The Farmer Takes a Wife

Fate plays a big factor in people's lives, especially if the profession is acting. Henry Fonda, at 30, was happy with his five years so far acting on the stage, especially in New York City. In Hollywood, Fox Films was winding down its productions with its pending consolidation with 20th Century Pictures when the studio began casting for its August 1935 "A Farmer Takes A Wife." First Gary Cooper, then Joel McCrae were approached to play Dan Harrow, an Erie Canal boat driver in the mid-1800s who sees farming as his future. Both actors were unavailable. Studio scouts then pointed to the young actor, Henry Fonda, on the Broadway stage as befitting the character's personality. It was a huge gamble to take such a neophyte unfamiliar with studio lights and filmmaking methods and hand him the lead in a major Hollywood production. Director Victor Fleming was willing to take the chance on Fonda and commit the extra work to familiarize him with Hollywood's ways.

"With this first movie, Fonda established himself as an earnest screen presence - a young man of ideals and integrity," described film reviewer Paddy Lee. Fleming gave Fonda the film presence that reflected the humbleness the actor showed off camera. "The debut of that soon-to-be-iconic screen persona is immediately engaging," wrote reviewer Paul Mavis. "The tentative glances, the long, slow gait, the stillness and inner resolve, and the romanticized plaintiveness of his speech as he quietly rhapsodizes about simple rural pleasures. No wonder he was a big hit right out of the gate with this turn." Henry Fonda was a shy six-foot tall Omaha, Nebraskan native when his mother's friend recommended that he try out for a part in a local community theatre's play. The 20-year-old credit bank clerk got the part. Soon after he received the lead in another play, where he realized acting was something he enjoyed. He joined the University Players in Cape Cod, meeting his future wife actress Margaret Sullivan. Before long, Fonda journeyed to New York City, reconnecting with fellow University Players alumni Jimmy Stewart, where the two became roommates honing their acting skills on Broadway for the next several years. Fate took over after two major Hollywood stars were unavailable to play the canal driver. Fonda assumed the lead in the movie version of the Frank Elser/Marc Connelly play 'The Farmer Takes a Wife.'

Janet Gaynor's character Molly Larkins was the love interest to Fonda's Dan Harrow in "The Farmer Takes a Wife." As one of the main stars for Fox Films, Gaynor's luster with the newly merged 20th Century-Fox dropped from number one to 24th. Her frustration in the two roles she played the following year caused her to seriously think about retiring. That's when producer David O. Selznick offered her a part of a rising actress in his 1937 "A Star Is Born."

The framework of "The Farmer Takes a Wife" illustrates the transformation from canal transportation to the railways. Molly Larkins is a cook who works for Jotham Klore (Charles Bickford), a rough, rowdy canal driver who locks horns with Dan, who believes there's no future working on the canals. Ironically, although Bickford played a major role alongside Fonda in his movie debut, the two never acted in the same film again until Bickford's final motion picture, 1966's 'A Big Hand for the Little Lady.' Two other character actors, Andy Devine and Margaret Hamilton, also contributed largely to "The Farmer Takes a Wife." Devine's distinctive voice set him apart from other actors. The Arizonian performer claimed a curtain rod he was holding between his teeth as a child while running jammed into his mouth when he fell. One reporter later asked about his anodes causing his raspy voice. Devine replied, "I've got the same nodes as Bing Crosby, but his are in tune." The actor began his entertainment career in a comedy act called 'Three Fat Guys' with David Arvedon and Jackie Gleason, the well-known comic entertainer with his long-running TV show. Devine left for Hollywood, where he appeared in over 400 movies, mostly Westerns.

Margaret Hamilton, known famously for her role in the Wicked Witch of the West in 1939's "The Wizard of Oz," initially loved teaching, earning a college degree at Wheelock College in Boston as a kindergarten instructor. But Hamilton gravitated towards the theater, and made her film debut in 1933's 'Another Language.' "A Farmer Takes a Wife" was Hamilton's sixth feature film appearance and was consistently active in movies and television well into the early 1980s.

"The Farmer Takes a Wife" was remade into the Technicolor 1953 musical with Betty Grable and Dale Robertson. But the original film version is more known today as the movie that introduced the public to the unique talents of Henry Fonda.

The 30 year old Henry Fonda made his screen debut in this film where he delivers a fairly mediocre performance. His voice is always the same and he's still as stiff and one dimensional as he went on to become as an old man on the screen, but there is activity in his face which redeems him as a screen actor.

Bucolic and slow-moving in the '30s Fox tradition, this comedy-drama from a mild Broadway hit preserves what was probably best about it--Henry Fonda, in his film debut--and adds some beautiful photography that may be back-lot but sure looks like the real Erie Canal in the 1850s, complete with morning haze, small-town unpaved streets, and modest canal skiffs. Not a lot happens as would-be farmer Fonda romances a proud Canal gal (Janet Gaynor, feistier and less goody-goody than usual), but it gets by on mood and a gallery of vivid supporting roles, ably handled by Charles Bickford, Slim Summerville, Andy Devine, Margaret Hamilton, and the appealingly un-cute child actress Jane Withers. Victor Fleming brought a lot of feeling to this, and Alfred Newman's scoring, for a change, isn't overemphatic. It's a lazy, outdoorsy movie that builds nicely to an unsurprising, satisfying conclusion.

In 1853 upstate New York, sweet 'n' bossy Janet Gaynor (as Molly Larkins) admires boatmen laboring along the Erie Canal, but frowns upon railroad-loving farmers like handsome Henry Fonda (as Dan Harrow), who only wants to work on the canal until he can buy a farm. Despite their differences, Mr. Fonda and Ms. Gaynor are obviously smitten with each other. Fonda wants Gaynor to cook for him, rather than boozy boating rival Charles Bickford (as Jotham Klore). But, Gaynor wants Fonda show he can be strong 'n' rough.

The crew at Fox created Award-worthy sets and locations for this film, which photographer Ernest Palmer and director Victor Fleming display beautifully. More about gender roles than farm and boatmen, the story is very silly. Yet, Gaynor elevates it by using cooking as a metaphor for sex. She and Fonda, reprising his stage success as a debut film appearance, are a radiant couple. And, the supporting cast is excellent. Watch out for veteran actor Robert Warwick (as Junius Brutus Booth) and his politically-interested young son.

******* The Farmer Takes a Wife (8/2/35) Victor Fleming ~ Janet Gaynor, Henry Fonda, Charles Bickford, Slim Summerville

When The Farmer Takes A Wife completed its run of 104 performances on Broadway in 1934 it was readily seen as a tailor made property for the number one star on the Fox Film's lot, Janet Gaynor. She specialized in playing sweet and rustic rural girls both on the silent and talking film.

But when Winfield Sheehan could not get either Gary Cooper or Joel McCrea to play the male lead, he took the unusual step of hiring the actor who originated the part on Broadway. And that boys and girls is how Henry Fonda became a motion picture star.

Even with Gaynor getting first billing, the accent here is on Fonda's character, a farm kid who's working on the Erie Canal in its last days because the railroad is coming through. Fonda just wants to earn enough money for good piece of farm land, not unlike Gary Cooper's Sergeant York character before he went to war. He's not into the Canal and what it's meant to the history and economy of upstate New York, in fact the whole Northeast of the USA.

Gaynor and most of the rest of the cast depend on the canal for a living and they don't like progress. But she does like Fonda, prefers him in fact to another Erie Canal boat pilot, Charles Bickford who plays a real lout. You know he and Fonda will tangle.

The Farmer Takes A Wife made Fonda both a stage and screen star, unusual for one work to accomplish both. But on the screen it also type cast Fonda into playing rustics for years. Think about all the roles he had in his early days. His next film was a sound remake of Way Down East, after that he did The Trail Of The Lonesome Pine, Slim, Chad Hanna which was based on a novel by Walter Edmonds just as The Farmer Takes A Wife was. Even his acclaimed parts for John Ford in The Grapes Of Wrath, Drums Along The Mohawk, and Young Mr. Lincoln fall in this same vein.

After almost 80 years, The Farmer Takes A Wife still holds up well as a drama. This is a quintessential Janet Gaynor film and if a young viewer didn't know Henry Fonda became a major star because of this film, they'd guess it right away.