Blast from the Past: Kirk Douglas Revisited
H. C. Potter directed Top Secret Affair, a flat romantic comedy from a screenplay by Roland Kibbee and Allan Scott, starring Susan Hayward and Kirk Douglas.
Grade: C
The film was produced by Carrollton Inc., Hayward’s production company, named for her adopted hometown in Georgia, and distributed by Warner.
The story is very loosely adapted from John P. Marquand’s 1951 novel “Melville Goodwin, U.S.A.,” which had previously been adapted in 1952 for TV’s “Pulitzer Prize Playhouse.”
Hollywood had avoided filming the novel because of its controversial subject matter, a married general’s affair with a wealthy journalist. Hence, while the characters’ names—Melville Goodwin and Dottie Peale—were retained, the marital status of both was changed and they were made single.
The original leads were supposed to be Humphrey Bogart and wife Lauren Bacall, and wardrobe tests had bee made in 1956. But Bogart’s illness forced his withdrawal, and Bacall opted to care for him until his death in 1957.
Douglas plays Melville Goodwin, a decorated U.S. Army general, who’s appointed chair of the Joint Atomic International Commission by the President.
Meanwhile, Dottie Peale (Susan Hayward), a stubborn, high-powered media mogul, wants a close friend of her father’s to get the position, so she plots to torpedo Goodwin’s reputation.
She invites him to her Long Island estate for an interview, and assigns a cameraman to photograph Goodwin in compromising situations. However, her every attempt to catch Goodwin off guard fails. Deesprate, Dottie takes the general nightclubbing, hoping to get him drunk, yet nothing works.
Back in Long Island, Dottie, a little tipsy herself, falls off the diving board of her pool, and Goodwin rescues her, leading to romantic night.
Goodwin confides to a love affair with a woman (Yvette) to whom he revealed top-secret information during the Korean War. When he found out Yvette was an enemy spy, he ordered her shot.
Determined to ruin Goodwin, Dottie publishes a magazine story, “Blabbermouth Goodwin,” which results in a Senate inquiry of his behavior. Unfortunately, the Yvette spy case is still top secret, and he is forbidden to discuss it. It is only after the President’s intervention that the story is declassified. Able to Defend his status successfully, Goodwin is publicly cleared of wrongdoing and recognized as a hero.
In the end, Goodwin drags in public a seemingly protesting Dottie into a car, and the two ride off happily.
Neither Hayward (who received top billing) not Douglas were actors known for the kind of light touch required by this comedy, which was thinly plotted in the first place. Both performers were more adept at “serious” heavy-duty dramas.
And indeed, in the following year, Hayward would finally win the Best Actress Oscar (at her fifth nomination) for Robert Wise biopicture, I Want to Live!
The movie was a commercial failure.
Cast
Susan Hayward as Dorothy “Dottie” Peale
Kirk Douglas as Maj. Gen. Melville A. Goodwin
Paul Stewart as Phil Bentley, Dottie’s assistant and conscience
Jim Backus as Col. Homer W. Gooch, Goodwin’s Public Information Officer
John Cromwell as General Daniel A. Grimshaw, Goodwin’s commanding officer
Roland Winters as Sen. Burdick
Arthur Gould-Porter as Holmes, Dottie’s butler
Michael Fox as Reporter Laszlo “Lotzie” Kovach
