Topper
Studio: Hal Roach Studios, United Artists
Starring: Constance Bennett, Cary Grant, Roland Young
Director: Norman Z. McLeod
Writer: Jack Jevne, Eric S. Hatch
Producer: Hal Roach
Topper is a 1937 American supernatural comedy film starring Constance Bennett and Cary Grant, and featuring Roland Young, Billie Burke, Alan Mowbray, and Eugene Pallette in support. Directed by Norman Z. McLeod, it tells the story of a stuffy, stuck-in-his-ways man who is haunted by the ghosts of a fun-loving married couple.
Trivia
- Nominated for: Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor; Academy Award for Best Sound.
- After a long career producing comedy shorts, producer Hal Roach was looking to expand into long-form films to complement his Laurel and Hardy features, and found a property in Topper, a risqué 1926 novel by Thorne Smith (the film is relatively faithful to the first half of the book, but more or less cuts the latter).
- Roach immediately wanted Cary Grant to play George Kerby, but he had difficulty getting the actor to agree to play the part, since Grant was concerned that the supernatural aspects of the story would not work.
- Roach was successfully able to pitch the film to Grant as a screwball comedy instead—and a $50,000 payday.
Filming Locations
- Topper was produced at Hal Roach Studios in Culver City, with location shooting at the entrance to the Bullock's Wilshire department store on Wilshire Boulevard - as the entrance to the "Seabreeze Hotel" - and at a location on San Rafael Avenue in Pasadena, California.
Previous Showings
12 Runs • 8 Festivals
15,731 tickets sold
Original Billings: 1 run (September 9, 1937)
Original Run: September 9, 1937 (Thursday - Saturday)
All runs on record (12):
- September 9, 1937 (Thursday - Saturday)Cary Grant, Constance Bennett
- August 15 - 18, 1992 · 2,955 ticketsw/ The Awful Truth
- April 20 - 22, 1994 · 1,134 ticketsw/ Holiday
- July 31 - August 1, 1997 · 628 ticketsw/ Peter Ibbetson
- July 2 - 3, 1998 · 1,256 ticketsDear Old Hollywoodw/ Holiday
- August 26 - 29, 2000 · 2,211 ticketsSummer 2000w/ Top Hat
- March 2 - 3, 2002 · 2,103 ticketsCG2002-1w/ The Toast of New York
- April 14 - 15, 2007 · 1,475 ticketsFilm Noir, Val Lewton, 1930s musicals and more!w/ Shall We Dance
- November 8 - 9, 2009 · 585 tickets20th Anniversary Festivalw/ The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
- November 27 - 29, 2010 · 1,005 ticketsFall 2010 Featuring film noir every Thursday and Fridayw/ The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
- April 17 - 19, 2015 · 1,097 ticketsCary Grant every Fri-Sat-Sun Plus Ernst Lubitsch and Rouben Mamoulian every Wedsw/ Madame Butterfly
- July 15 - 16, 2023 · 1,282 ticketsSummer 2023: The Best of Cary Grant and Alfred Hitchcockw/ The Awful Truth