Best Man Wins
Cast & Crew
John Sturges
Edgar Buchanan
Anna Lee
Robert Shayne
Gary Gray
Hobart Cavanaugh
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
In the summer of 1853, profligate gambler Jim Smiley returns home to Dawson's Landing, Missouri after an absence of ten years. At the local hotel, Jim introduces his old friend, Amos the hotel clerk, and Sheriff Dingle to his "educated" jumping frog, Daniel Webster, and bets that Daniel will jump on command. With his winnings, Jim pays for his hotel room, and then calls on his wife Nancy and young son Bob but soon discovers that Nancy has divorced him and plans to marry Judge Leonidas K. Carter. Nancy upbraids Jim for deserting her and Bob, but allows him to become acquainted with the son he has never seen. To win the boy's affections, Jim promises to buy the possession Bob prizes the most, a racing Greyhound named Andrew Jackson III. Through a series of underhanded deals, Jim manages to scrape together $300 to buy the dog, and Bob eagerly enters the animal in an upcoming race at the fairgrounds. As Bob trains Andy for the contest, Monty, Carter's bratty son, taunts him, resulting in a fight between the two boys. Still in love with Nancy and disapproving of the pompous Carter, Jim decides to forswear gambling and take a job working at the hotel in an effort to win back Nancy's love. On the day of the race, Jim, unable to resist temptation, asks the river boat captain to place a bet for him on Carter's champion racer. Against all odds, Andy wins, and Nancy, believing that Jim had not placed any bets, is delighted that his reformation is complete and agrees to remarry him. On the day of the wedding, Jim finds Bob betting with Monty and counsels his son about the ruinous effect that gambling can have on one's life. Broke and remorseful for allowing Nancy to believe that he has forsworn gambling, and fearful that he will be a bad influence on his son, Jim decides to call off the wedding. At the same time, Carter, peeved at losing Nancy, tries to stop the ceremony by questioning Jim's ability to pay for the wedding arrangements. In response, Jim challenges Carter to bet $1,000 on Daniel Webster against Amos' leaper, Martha Washington. After Carter places his bet, Jim fixes the contest by stuffing Daniel with buckshot. Jim then refuses to accept Carter's money, and with his integrity restored, decides to tell Nancy the truth about betting on the dog race. Impressed by Jim's newfound honesty, Nancy gladly accepts him as her husband.
Director
John Sturges
Cast
Edgar Buchanan
Anna Lee
Robert Shayne
Gary Gray
Hobart Cavanaugh
Stanley Andrews
George Lynn
Bill Sheffield
Marietta Canty
Paul E. Burns
Jack Gargan
Robert B. Churchill
Al Thompson
Chester Clute
Louis Mason
Ralph Littlefield
George Chesebro
Pat O'malley
Emmett Vogan
Thomas Jackson
Jerome Franks Jr.
Ralph Peters
Mantan Moreland
Norman Leavitt
Earl Dewey
Tom Coffey
Si Jenks
Bill Sundholm
Al Kunde
Crew
Mischa Bakaleinikoff
James Crowe
Paul Donnelly
Vincent Farrar
Howard Fogetti
Walter Holscher
Edward Huebsch
Helen Hunt
Irving Klein
Rose Loewinger
Ted Richmond
Pat Sutherland
James Sweeney
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The viewed print was missing the majority of its production credits. According to a 1949 news item from Los Angeles Herald Express, Mark Twain's daughter, Sara Clemens Samossoud, and the Central Bank and Trust Company filed a lawsuit against Columbia, insisting that all references to Twain's story be eliminated. The outcome of that suit has not been determined. This film bears no relation to the 1935 Columbia Picture of the same name.
