Up the River
Brief Synopsis
Cast & Crew
Alfred Werker
Preston Foster
Tony Martin
Phyllis Brooks
Slim Summerville
Arthur Treacher
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
On an ocean liner heading to the United States, an American named George Lawson meets Englishman Ronald Barclay at the ship's bar and invites him to play blackjack at his suite. Barclay drops his wallet, and it is found by another American, Rex Parmalee. Parmalee returns the wallet and joins the two men for a poker game. When the boat docks, after three days of gambling, Lawson has lost $6,000 to Parmalee and $17,000 to Barclay. After insisting that they accept his checks, Lawson offers them a ride in his limousine, and they arrive at a police station, where Lawson reveals that he is really Clarence Willis, a police officer. He then arrests Parmalee and Barclay, who are really the infamous con artists Chipper Morgan and Darby Randall, respectively. Morgan and Randall are sent "up the river" to Rockwell prison, where they discover, to their dismay, that Willis has been appointed the new warden. Willis assigns them to the sweeping detail, and they are put into the same cell with Slim Nelson, the coach of the football team, and Tommy Grant, who is to be paroled soon. Tommy is looking forward to marrying Helen Lindsay, who is serving time in a reformatory because they got mixed up with con artists Jeffrey Mitchell and Ray Douglas and took the rap for them. After Willis sees that Morgan and Randall have significantly improved Slim's football team, he agrees to take them off the sweeping detail and places a $100 bet with Warden Harris, from a rival prison, on their upcoming game. When Helen is released, she goes to stay with Tommy's mother, who knows nothing of her prison record and thinks that she met her son in Shanghai, where, she believes, Tommy still is. Helen learns that Mitchell and Douglas have sold phony investment plans to nearly everyone in town and are about to close a deal with Tommy's mother. When Helen threatens to expose them, they point out the harm that will come if Tommy's past is found out, particularly as Tommy's sister is engaged to marry the mayor's son. Helen visits Tommy in prison and informs him of the situation, and he tells his cellmates that he wants to break out to help his mother. After the prisoners put on a "Frolics" show, Chipper slugs Tommy, so that he cannot escape. Dressed in women's clothes used for the show, Chipper and Randall then leave with the audience after shutting off the lights. When Tommy's parole is taken away because of the breakout, Slim tells Willis about the situation. Worried that the team will lose the next day without Chipper and Randall, Willis travels to Tony's hometown. Meanwhile, Chipper and Randall have contacted Helen, and they arrange to con Mitchell and Douglas into thinking that the townspeople are going to lynch them. Willis and his assistant Tiny break up the ruse, but when Chipper threatens to lose the game unless Willis gets Mitchell and Douglas out of town, Tiny hits Douglas over the head and Willis gives the crooks' money to Helen to return to her neighbors. Chipper and Randall arrive back at prison with one play left in the game. Randall gets the idea to have everyone on the team carry balloons that look like footballs, and while the others on the team are being tackled, Randall, Chipper and Tommy get the real ball across the goal line to win and make the day the happiest in Slim's life.
Director
Alfred Werker
Cast
Preston Foster
Tony Martin
Phyllis Brooks
Slim Summerville
Arthur Treacher
Alan Dinehart
Eddie Collins
Jane Darwell
Sidney Toler
Bill Robinson
Edward Gargan
Robert Allen
Dorothy Dearing
Charles D. Brown
Leyland Hodgson
Olaf Hytten
Virginia Brissac
Billy Bevan
Gladys Gale
Irving Bacon
Bill Irving
Frank Darien
Russ Clark
Margaret Daggett
Lucille Ward
Lillian Yarbo
Lee Shumway
Frank Hagney
Charles Tannen
George Chandler
James C. Morton
Fred Kelsey
Sam Mcdaniel
Fredrik Vogeding
Dale Armstrong
J. Anthony Hughes
Ben Welden
Harry C. Johnson
Dewey Robinson
Max Wagner
Cliff Clark
Dutch Hendrian
Jack Stoney
Joe Devlin
Gary Breckner
Crew
Joseph E. Aiken
Harry Akst
William H. Anderson
Lou Breslow
Nicholas Castle
Sidney Clare
Nick De Maggio
Chester Gore
Bernard Herzbrun
Samuel Kaylin
Thomas Little
Peverell Marley
Helen A. Myron
John Patrick
Geneva Sawyer
Lew Wertheimer
Saul Wurtzel
Sol M. Wurtzel
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The working title of this film was Hard to Get. According to a Hollywood Reporter news item, the film went back into production "to build production values" after executives saw a rough cut. Because Preston Foster and Arthur Treacher were already involved in other films, the additional shooting had to be done on Sunday. This film was a remake of the 1930 Fox film of the same title, which was directed by John Ford and starred Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart (see AFI Catalog of Feature Films, 1921-30; F2.5999). According to publicity for the 1938 film, the earlier film, which climaxed in a baseball game, was inspired by a prison riot in Auburn, N.Y. Variety commented concerning the 1938 film, "Major changes have been made in the original story, but basic idea is the same, and a few ideas have been retained in substance." They also noted that this film, as distinct from the earlier version, "emphasizes the burlesque."
