Fox Studio Classics – Film Noir – Nightmare Alley – Point Of View
The film Nightmare Alley laid in copyright limbo for over fifty years, a struggle between the estates of producer George Jessel, author W.L. Gresham and the 20th Century Fox Film Corporation. In that time, its cult status continued to grow. Not just from the rarity of its screenings on television and at film festivals, but from the later suicides of the book’s author and the movie’s director, and its remarkably grim, bold, and disturbing look at hucksterism and its milieu.
It was 1946 and Tyrone Power, Fox’s leading male star, had returned from service in World War II. From an acting family and a stage background, he had grown tired of the empty “pretty boy” image that had made him a matinee idol. He wanted a different role. One that would showcase his range and depth and change the public’s (and industry’s) perception of him from a toothpaste ad to a serious actor. He had leaned toward that end with his first post-war duty role by playing Larry Darrell in Somerset Maugham’s The Razor’s Edge.
Power leveraged his past success (and the considerable money he made for the studio) to make Nightmare Alley his prestige project. Studio Head Daryl F. Zanuck was against it from the start but he owed Power gratitude and a bit of artistic license so he green-lighted the film. Ultimately, Zanuck’s instincts would prove correct (as they so often did). The film failed miserably at the box office and Power ended up returning to the adventurous, swashbuckling roles that had made him famous. Interestingly, many of 20th Century Fox’s most unique and enduring pictures were made in this vein, by a proven film artist’s passionate plea and Zanuck’s begrudging nod.
War weary audiences of the late ’40s were not ready for it. Although film noir was seeping into the mainstream, an “A” picture starring the dashing and overwhelmingly handsome Tyrone Power as a greedy, manipulative charlatan was too much for them. Adding to this shock was the story, adapted from a novel immersed in the sleazy world of carny, portraying the darker realities of alcoholism, marital infidelity, religion, spiritualism and ambition by an author who was a known communist, drunkard and wife beater.
via Fox Studio Classics – Film Noir – Nightmare Alley – Point Of View.