Trivia

A Little Casual History: Beauty and the Boss (1932) was filmed in the San Fernando Valley from the Warner Bros. Studio along the Santa Monica Mountain --- on the other side of the HOLLYWOOD Sign. The 1930's were the time when "Movies" (From Silent to 'Talkies') meant "Hollywood" generically.

Still, Warner Bros. filmed north of the Hollywood Sign in the San Fernando Valley. Still, another piece of history was this film was released in 1932 after being shot on the sound stage a good five to 15 minutes by car-- before there were "Freeways"---from Burbank Airport (aka, Bob Hope Airport, etc.)

Two minutes into the film, the Viennese bank president's plane lands. That airport was "United Airport" then; Burbank Airport for decades to come.

"So what," comes to mind. This was a historical location for American Aviation. As his plane taxis on the tarmac, the camera capture the barren land and the landmark mountains behind, barren of the housing boom following World War II.

This is the airport were Amelia Earhart called her home base. Released in 1932, pictures and film exist of the first lady of aviation at the same Burbank Airport Beauty And The Boss did rare location shots. Earhart hangered her plane in the same time frame until her assumed death---July 2, 1937.

Lost in the multiple airport scenes, such as where The Church Mouse directed her Boss' lover to the wrong plane, there were tumbleweeds, no Interstate 5 "Golden State" Freeway. Millions of locals, visitors foreign and domestic have traveled over the last some 60 years.

Yet, the Earhart Electra sat in the "Burbank Airport" hanger before being lost some five years later. It is a metaphor how the minds of girls, mothers and grandmothers lost track of this famed Airport in a throwaway scene. A scene showing off in the distance Los Angeles Suburbs a desert locale, and the home base of one of America's greatest aviators.

Beauty and the Boss (1932) was based on a 1928 Hungarian play by Ladislas Fodor about a secretary who eventually marries her boss. The original play opened in Budapest, Hungary, on 2 December 1927. According to Variety, Paul Frank was a co-author of the Hungarian play.

The Baron's plane is a Fokker F-10A, registration NC394E, built by the Fokker Aircraft Corporation of America - the U.S. division of the Dutch company. First flown in 1927, only 65 were built. This particular aircraft later flew with Western Air Express (later Western Airlines) from 1933-35.

The play was made into a German film Poor as a Church Mouse (1931), directed by Richard Oswald. First National remade the story into a film as The Church Mouse (1934).

An English language adaptation of the Ladislas Fodor play by Benn W. Levy, entitled A Church Mouse, opened in London in early May 1931. Another English language adaptation by Frederic Hatton and Fanny Hatton, also called A Church Mouse, presented by William A. Brady opened in New York at the Playhouse Theatre, 137 W. 48th St., on October 12, 1931 and ran for 164 performances until March 1932.