In her early days as a film actress, young Bette Davis was ready to chuck Hollywood and return to the Broadway stage. After spending a couple of years thrashing around Universal Studios where she appeared in six unsatisfying roles, the 24-year-old actress had had enough. Davis was packing her bags when she received what she thought was a crank call. The person on the other end claimed he was veteran actor George Arliss, and he was phoning her to see if she was interested in playing his love interest in his next upcoming film, February 1932's "The Man Who Played God." Davis said she adopted an English accent talking to whom she thought was an impersonator, and exclaimed "Of course, Mr. Arliss. How jolly decent of you." After several minutes of convincing her he was the real deal, the young actress became all tingly inside. "My excitement and joy were indescribable," she remembers. "An Arliss film was a prestige film. Out of all bad comes some good. I have always believed this."
The phone call proved to be a pivotal point in the actress' career. Instead of returning to the East Coast, Davis was not only remaining in Los Angeles, but when Jack Warner saw the rough cut of "The Man Who Played God," he signed her to a five-year contract, a move that began an affiliation between the actress and the studio for the next 18 years. Arliss, viewing the actress's brief moments in her Universal movies and after interviewing many candidates for the role, was convinced Davis could realistically play Grace Blair, the character who both loved and hero-worshiped the concert pianist Montgomery Royle (Arliss). But her hair color bothered the actor. Arliss sent the actress to the studio makeup artist who recognized she needed a blondish hair color. "He was right," reminisced Davis. "For the first time I looked myself. It was for me a new lease on life."
When the censors were turning studio heads hair grey with their demands for cuts of controversial scenes, Warner Brothers bragged "The Man Who Played God" served as an example where a movie can deliver a positive message. In the film, while giving a private concert to a visiting monarch, Montgomery has his eardrums shattered from a bomb explosion meant for the ruler. Losing his hearing and unable to play the piano, the former musician learns to lip read. He discovers spying through his binoculars several conversations in a nearby park where he could help people overcome their troubles, especially financially. One talk he 'eavesdrops' on is his much younger fiancé, Grace, returning from a long stay in California to marry him. But he sees Grace talking to an admirer from out West, Harold Van Adam (Donald Cook), who's passionately in love with her. But the westerner is thwarted from deepening the relationship since she's firmly committed to marrying Montgomery.
The script, from an earlier play adapted ten years earlier in a 1922 silent in which Arliss appeared, was remade again in 1955 in Liberace's only starring role, "Sincerely Yours." Meanwhile, in real life Davis and Arliss remained lifelong friends, until the actor's death in 1946.
The phone call proved to be a pivotal point in the actress' career. Instead of returning to the East Coast, Davis was not only remaining in Los Angeles, but when Jack Warner saw the rough cut of "The Man Who Played God," he signed her to a five-year contract, a move that began an affiliation between the actress and the studio for the next 18 years. Arliss, viewing the actress's brief moments in her Universal movies and after interviewing many candidates for the role, was convinced Davis could realistically play Grace Blair, the character who both loved and hero-worshiped the concert pianist Montgomery Royle (Arliss). But her hair color bothered the actor. Arliss sent the actress to the studio makeup artist who recognized she needed a blondish hair color. "He was right," reminisced Davis. "For the first time I looked myself. It was for me a new lease on life."
When the censors were turning studio heads hair grey with their demands for cuts of controversial scenes, Warner Brothers bragged "The Man Who Played God" served as an example where a movie can deliver a positive message. In the film, while giving a private concert to a visiting monarch, Montgomery has his eardrums shattered from a bomb explosion meant for the ruler. Losing his hearing and unable to play the piano, the former musician learns to lip read. He discovers spying through his binoculars several conversations in a nearby park where he could help people overcome their troubles, especially financially. One talk he 'eavesdrops' on is his much younger fiancé, Grace, returning from a long stay in California to marry him. But he sees Grace talking to an admirer from out West, Harold Van Adam (Donald Cook), who's passionately in love with her. But the westerner is thwarted from deepening the relationship since she's firmly committed to marrying Montgomery.
The script, from an earlier play adapted ten years earlier in a 1922 silent in which Arliss appeared, was remade again in 1955 in Liberace's only starring role, "Sincerely Yours." Meanwhile, in real life Davis and Arliss remained lifelong friends, until the actor's death in 1946.