood were also in the cast, and we all had a great time.

"In trying to fill out my character, I decided this girl had to have dark hair. The papers used to write articles saying that the studio forced me to become a brunette for this or that movie, but in truth, except for my initial blonding, no studio ever told me what color my hair was to be for any movie. It was always my decision, based on my understanding of the role. Right or wrong, I made the decision, and the one time I found it to be a mistake was in the film with Ronald Colman, Lucky Partners.

"Since Roxie was supposed to be a dancer, I thought I should work a little tap routine into the proceedings and found a perfect spot for it. Roxie is in jail and I wanted to do my dance on metal stairs. Truly, I'd always wanted to do taps on a metal staircase, because I knew the tap would have a good, resounding sound. Twentieth Century-Fox didn't have a metal staircase on hand and had to go to a good deal of trouble to locate one. It was finally found in the wreckage from a demolished building in downtown Los Angeles. It was worth the effort; the tap sequence was a pure joy to do and, I'm happy to say, a pure joy to watch. The stairs tempted everyone on the set. [shown below]

"You'd hear clicks and clacks at odd times, and when you looked, you'd see a cameraman or a propman or a production assistant trying out the staircase. Years later, when Roxie Hart was turned into the stage musical Chicago, Gwen Verdon told me how sad she was that she was not going to be able to dance on a metal staircase.

"Roxie Hart has become a cult film in recent years. I know of one theater in Philadelphia that runs it frequently. The manager told a friend of mine, Sidney Luce, 'We practically sell out the house for the entire run.' Not bad for a film released in 1942."

--Ginger: My Story by Ginger Rogers

Full film: