An Old-Fashioned Girl
Cast & Crew
Arthur Dreifuss
Gloria Jean
Jimmy Lydon
John Hubbard
Frances Rafferty
Mary Eleanor Donahue
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
In the fall of 1870, Polly Milton travels with all her belongings from Lincoln to Boston, Massachusetts, where she takes lodgings at Miss Mills's Rooming House. After she has settled in, she goes to visit the Shaw family, to whom she is distantly related and with whom she stayed previously. Parents Anastasia and Edward, son Tom, sister Frances and younger sister Maud were expecting Polly to stay with them, but she has chosen the rooming house as she intends to give singing lessons in order to help support her family. Polly, who is enamoured of Tom, is dismayed to learn that he is engaged to Trix Parker. Three weeks later, with her classes underway, Polly receives a visit from Frances, who is being courted half-heartedly by Mr. Sydney, and is invited to an elaborate party at her home, where she is snubbed by the other young women because she has a career. After she meets Trix, who treats her like a country bumpkin, Polly decides to leave but runs into Sydney, who is arriving. They go for a walk, and much to Frances' dismay, dance with each other at the party. Polly then sings for the guests and wins some of them over. Later, after Tom has played a practical joke on one of his university professors, the dean sends a letter to his father but his mother intercepts it. Polly invites the Shaws and Sydney to a recital of vocal and instrumental works at her lodgings and is herself invited to a sewing circle tea party. She is uncomfortable among the gossipy women, but tells them about Jane Bryant, an invalid who lives in the rooming house. Jane has attempted suicide due to insufficient work, and Polly convinces them to send work to her. Later, when Trix goes to New York for a week, Frances asks Tom to escort Polly and her to the opera. Maud arranges for Sydney to be there also, and his interest in Polly further angers Frances. Later, Polly tells Miss Mills that she wishes to avoid further contact with Sydney, but he finds her in a park. Just as she tells Sydney that he should marry Frances, Tom happens along. After Sydney leaves, Tom tells her that he has been expelled from university and owes a lot of money. Polly agrees to help Tom break the news to his father, but Mr. Shaw tells Tom that the family's iron works business has gone bankrupt. When Frances frets that all her friends will drop her, Polly points out that they are not her real friends. Because of their depleted finances the family moves to a smaller house, where Polly visits them on Tom's birthday. He is, however, unhappy because he cannot find work, and becomes more despondent when Trix breaks their engagement, having found a more well-to-do beau. Later, Tom tells Polly that Snyder intends to pay all Tom's debts as a gift, but Tom intends to pay him back. Polly realizes that her brother Ned could get Tom a job in the lumber business in Michigan and makes the arrangements, then returns to spend the summer on her family's farm in Lincoln. In the fall, she returns to Boston and resumes her arduous schedule of teaching, which eventually causes her to collapse. Miss Mills looks after her and assures her that she will be better by Christmas. Frances, meanwhile, has dropped her snobbish attitude and Sydney has asked her to marry him. Polly receives a letter from her brother indicating that Tom is likely to become engaged to a girl called Marcia. Later, Mr. Shaw tells his family that the foundry has been awarded a large contract by an iron steamship line, but he does not know how he got the contract. At a Christmas concert given by Polly's students, Mr. Shaw brings numerous presents and reveals that he has discovered that Sydney is the new owner of the company that awarded the contract. Tom returns with the news that it is Ned who is marrying Marcia and proposes to Polly. She accepts and they kiss.
Director
Arthur Dreifuss
Cast
Gloria Jean
Jimmy Lydon
John Hubbard
Frances Rafferty
Mary Eleanor Donahue
Irene Ryan
Douglas Wood
Barbara Brier
Claire Whitney
Rosemary La Planche
Qwenna Norla
Shirley Mills
Saundra Berkova
Milton Kibbee
Crew
Hal Belfer
Barbara Brier
Arthur A. Brooks
Arthur Dreifuss
Arthur Dreifuss
Stephen Foster
Herschel Gilbert
Danny Hall
Kiva Hoffman
Joseph Levinson
Nate Levinson
Felix Mendelssohn
Ray Mercer
Mcelbert Moore
Mcelbert Moore
Charles Previn
Franz Schubert
Albert Sendrey
Josephine W. Sweeney
Philip Tannura
Murray Waite
Bobby Worth
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The main title card reads Louisa May Alcott's An Old-Fashioned Girl. Alcott's novel was serialized in Merry's Museum (Jul-December 1869). Although the onscreen credits "introduce" violinist Saundra Berkova, she had previously appeared in the 1945 Republic production Captain Tugboat Annie.
