Death Takes a Holiday

Death Takes a Holiday
Death Takes a Holiday
	Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Mitchell Leisen
Screenplay by	Maxwell Anderson; Gladys Lehman
Based on	Death Takes a Holiday; 1929 play La Morte in Vacanza by Alberto Casella; by Walter Ferris
Produced by	E. Lloyd Sheldon; Emanuel Cohen
Starring	Fredric March; Evelyn Venable; Guy Standing; Katharine Alexander; Gail Patrick; Kent Taylor; Helen Westley; Henry Travers; Kathleen Howard;
Cinematography	Charles Lang
Music by	Bernhard Kaun; John Leipold; Milan Roder;
Production; company	Paramount Pictures
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date	February 23, 1934;
Running time	79 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

Death Takes a Holiday is a 1934 American pre-Code romantic drama starring Fredric March, Evelyn Venable and Guy Standing. It is based on the 1924 Italian play La morte in vacanza by Alberto Casella (1891–1957), as adapted in English for Broadway in 1929 by Walter Ferris.

Plot

After years of questioning why people fear him, Death takes on human form as Prince Sirki for three days so that he can mingle among mortals and find an answer. He finds a host in Duke Lambert after revealing himself and his intentions to the Duke, and he takes up temporary residence in the Duke's villa. However, Death falls in love with the beautiful young Grazia. As he does so, Duke Lambert, the father of Grazia's mortal lover Corrado, begs him to give Grazia up and leave her among the living.

Death is torn between seeking his own happiness or sacrificing it so that Grazia may live. After listening to the pleas from the Duke and his houseguests, Death finally decides to let Grazia live and returns to his true self, a black shadow. As he prepares to depart, Grazia chooses to go with him, telling him that she knew all along who he really was. Death then proclaims that love is greater than illusion and is as strong as death. He puts his arm around Grazia, and they both disappear in a flash of light.

Cast

Fredric March as Prince Sirki/Death
Evelyn Venable as Grazia
Guy Standing as Duke Lambert
Katherine Alexander as Alda
Gail Patrick as Rhoda
Helen Westley as Stephanie
Kathleen Howard as Princess Maria
Kent Taylor as Corrado
Henry Travers as Baron Cesarea
G. P. Huntley, Jr. as Eric
Otto Hoffman as Fedele
Hector Sarno as Pietro (uncredited)

Releases

The theatrical premiere of the film was on February 23, 1934, at the Paramount Theatre in New York City.^[1] The home video releases have been:

Death Takes a Holiday (VHS). Universal Studios. March 8, 1999.
Death Takes a Holiday (DVD). Universal Studios. January 9, 2007. (as part of the Meet Joe Black Ultimate Edition)
Death Takes a Holiday (DVD). Universal Studios. January 11, 2010.
Death Takes a Holiday (Blu-Ray). Kino Lorber. July 23, 2019.^[2]

Reception

Time called the film "thoughtful and delicately morbid", while Mordaunt Hall for The New York Times wrote that "it is an impressive picture, each scene of which calls for close attention".

Richard Watts, Jr, for the New York Herald Tribune, described it as "An interesting, frequently striking and occasionally beautiful dramatic fantasy", while the Chicago Daily Tribune said that March was "completely submerged in probably the greatest role he has ever played."^[3] Variety called it "the kind of story and picture that beckons the thinker, and for this reason is likely to have greater appeal among the intelligentsia." It praised March's performance as "skillful".^[4] John Mosher of The New Yorker wrote that the film was "nicely done", although he suggested it was "a little obnoxious with all its talk of being in love with death."^[5]

The New York Times initially listed the film among those that "failed completely" at the box office.^[6] Yet one month later the same author in the Times described the movie as a "gratifying success" for Paramount that "gave new life to the stockholders".^[7]

Remakes and adaptations

A one-hour radio adaptation of the film aired on Cecil B. DeMille's Lux Radio Theatre on March 22, 1937, starring Fredric March reprising his role as Death and his wife, actress Florence Eldridge, as Grazia.^[8]
Universal Studios, which acquired the rights to the film in 1962 following a merger with then-owners MCA, made a 1971 television production featuring Yvette Mimieux, Monte Markham, Myrna Loy, Melvyn Douglas and Bert Convy. Loy related in her biography that the production was marred by a decline in filming production standards; she described a frustrated Douglas storming off the set and returning to his home in New York when a tour guide interrupted the filming of one of his dramatic scenes to point out Rock Hudson's dressing room.
The film was remade by Universal again in 1998 as Meet Joe Black starring Brad Pitt, Claire Forlani and Anthony Hopkins.
It was adapted into a musical by Maury Yeston with the book by Peter Stone and Thomas Meehan. It began previews Off-Broadway on June 10, and officially opened on July 21, 2011, in a limited engagement through September 4, 2011, at the Laura Pels Theatre at the Harold & Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre in a production by Roundabout Theatre Company.^[9]
A May 2006 episode of the television drama Medium also builds on the concept of death portrayed as a man. The season 2 episode is similarly titled, being called "Death Takes a Policy".

References

^ ^a ^b "Death Takes a Holiday (1934)". Toronto Film Society. October 21, 2014. Retrieved June 22, 2015.
^ "Kino: Two Mitchell Leisen Films Detailed for Blu-ray". Blu-Ray.com. Retrieved October 14, 2021.
^ Striner, Richard (2011). Supernatural Romance in Film: Tales of Love, Death and the Afterlife. McFarland and Company. pp. 21–22. ISBN 9780786484874.
^ "Death Takes a Holiday". Variety. February 27, 1934.
^ Mosher, John C. (March 3, 1934). "The Current Cinema". The New Yorker. p. 66.
^ Churchill, Douglas W. (Nov 25, 1934). "Taking a Look at the Record". The New York Times. p. X5. ProQuest 101193306.
^ Churchill, Douglas W. (December 30, 1934). "The Year in Hollywood: 1934 May Be Remembered as the Beginning of the Sweetness-and-Light Era (gate locked);". The New York Times. p. X5.
^ "Death's Holiday". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. March 22, 1937. p. 19 – via Google News.
^ Jones, Kenneth (June 10, 2011). "Julian Ovenden's Reaper Has a Song in His Heart in Death Takes a Holiday, Premiering in NYC". Playbill.