By Richard Harland Smith
One Man's Way
Brief Synopsis
The Reverend Norman Vincent Peale fights to bring his message to the nation.
Cast & Crew
Read More
Denis Sanders
Director
Don Murray
Norman Peale
Diana Hyland
Ruth Peale
William Windom
Rev. Clifford Peale
Virginia Christine
Anna Peale
Carol Ohmart
Evelyn
Film Details
Genre
Drama
Adaptation
Biography
Release Date
Jan
1964
Premiere Information
Kansas City, Missouri, opening: 26 Feb 1964
Production Company
Frank Ross Productions
Distribution Company
United Artists
Country
United States
Screenplay Information
Based on the book Norman Vincent Peale; Minister to Millions by Arthur Gordon (Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1958).
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 45m
Sound
Mono (Westrex Recording System)
Color
Black and White
Synopsis
Twelve-year-old Norman Vincent Peale determines never to become a clergyman because of the insults he has suffered as the son of a smalltown Ohio minister. He changes his mind when, years later, as a Detroit crime reporter, he becomes frustrated by his inability to relieve much of the suffering and misfortune he reports. He enters a seminary and is there regarded as a rebel because he believes in a God of love rather than of vengeance, but his zeal increases church attendance wherever he preaches. In Syracuse he convinces pretty co-ed Ruth Stafford that the life of a minister's wife can be exciting; and after their honeymoon he accepts a position at New York City's Marble Collegiate Church. His methods and preachings are criticized as his fame grows; but through radio, articles in magazines, and a syndicated newspaper column he develops his thesis that God helps those who help themselves. With the publication of his book The Power of Positive Thinking , the condemnation of his theological attitudes reaches new heights; and he is about to resign from his pulpit when an experience with a critically ill child, who is given no chance for survival by medical science but nevertheless rallies after Peale keeps a night-long prayer vigil, renews his faith in all he has written and preached. He decides to remain with his church.
Director
Denis Sanders
Director
Cast
Don Murray
Norman Peale
Diana Hyland
Ruth Peale
William Windom
Rev. Clifford Peale
Virginia Christine
Anna Peale
Carol Ohmart
Evelyn
Veronica Cartwright
Mary
Liam Sullivan
Dr. Gordon
June Dayton
Mrs. Gordon
Ian Wolfe
Bishop Hardwick
Charles Lampkin
Lafe
Arthur Peterson Jr.
Instructor
Hope Summers
Mrs. Thompson
Virginia Sale
Miss Collingswood
Rory O'brien
Leonard Peale, as a child
David Bailey
Robert Peale, as a child
Mickey Sholdar
Norman Peale, as a child
Paul Marin
Feldman
Hank Stanton
Jack Wilson
Bryan O'byrne
Organist
Eddie Ryder
Gas station attendant
Ed Peck
Harry, the reporter
John Harmon
Elder Marcus
Joseph Hamilton
Elder Thompson
Tom Palmer
Professor Aiken
Sandra Gale Bettin
Alma
Wendy Ferdin
Margaret Peale
Sharyl Locke
Elizabeth Peale
Butch Patrick
John Peale
Gerald Gordon
Robert Peale, grown
Tom Skerritt
Leonard Peale, grown
Vernon Rich
Mr. Melton
Bing Russell
Tom Rayburn
Ann Morgan Guilbert
Receptionist
Ed Prentiss
Mr. Boardman
Arthur Marshall
Rod Allenberry
Geraldine Wall
Mae Michaels
Jon Lormer
John Hellman
Jean Carson
Woman who shoots husband
Crew
Philip W. Anderson
Film Editor
Jack Angel
Costumes
John W. Bloch
Screenwriter
Lambert Day
Sound
Joe Di Bella
Makeup
Herbert S. Greene
Assistant Director
Eleanore Griffin
Screenwriter
Ben Hersh
Prod Supervisor
Morris Hoffman
Set Decoration
Lillian Hokom
Hairstyles
Edward Jewell
Art Director
Willard Jones
Orchestration
Grace Kuhn
Costumes
Ben Lane
Makeup
Ernest Laszlo
Director of Photography
Richard Markowitz
Music
Dick Ross
Associate Producer
Frank Ross
Presented By
Frank Ross
Producer
Videos
Movie Clip
Film Details
Genre
Drama
Adaptation
Biography
Release Date
Jan
1964
Premiere Information
Kansas City, Missouri, opening: 26 Feb 1964
Production Company
Frank Ross Productions
Distribution Company
United Artists
Country
United States
Screenplay Information
Based on the book Norman Vincent Peale; Minister to Millions by Arthur Gordon (Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1958).
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 45m
Sound
Mono (Westrex Recording System)
Color
Black and White
Articles
One Man's Way
The author of the bestselling The Power of Positive Thinking is the subject of this Hollywood biopic, which stars Don Murray as Norman Vincent Peale, a Detroit crime reporter turned Protestant preacher whose canny co-option of mass media gave him a celebrity status on par with Aimee Semple McPherson and the Reverend Billy Graham. A conscientious objector during the Korean War, Don Murray parlayed his Academy Award nomination for Bus Stop (1956) into an opportunity to produce and star in The Hoodlum Priest (1960), which chronicled the founding of Dismas House, the nation's first halfway house for rehabilitated prison parolees. Directed by Denis Sanders, whose War Hunt (1962) had provided Robert Redford with an early featured role, One Man's Way benefits from Murray's charismatic central performance but also from the winning support of William Windham (as Peale's clergyman father), Folgers coffee pitchlady Virginia Christina (as Peale's mother), Broadway transplant Diana Hyland (as the sorority girl who becomes Peale's supportive wife) and, in bits, The Dick Van Dyke Show's Ann Morgan Guilbert, a pre-Munsters' Butch Patrick, and Alien (1979) costars Tom Skerritt and Veronica Cartwright. Peale's problematic real life anti-Catholic beliefs (he was a vocal opponent of the presidency of John Fitzgerald Kennedy) are sidestepped here in favor of his central message of positive thinking and the initial backlash that made the "minster to millions" a cause celébrè.
By Richard Harland Smith
By Richard Harland Smith
One Man's Way
The author of the bestselling The Power of Positive Thinking is the subject of this Hollywood biopic, which stars Don Murray as Norman Vincent Peale, a Detroit crime reporter turned Protestant preacher whose canny co-option of mass media gave him a celebrity status on par with Aimee Semple McPherson and the Reverend Billy Graham. A conscientious objector during the Korean War, Don Murray parlayed his Academy Award nomination for Bus Stop (1956) into an opportunity to produce and star in The Hoodlum Priest (1960), which chronicled the founding of Dismas House, the nation's first halfway house for rehabilitated prison parolees. Directed by Denis Sanders, whose War Hunt (1962) had provided Robert Redford with an early featured role, One Man's Way benefits from Murray's charismatic central performance but also from the winning support of William Windham (as Peale's clergyman father), Folgers coffee pitchlady Virginia Christina (as Peale's mother), Broadway transplant Diana Hyland (as the sorority girl who becomes Peale's supportive wife) and, in bits, The Dick Van Dyke Show's Ann Morgan Guilbert, a pre-Munsters' Butch Patrick, and Alien (1979) costars Tom Skerritt and Veronica Cartwright. Peale's problematic real life anti-Catholic beliefs (he was a vocal opponent of the presidency of John Fitzgerald Kennedy) are sidestepped here in favor of his central message of positive thinking and the initial backlash that made the "minster to millions" a cause celébrè.
By Richard Harland Smith
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
"Ohio" exteriors filmed in Pasadena, California. Marble Collegiate Reformed Church sequences filmed in New York City.
Miscellaneous Notes
Released in United States 1964
Released in United States 1964
