Bringing Up Baby

Bringing Up Baby is a 1938 American screwball comedy film directed by Howard Hawks and starring Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant. The film follows a befuddled paleontologist who becomes entangled with a flighty heiress and a domesticated leopard during a chaotic day that upends his career and romance prospects. Initially a commercial failure, the film has been reevaluated and is now celebrated as a classic, influential to directors and performers across Hollywood, Broadway, and international cinema.

Plot

A scattershot narrative begins with museum curator and paleontologist David Huxley, employed at the American Museum of Natural History, struggling to complete a mounted brontosaurus skeleton for an eminent benefactor, Mrs. Champernowne. David's plans are disrupted when Susan Vance, a wealthy and exuberant socialite, arrives at a country estate belonging to her uncle, General Schofield, featuring chaos involving a runaway Staghound (often misremembered as a leopard), a missing bone, and a series of misunderstandings. Susan pursues David with a mix of romantic pursuit and comic sabotage, leading to a courtroom scene, car chases, and encounters with characters connected to Tammany Hall-style socialites, reporters from the New York Times, and rural law enforcement. The plot culminates with David's career jeopardized, social reputations in flux, and a finale that resolves through improvisation, misdirection, and a return to the museum setting where the brontosaurus display intersects with personal reconciliation.

Cast and Characters

The principal cast includes Katharine Hepburn as Susan Vance, whose vivacious persona echoes her roles in films linked to RKO Pictures, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and stage work on the Broadway circuit; Cary Grant as David Huxley, reflecting the debonair screen persona he honed in films like The Lady Eve and later North by Northwest; Walter Catlett as the comedic suitor and local authority; May Robson as Mrs. Champernowne, a patron whose expectations drive the fossil subplot. Supporting players feature character actors associated with 1930s Hollywood repertory: Charlie Ruggles, Edward Everett Horton, and a young performer later seen in Citizen Kane-era circles. Cameo and bit parts include actors with stage ties to The Group Theatre, Federal Theatre Project, and touring companies that also worked with producers from Samuel Goldwyn and David O. Selznick.

Production

Production took place under the supervision of producer Pandro S. Berman at RKO studios in Hollywood, with principal photography scheduled amid studio conflicts involving RKO Radio Pictures executives, union negotiations with the Screen Actors Guild, and scheduling overlaps with other Hepburn and Grant projects. Director Howard Hawks, known for collaborations on films such as Scarface (associate influences) and for later work with actresses like Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart in To Have and Have Not, emphasized rapid-fire dialogue and improvisation influenced by stage techniques from Eugene O'Neill-trained actors. The screenplay by Hagar Wilde and Dudley Nichols underwent multiple drafts to accommodate Hepburn's comedic timing and Grant's screwball style, integrating physical comedy sequences reminiscent of silent-era practitioners like Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin. The animal actor—a leopard named “Baby”—required coordination with animal handlers linked to touring circuses and animal trainers who had worked with production companies including MGM and 20th Century Fox. Cinematographer Joseph Walker and composer Roy Webb contributed techniques related to visual composition and musical cues common to RKO pictures of the late 1930s.

Release and Reception

Upon its 1938 release the film faced mixed reviews from critics at publications such as the New York Herald Tribune, The New York Times, and Variety, and underperformed at the box office against competition from films distributed by Warner Bros., Universal Pictures, and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer that season. Contemporary reviewers critiqued its pacing and Hepburn's departure from dramatic roles associated with RKO prestige projects. Over ensuing decades, film historians and critics from institutions like the British Film Institute, the Library of Congress, and academies organizing the Cannes Film Festival reassessed the picture, noting its influence on the screwball tradition and on actors who later worked in postwar comedies at Paramount Pictures and European studios such as UFA and Cinecittà.

Legacy and Influence

The film's reputation grew among filmmakers, scholars, and performers, cited by directors including Billy Wilder, Wes Anderson, Noah Baumbach, and Peter Bogdanovich for its dialogue, pacing, and female lead agency. Film studies programs at universities like Yale University, UCLA, and New York University analyze it alongside works by Frank Capra, Ernst Lubitsch, and Preston Sturges for its contributions to screwball conventions. Actors influenced by Hepburn and Grant reference the film in interviews with organizations such as the American Film Institute and during retrospectives at institutions like the Museum of Modern Art and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The film appears on curated lists by critics from Sight & Sound, Time Magazine, and the British Film Institute and has inspired stage adaptations, radio plays on networks like NBC Radio, and homages in television series produced by BBC and HBO. It remains an object of study in courses on classic Hollywood, gender performance, and the history of RKO Radio Pictures.

Category:1938 films Category:American screwball comedy films Category:Films directed by Howard Hawks