In 1948 two Christmas movies were among the nominees for Best Story at the 20th Academy Awards: Miracle on 34th Street and It Happened on 5th Avenue. The former won the award and went on to become a yearly Christmas standard. The latter disappeared from television after 1990. An online fanbase brought the film back from anonymity and now enjoys yearly showings on TCM (and is currently available to stream on HBO Max.)
Many viewers recognize a similarity between It Happened on 5th Avenue and the sort of pictures Frank Capra made. Capra noticed too and nearly directed the film, but chose It’s a Wonderful Life instead. Fewer mention the movie’s similarities to A Christmas Carol. This one lacks ghosts, time travel, and, humbugs, but the central character undergoes a transformation and redemption comparable with Scrooge's.
Charles Ruggles (the grandpa in the original Parent Trap) plays Michael J. O’Connor, the second richest man in the world. O’Connor is a decent guy but self-centered, focused more on tearing down abandoned army barracks than his daughter and wife (well, ex-wife now). Every winter O’Connor goes to Virginia, leaving his swanky Fifth Avenue mansion unoccupied. Unbeknownst to him, that’s when Aloysius T. McKeever (Victor Moore) moves in.
McKeever is a convivial and cavalier hobo, a homeless man-about-town, who partakes in his taste for finer things by living in the empty mansions of New York City’s vacationing billionaires. McKeever eats their food, sleeps in their beds, and dons their fancy clothing. This year, he invites a homeless solider, Jim Bullock (Don De Fore), to stay with him at O’Connor’s mansion. Bullock was evicted from his apartment after O’Connor bought the building to tear it down.
Just as McKeever and Jim settle into the lap of luxury, more outcasts join them. Jim invites his army buddies, wives and kids included, to stay at the mansion for Christmas when they can’t find affordable lodgings. Jim and McKeever also welcome in a beautiful young woman, Trudy. As happens in these movies, Jim and Trudy fall in love.
But Trudy’s got a secret: she’s actually O’Connor’s daughter, on the run from boarding school. She wants certainty that Jim loves her for her and not for her dad’s money. So when O’Connor flies back to New York in search of her, Trudy persuades him to play the part of a homeless man. McKeever “allows” O’Connor (or Mike as he’s known in the house) to stay at the mansion, unaware of O’Connor’s true identity. O’Connor becomes a sort of housekeeper, washing dishes and making beds, subservient to all the interlopers in his own mansion. O’Connor the rich man now becomes the servant to McKeever the poor man.
That’s when the movie finds its sparkle and O’Connor finds his path to redemption. Forced to live like a poor man, surrounded by those less fortunate than himself, O’Connor learns to see them as people, even friends. Much like Scrooge, O’Connor worldview expands and so too does his empathy and his generosity.
Screenwriter Everett Freeman tries to position Jim and Trudy’s romance into the film’s center. De Fore and Storm’s chemistry is light and serviceable even when their performances feel slight and forgettable. Storm owns one pronounced scene where Trudy tearfully confides to her father about her lonely and friendless life. But De Fore and Storm are outshone at every turn by Ruggles and Moore. Individually, they give multifaceted performances, equally funny and eccentric, but also tender and downhearted. Together they are sensational.
If Ruggles plays the movie’s soul, Moore represents the heart. His gentle prodding and simple thinking guides and inspires the eclectic band of lost souls to grasp for life and it’s many basic pleasures. While he serves as a beacon for the others to strive for, he is paradoxically a cautionary tale of a life lived alone. McKeever usually stays in the mansion alone. This Christmas he opens “his doors” to others and realizes he’s much better off in the company of new friends.
Director Roy Del Ruth, who earned his stripes making early silent films, handles the Capra-esque material with sensitivity. In 1947, this subject matter was topical and very real for many. Former World War II G.I.s and their families faced housing shortages while living in the looming shadows of mansions, owned by multimillionaires in New York and Palm Beach. Del Ruth and Freeman strike the right balance of situational humor and socioeconomic concern. They do not take the subject matter glibly.
The movie was produced by Allied Artists Productions, a new division of Monogram Pictures. Long associated with cheap westerns and low-budget horror movies, Monogram hoped that It Happened on 5th Avenue would elevate the studio from their “Poverty Row” reputation. Most Monogram movies were budgeted at $90,000. It Happened on 5th Avenue was budgeted $1.2 million and earned $1.8 million at the box office. (Today, Monogram Pictures is remembered only for its cheaply made movies.)
Despite a slightly overlong running time and a story that nowadays might feels more sitcom than cinema, It Happened on 5th Avenue remains a deliciously entertaining Christmas movie. Be on the look out for Alan Hale, Jr. (the Skipper from Gilligan’s Island) and Charles Lane (a character actor whose career went for 72 years). This underrated Christmas gem, populated by quirky and eccentric characters, is richened by the trite but true belief that richness and poorness are not assessed by money alone.
-T.Z.
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