Little Old New York (1940)

Interesting facts

Little Old New York is a 1940 American black-and-white historical drama from 20th Century Fox, produced by Darryl F. Zanuck, directed by Henry King, that stars Alice Faye, Fred MacMurray, and Richard Greene. The film is based on a play by Rida Johnson Young, which opened on Broadway on September 8, 1920, and starred Genevieve Tobin, Douglas Wood, and Donald Meek. It was previously adapted into a 1923 film starring Marion Davies.

Production

This is one of Faye's few nonmusical features, and her fans complained about her not singing in the film while it was still in production. A song was later added during an outdoor political rally set in a festive beer garden; Faye's participation in the added song proved minimal.

Both a 12-foot (3.7 m) Clermont shooting miniature and a full-size mock-up were built in Hollywood for the Fox production. Both were based on the original full-sized Clermont replica built for the 1909 Hudson-Fulton Celebration, which was eventually broken up for scrap by its New York owners, a result of financial hardships brought on in the 1930s by the Great Depression.

North River Steamboat is the actual name of the historic steamboat upon which this film is based; the vessel was never known as Clermont in its era.

Little Old New York is a sound remake of a silent film of the same title made in 1923, directed by Sidney Olcott and starring Marion Davies, Stephen Carr, and J. M. Kerrigan.

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