CASABLANCA LORE

CASABLANCA IS my favorite movie of all time; maybe yours too? I think of it as having not a wasted frame, not a wasted look, not a wasted sound, not a wasted word. What’s more, it has enriched my collection of stuff—cinema, literature, music, and even a musical ripoff.

Casablanca, with Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Michael Curtiz, director, a Hal B. Wallis production, Warner Bros., 1942.

The movie Casablanca, cataloged as an American romantic drama, had its world premiere in New York City on November 26, 1942. It was based on a stage play, never produced, titled Everybody Goes to Rick’s, the reference, of course, to Bogie’s restaurant in the Vichy-controlled Moroccan city of Casablanca where he encounters old flame Ilsa/Ingrid.

In fact, the movie was shot entirely at Warner Bros. Studio in Burbank, California, with the exception of the airport sequence at Van Nuys Airport. It’s filled with iconic lines (“The Germans wore gray, you wore blue.”) and images (Rick’s must have been close to the airport—remember flashes of the airport beacon across its entrance?).

Sydney Greenstreet, left, introduced most Americans to the name Ferrari. At right, Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid) and Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman).

Aviation buffs recognize an oddity, however. Promotional posters show a Douglas DC-3 in the closing scene, yet the movie’s aircraft is a Lockheed Electra 12A. Also, the flyby scenes are, at best, 1940s Hollywood-chintzy. For other Casablanca aircraft lore, check out http://goo.gl/vCLYbN.

The shooting script, with comments as to its day-by-day generation, can be seen at http://goo.gl/9xUaYm.

Round Up The Usual Suspects: The Making of Casablanca—Bogart, Bergman, and World War II, by Aljean Harmetz, Hyperion, 1992.

Hollywood film authority Aljean Harmetz describes background of the film, its origins and its production under the Hollywood studio system during World War II.

Of the movie’s Hungarian-born director Michael Curtiz, Harmetz quotes his stepson saying, “He spoke five languages—and I’m told he spoke all of them equally badly.”

On another Hollywood set, when razzed about his poor English, Curtiz responded, “You think I know f*** nothing. But you’re wrong; I know f*** all!”

A Night at the Movies, or, You Must Remember This, by Robert Coover, Linden Pub, 1987.

Robert Coover’s book of short stories, A Night at the Movies, or, You Must Remember This, shares a line from Sam/Dooley Wilson’s song, so it’s no surprise there’s a Casablanca connection. These short stories take Hollywood genres—and turn them on their heads. In the cowboy one-reeler, the black hat triumphs. The horror flic is so well wrought that I shudder even in rereading it.

And that Casablanca scene where Ilsa returns to Rick’s to get the Letters of Transit? In the book, this expands into a funny bit of pornography.

As Time Goes By, by Michael Walsh, Grand Central Publishing, 1999.

By contrast, Michael Walsh’s As Time Goes By is a G-Rated prequel/sequel. What was Rick’s past in 1930s New York gangland? (“I like to think you killed a man. It’s the Romantic in me…”) And what happens after the Electra takes off for Portugal? (Rick, Sam and Ilsa get involved in a plot to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich, the Hangman of Prague.)

Casablanca, Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, music by Max Steiner, Warner Bros. Studio Orchestra, Turner Broadcasting, 1997.

The soundtrack album is more than a collection of Casablanca music by Max Steiner (who also did the film scores for King Kong, Gone with the Wind, The Treasure of Sierra Madre and scads of others). It also contains selected bits of dialogue: “Of all the gin joints…” “Here’s looking at you, kid.”

Casablanca, a two-CD collection, ostensibly of movie themes.

What with various royalties, soundtrack CDs are typically expensive. Thus, what better deal when shopping a government authorized book/music store in Shanghai than to find a two-CD set with Bogie, Bergman, the Arc de Triumph and the word Casablanca?

Imagine, two CDs of movie score ripoffs for the equivalent of $3.52!

The album had precisely one ripoff—Simon and Garfunkel’s Sound of Silence—along with 13 really cheesy covers of Moon River, Endless Love, When I Fall in Love—and a title cut with a lounge lizard singing “I fell in love with you/Watching Casablanca/Back row at the driven show/In the flickering light.” ds

© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com, 2013