Miracle on 34th Street

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Miracle on 34th Street

Original movie poster for Miracle on 34th Street
Directed by George Seaton
Produced by William Perlberg
Written by Valentine Davies (story)
George Seaton (written by)
Starring Maureen O'Hara
John Payne
Natalie Wood
Edmund Gwenn
Music by Cyril Mockridge
Cinematography Lloyd Ahern
Charles G. Clarke
Editing by Robert L. Simpson
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Release date(s) May 2, 1947 (U.S. release)
Running time 96 min
Language English
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Miracle on 34th Street (also titled The Big Heart in the UK) is a 1947 film written by Valentine Davies, directed by George Seaton, and starring Maureen O'Hara, John Payne, and Edmund Gwenn. The film won Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Edmund Gwenn), Best Writing, Original Story (Valentine Davies) and Best Writing, Screenplay. It was also nominated for Best Picture, losing to Gentleman's Agreement. It was placed #9 at AFI's 100 Years... 100 Cheers. Davies also penned a short story version of the tale which was published simultaneously with the film's release.

One of the great Christmas movies, Miracle on 34th Street is the story of what takes place in New York City following Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, as a single mother and her daughter, a lawyer, and many others are left wondering whether or not a department store Santa Claus just might be the real Mr. Claus.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Contents

[edit] Plot synopsis

Kris Kringle (Edmund Gwenn) attracts the attention of a window dresser and corrects his placement of the reindeer. He then attends the annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and finds to his indignation that the actor cast as Santa (Percy Helton) is drunk. When he complains to the special events director, Doris Walker (Maureen O'Hara), she persuades Kris to replace him. He proves to be sensational and is hired to be the Santa for Macy's flagship New York City store on 34th Street at Herald Square.

Once there, both his firm belief in the spirit of Christmas and his firm contention that he is actually Santa himself cause problems. One woman shopper (Thelma Ritter) is impressed by Santa sending her to another store, "Schoenfeld's", for a fire engine for her son Peter. She tells Mr. Shellhammer, head of the toy department, that she will become a loyal Macy's customer. Kris later tells another mother that Macy's rival, Gimbels, has better skates for her daughter. Fred, a neighbor of Doris' who is attracted to her and who occasionally babysits her 9-year-old daughter Susan, brings Susan to see Kris. Doris then lectures Fred about filling Susan's mind with fantasy. But Susan watches Kris talk and sing to a Dutch World War II orphan girl in her native tongue, and begins to believe that perhaps Kris is real.

Although Doris initially wants to fire him as crazy, Kris' winning ways and unorthodox ideas, such as recommending rival stores when they have better bargains, generate so much good publicity and customer goodwill for Macy's that Mr. R.H. Macy himself (Harry Antrim) promises Doris and her boss, Julian Shellhammer (Philip Tonge) generous bonuses, making it vital to keep the old man.

However, as a condition of employment, Doris sends Kris to a Mr. Granville Sawyer (Porter Hall) to take a "psychological evaluation" (actually an intelligence test). Kris easily passes the test, but invites trouble from Sawyer by probing a little too aggressively into Sawyer's own psychological status, asking him about his nervous habits and whether he has a happy home life (he does not, as a later phone call to his wife reveals). (We also see that Sawyer's idiosyncracies have affected his own secretary, who rubs her eyes after the fashion of sawyer.)

The store expands on the marketing concept to good effect, while the main competitor, Gimbels, retaliates by using the same store referral policy throughout its chain, forcing Macy's to respond likewise. Eventually, Kris accomplishes the impossible: Mr. Macy shakes hands with his biggest competitor, Mr. Gimbel (Herbert H. Heyes), owner of Gimbels Department Store. Gimbel asks Kris what he will do with the money from a large bonus check Macy has just given him; Kris says he will give the money toward an X-ray machine needed at the home. Gimbel states he will get the machine for him at cost.

Doctor Pierce (James Seay), Kris' doctor at his nursing home firmly assures Doris and Shellhammer that Kris' apparent delusion is harmless and equally disagrees with the secretly vindictive Sawyer, who argues that Kris should be institutionalized in a mental hospital. Meanwhile, Doris' idealistic lawyer neighbor, Fred Gailey (John Payne), agrees to let Kris bunk with him during his employment period at the store, and her no-nonsense young daughter, Susan (Natalie Wood), whom she has raised not to believe in such childish fantasies, (as Doris still has bitter feelings of a failed relationship with her ex-husband) gradually come to see there is something special about the old man.

Things take a turn for the worse when Kris learns that the incompetent, would-be psychologist Sawyer has made a quack's diagnosis of a young, impressionable employee, Alfred (Alvin Greenman), as mentally ill simply because he is generous and kind hearted (he likes to play Santa Claus himself). Kris becomes outraged when Alfred also reveals that Sawyer has convinced the boy that he hates his father. Kris confronts Sawyer and warns him that he will expose his illegal and harmful "practice" and in a fit of anger at Sawyer's obstinate belligerence, Kris raps him on the head with his cane. Doris and Shellhammer, approaching at that moment, only see the aftermath; Sawyer exaggerates his injury in order to justify having Kris committed involuntarily at Bellevue mental hospital. Tricked into cooperating and believing Doris to be part of the deception, a discouraged Kris deliberately fails his mental examination (again, actually an intelligence test) and is recommended for permanent commitment.

However, Fred has been notified by the hospital and persuades Kris not to give up while he works to secure his release. To that end, Fred gets a formal hearing before Judge Henry X. Harper (Gene Lockhart) of the New York Supreme Court to block the commitment order. Warned by Mr. Macy to get the matter dropped, Sawyer is told it must go through the legal system and pleads for Fred not to seek publicity. Fred realizes that publicity is his best defense tactic, and thanks the startled Sawyer for the idea. The immediate novelty of the case puts Judge Harper on the spot--even his own grandchildren rebuke him for "persecuting" Santa Claus.

At the hearing Kris is the State's only witness. New York County District Attorney Thomas Mara (Jerome Cowan) immediately gets Kris to assert that he is in fact Santa Claus and rests his case, believing he has prima facie proved the point. Fred counters with the stunning argument that Kris is not insane because he actually is Santa Claus--and Gailey will prove it. Mara, oblivious to the public relations nightmare brewing, requests the Judge to rule legally that Santa Claus does not exist. Judge Harper, whose practicality, honesty, and ego makes him inclined to agree, is warned in chambers by his political adviser Charlie Halloran (William Frawley) that to do so would be politically disastrous. The judge takes the safe, compromise position of allowing evidence from either side. Fred calls R.H. Macy as a witness and Mara pointedly asks if he really believes Kris to be Santa Claus. At first Macy sees that denying Kris could ruin the Christmas sales season, and starts to give a weasely answer ("Well, he gives every indication...") Mara confronts him with the question, "Do you or do you not believe this man to be Santa Claus?" Macy then remembers the expressions on the faces of small children seeing Kris, and firmly states, "I do!" After he leaves the stand Macy passes near Sawyer sitting in the gallery, and tells him he's fired. Fred then calls Mara's small son to the stand to bolster his case, as Mara had told his own son that Santa is real, and "My daddy would never tell a lie!" Outmaneuvered, Mara concedes the existence of Santa Claus by the State of New York. However, he then forces Fred to legally put up or shut up--can he prove that Kris is "the one and only" Santa Claus, on the basis of some competent authority? (The Judge says, "Your point is well taken, Mr. Mara--I'm afraid we must agree." He glances at Charlie, who sensibly nods.)

Fred quits his prestigious New York law firm and has a falling out with Doris, who has no faith in his ability to argue this case and calls it an "idealistic binge" over some "lovely intangibles." He retorts that one day she may discover that those lovely intangibles are the only worthwhile things in life.

While Fred searches frantically for something to prove his point, Susan, by now firmly believing in Kris, writes him a letter to cheer him up, which Doris signs also. A mail sorter (Jack Albertson) sees it and realizes that the post office could clear out the many letters to Santa taking up space in their dead letter office by delivering them to Kris at the courthouse. Kris receives Susan's letter and shrugs off Fred's despair about the case, as this "intangible" means the world to him. Just then Fred learns that the Post office has delivered over 50000 pieces of mail to Kris, and adroitly outmaneuvers Mara a final time, starting with three letters addressed only "Santa Claus" that have been delivered to Kris at the courthouse. He lays a foundation that the Post Office is competent authority and takes special precautions to deliver mail only to the rightful person--a claim Mara unwittingly concedes "for the record" because it is Christmas Eve and he wants to get home. Fred nonchalantly admits he "has further exhibits" and Judge Harper demands he produce all of them and "put them here on my desk". Fred has all the mail brought in and the judge is practically buried beneath bags and bags of letters.

Fred then argues that the United States Post Office, a branch of the federal government, accepts Kris' claim as the one and only Santa Claus. This conveniently lets Judge Harper rule in favor of Kris, as the judge's political advisor discreetly nods in approval from the gallery. After the hearing, Doris invites Kris to dinner, but he turns her down, reminding her "it's Christmas Eve!"

On Christmas morning, Susan, Fred, Doris, R.H. Macy, and Alfred (dressed as Santa) have breakfast at the Brooks Home. Dr. Pierce is thrilled to find the X-ray machine, and tells Kris that "personally and professionally" he agrees with the court's ruling that Kris is Santa Claus. Howver, Susan is disillusioned because Kris was apparently unable to supply her greatest wish, a house in the suburbs. At that point, Doris repeats the words to Susan that Fred had spoken to her earlier, "Faith means believing when common sense tells you not to."

As they are about to leave, Kris gives Fred and Doris a route home, supposedly to avoid traffic, that takes them through a certain suburb. As Fred, Doris and Susan are driving the route Kris recommended, Susan is elated to see the house of her dreams with a For Sale sign in the front yard. (The house exactly matches the drawing she had shown Kris earlier). Fred learns that Doris has come out of her shell and taught Susan to have faith, and suggests they get married and purchase the house. Fred boasts that he must be a great lawyer since he managed to do the seemingly impossible in getting Kris officially recognized as Santa. He then spots a cane leaning against the fireplace that looks exactly like the one Kris carried, and remarks: "Maybe I didn't do such a wonderful thing after all!" The final shot is a closeup of the cane with "Jingle Bells" playing on the soundtrack.

Spoilers end here.

[edit] Cast

  • Maureen O'Hara as Doris Walker, co-ordinator of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and assistant manager of the toy department at Macy's.
  • John Payne as Frederick M. Gailey, Attorney-at-law and neighbor to Mrs. Walker.
  • Edmund Gwenn as Kris Kringle. Is he, or is he not, the one-and-only Santa Claus?
  • Natalie Wood as Susan, Doris' 8-year-old daughter.
  • Theresa Harris as Cleo, Doris' cook and housemaid.
  • Percy Helton as the "original" Santa Claus stand-in in the parade, whom Kris Kringle denounces for being drunk on the job.
  • Philip Tonge as Julian Shellhammer, manager of the toy department and Mrs. Walker's boss.
  • Lela Bliss as Julian Shellhammer's wife.
  • Alvin Greenman as Alfred, another Macy's employee who often plays Santa Claus at the local YMCA.
  • Porter Hall as Granville Sawyer, intelligence-test administrator and "psychologist" at Macy's.
  • Harry Antrim as R. H. Macy, owner of "THE biggest department store in New York".
  • Herbert H. Heyes as Mr. Gimbel, current head of Gimbels
  • James Seay as Dr. Pierce, a geriatrics physician at the Brooks Memorial Home for the Aged, where Kris lives.
  • Thelma Ritter as a harried mother who is the first to get a referral from Kris Kringle to a store other than Macy's where she can find a toy for her son.
  • Gene Lockhart as The Hon. Henry X. Harper, Judge of the New York State Supreme Court.
  • William Frawley as Charlie Halloran, Judge Harper's political adviser.
  • Jerome Cowan as District Attorney Thomas Mara.
  • Ann Staunton as Mrs. Mara, his wife.
  • Bobby Hyatt as Thomas Mara, Jr., his son, whom Fred Gailey calls to testify to the existence of Santa Claus.
  • Jack Albertson and Guy Thomajan as two United States Post Office Department employees who decide to deliver all their Santa Claus mail to Kris Kringle at the courthouse.

[edit] Trivia

  • When Fred is called by Bellevue about Kris, he is dictating on the subject of real property.
  • During the courtroom scene, Kris promises Attorney Thomas Mara's son that he would get the "real football helmet" he wants. Coincidentally or otherwise, the real-life Mara family have owned the NFL's New York Giants since 1925.[1] Early in the film, there had been a "giant" balloon of a football player in the Macy's parade.
  • Ranked #9 on the American Film Institute's 100 Most Inspiring Movies of All Time (2006).
  • There are 21 mail bags carried into the courtroom at the end of Kris's hearing.
  • Maureen O'Hara was initially reluctant to take the role, as she had just returned to Ireland before being called back to America for the film. However, she immediately changed her sentiments upon reading the script.[2]
  • There was no Mr. Macy by the time of the film. In 1896, R. H. Macy's was acquired by Isidor Straus and his brother Nathan.
  • In the book, Reel Justice, the authors point out that Judge Harper had an easy way of dismissing the case early without the political repercussions he feared. This was when the prosecutor rested his case immediately after Kris Kringle admitted in court simply that he believed he was Santa Claus. In doing so, Judge Harper could have ruled that prosecution had forfeited its opportunity to prove that Kringle was dangerous, the basic point of such hearings (his actual mental state itself being irrelevant), and ordered the subject immediately released.
  • Although Kris Kringle appears to be a master psychologist at dealing with children, his confrontational and defiant approach to Sawyer (rather than working to gain his trust) escalates into the climactic hearing.
  • When demonstrating that he has taken several mental examinations in the past, Kris Kringle says that Daniel D. Tompkins was John Quincy Adams' vice-President, but Tompkins was Vice-President under James Monroe. John C. Calhoun was Adams' Vice-President.
  • Despite the fact that the film is set during the Christmas season, studio head Darryl F. Zunick insisted that it be released in May, because he argued that more people went to the movies during the summer. So the studio began scrambling to promote it while keeping the fact that it was a Christmas movie a secret.

[edit] Remakes

There are four remakes of the movie:

[edit] 1955 version

A 1955 television movie starring Thomas Mitchell as Kris Kringle and Sandy Descher as Susan Walker. Titled The Miracle on 34th Street instead of just Miracle on 34th Street. Originally aired as an episode of TV's The 20th Century Fox Hour.

[edit] 1959 version

A 1959 television movie starring Ed Wynn as Kris Kringle; also featured was Orson Bean. This version of the popular Valentine Davies story was broadcast live and in color on NBC the day after Thanksgiving in 1959 and seemed to have disappeared completely. NBC made a kinescope of the program, probably for broadcasting opening night on the west coast. The copy was in a large collection of kinescopes donated by NBC to the Library of Congress and recently unearthed by Richard Finegan, who reported his quest and experiences in the December 2005 issue of Classic Images.

[edit] 1963 Broadway musical

A 1963 Broadway musical version, entitled Here's Love, was written by Meredith Willson.

[edit] 1973 version

A 1973 television movie starred Jane Alexander, David Hartman, Roddy McDowall, Sebastian Cabot, Suzanne Davidson, Jim Backus, David Doyle and Tom Bosley. It was adapted by Jeb Rosebrook from the George Seaton screenplay, and directed by Fielder Cook. Mrs. Walker's first name is changed to Karen in this version.

[edit] 1994 version

A 1994 feature film version featured Richard Attenborough, Elizabeth Perkins, Dylan McDermott, J.T. Walsh, James Remar, Jane Leeves, Simon Jones, William Windom and Mara Wilson. It was adapted by John Hughes from the Seaton script, and directed by Les Mayfield. Due to Macy's refusal to give permission it was replaced by the fictitious "Cole's." Alvin Greenman (Alfred in the original version) was featured as the doorman.

This remake had a more serious tone than the original and a large portion of the movie was rewritten, although the majority of the plot and characters remained intact. The characters of Alfred and Sawyer were removed entirely and Kris is instead manipulated to land himself in trouble due to a conspiracy between the drunken Santa fired at the beginning of the film and the agents of a rival store.

This version made much of the fact that the world in its current state is filled with greed and cruelty as demonstrated by how willing the people in the conspiracy were to lock up an innocent, benevolent man for their own selfish ends. This is contrasted with the number of people who support Kris, which includes an orderly at the hospital where he's placed and, apparently, the police officers who arrested him. There is a scene where Kris tells Dorey that he sees himself (Santa Claus) as a symbol of hope and compassion in a jaded modern world of selfishness.

The film also added a subtext concerning religious faith. This is demonstrated in the climax of this version, where Judge Harper rules in favor of Kris after Susan presents him with a Christmas card containing a one-dollar bill with the words "In God We Trust" circled and he declares that if the United States government can issue its currency bearing a declaration of trust in God on faith alone, then he can rule that Santa Claus exists in the man of Kris Kringle. (It's worth noting that the words "In God We Trust" weren't permanently added to U.S. currency until 1957, so they would not have been on the one-dollar bill when the original version was made.)

West Wing fans may also find worthy of note an early appearance by Allison Janney (C. J. Cregg) where she plays the role played by Thelma Ritter in the original version.

[edit] Names of the Characters in Different Versions

1947 version 1955 version 1959 version 1963 Broadway musical 1973 version 1994 version
Doris Walker Doris Walker Doris Walker Doris Walker Karen Walker Dorey Walker
Frederick M. Gailey Fred Gaily Fred Gaily Fred Gaily Bill Schaffner Bryan Bedford
Kris Kringle Kris Kringle Kris Kringle Kris Kringle Kris Kringle Kris Kringle
Susan Walker (no middle name given) Susan Walker Susan Walker Susan Walker Susan Walker Susan Elizabeth Walker
Cleo ?? ?? ?? ?? [eliminated]
Drunk Santa (no name given) ?? [no name given] ?? ?? Tony Falacchi
Julian Shellhammer Mr. Shellhammer (no first name given) Mr. Shellhammer (no first name given) Marvin Shellhammer Horace Shellhammer Donald Shellhammer
Mrs. Shellhammer [eliminated] [eliminated] [eliminated] [eliminated] [eliminated]
Alfred ?? ?? ?? Alfred [eliminated]
Granville Sawyer Dr. Albert Sawyer Dr. William Sawyer ?? Dr. Henry Sawyer [eliminated]
R. H. Macy Mr. Macy R. H. Macy R. H. Macy R. H. Macy C. F. Cole
Mr. Gimbel Mr. Gimbel Mr. Gimbel Mr. Gimbel Mr. Gimbel Victor Landbergh
Dr. Pierce Dr. Pierce [eliminated] ?? Dr. Pierce [eliminated]
Hon. Henry X. Harper Hon. Harper Hon. Harper Hon. Martin Group Hon. Harper Hon. Henry Harper (no middle initial given)
Charlie Halloran ?? ?? ?? ?? [eliminated]
Thomas Mara Thomas Mara Mr. Mara (no first name given) Thomas Mara [no name given] Ed Collins
Mrs. Mara [eliminated] ?? ?? ?? Rebecca Collins

[edit] External links

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