ADAM'S RIB

USA, 1949

Director: George Cukor

Production: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Corp.; black and white, 35mm; running time: 101 minutes. Released 1949. Filmed at MGM studios.

Producer: Lawrence Weingarten; screenplay: Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin; photography: George J. Folsey; editor: George Boemler; art directors: Cedric Gibbons and William Ferrari; music: Miklos Rozsa.

Cast: Spencer Tracy (Adam Bonner); Katharine Hepburn (Amanda Bonner); Judy Holliday (Doris Attinger); Tom Ewell (Warren Attinger); David Wayne (Kip Lurie); Jean Hagen (Beryl Caighn); Hope Emerson (Olympia La Pere); Eve March (Grace); Clarence Kolb (Judge Reiser); Emerson Treacy (Jules Frikke); Polly Moran (Mrs. McGrath); Will Wright (Judge Marcasson); Elizabeth Flournoy (Dr. Margaret Brodeigh).

Publications

Script:

Gordon, Ruth, and Garson Kanin, Adam's Rib, New York, 1971.

Books:

Langlois, Henri, and others, Hommage à George Cukor, Paris, 1963.

Domarchi, Jean, George Cukor, Paris, 1965.

Deschner, Donald, The Films of Spencer Tracy, New York, 1968.

Carey, Gary, Cukor and Company: The Films of George Cukor andHis Collaborators, New York, 1971.

Kanin, Garson, Tracy and Hepburn, New York, 1971.

Dickens, Homer, The Films of Katharine Hepburn, New York, 1971.

Lambert, Gavin, On Cukor, New York, 1972.

Tozzi, Romano, Spencer Tracy, New York, 1973.

Marill, Alvin H., Katharine Hepburn, New York, 1973.

Cavell, Stanley, Pursuits of Happiness: The Hollywood Comedy ofRemarriage, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1981.

Phillips, Gene D., George Cukor, Boston, 1982.

Carey, Gary, Katharine Hepburn: A Biography, London, 1983.

Britton, Andrew, Katharine Hepburn: The Thirties and After, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 1984.

Freedland, Michael, Katharine Hepburn, London, 1984.

Morley, Sheridan, Katharine Hepburn: A Celebration, London, 1984.

Bernadoni, James, George Cukor: A Critical Study and Filmography, Jefferson, North Carolina, 1985.

Edwards, Anne, Katharine Hepburn: A Biography, London, 1986.

Davidson, Bill, Spencer Tracy: Tragic Idol, London, 1987.

Levy, Emanuel, George Cukor, Master of Elegance; Hollywood'sLegendary Director and His Stars, New York, 1994.

McGilligan, George Cukor: The Book, New York, 1997.

Articles:

Crowther, Bosley, in New York Times, 24 December 1949.

Houston, Penelope, "Cukor and the Kanins," in Sight and Sound (London), Spring 1955.

Tozzi, Romano, "Katharine Hepburn," in Films in Review (New York), December 1957.

"Cukor Issue" of Cahiers du Cinéma (Paris), February 1964.

Tozzi, Romano, "Spencer Tracy," in Films in Review (New York), December 1966.

Gilliatt, Penelope, "The Most Amicable Combatants," in New Yorker, 23 September 1972.

Lynch, Anne Louise, in Magill's Survey of Cinema 1, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1980.

Tobin, Yann, in Positif (Paris), May 1985.

Aarts, A., in Skrien (Amsterdam), September-October 1985.

Detassis, P., "La costola di Adamo di George Cukor," in Cineforum (Bergamo, Italy), October 1989.

Shumway, D. R., "Screwball Comedies: Constructing Romance Mystifying Marriage," in Cinema Journal (Austin, Texas), no. 4, 1991.

Nacache, Jacqueline, "'Madame porte la culotte': maris et femmes," in Mensuel du Cinéma, October 1993.

Adam's Rib represents a climax in the evolution of the classic Hollywood screwball comedy. In the 1930s, screwball comedies united antagonistic couples whose clashes revolved around egos, class conflicts, and attitudes about money and values. In the 1940s, screwball comedies replaced these conflicts with ones that revolved around egos and career-marriage decisions. In such films as His Girl Friday, Woman of the Year, Take a Letter, Darling, and They All Kissed the Bride, the comic crises hinged on the heroines' decisions regarding their professional careers and domestic roles. In 1949, George Cukor's Adam's Rib took the familiar marriage-career crisis formula of the screwball comedy to its logical conclusion—a comic study of sex role stereotyping and the invalidity of narrowly defined sex roles.

The film reunited Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, who had previously teamed on Woman of the Year, Keeper of the Flame, Without Love, and State of the Union, and whose successful on-screen romances seemed to radiate some of the genuine love and affection of their off-screen relationship. The film also features a brilliant screenplay by the husband-wife team Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon. All the principals—director, stars, and writers—had proven track records, and in a financially bad year for Hollywood, their combined box-office appeal led to the three-way teaming on a film project that otherwise might not have been possible.

The movie is about Adam and Amanda Bonner, husband and wife lawyers who find themselves on opposite sides of a courtroom case. The legal case in question concerns a woman (Judy Holliday) who has shot her adulterous husband (Tom Ewell). Defense attorney Amanda Bonner views her case as a woman's rights issue, and she bases her defense on the premise that the husband would have been exempt from prosecution if the roles were reversed. In front of her district attorney husband, she turns the courtroom and the trial into a hilarious forum for a public debate on the "double standard" and the narrowness of sexual stereotypes. In the meantime, the courtroom competition begins to threaten the Bonner's marriage.

Much of the film's humor arises from the many sex-role reversals. Through such reversals, the movie simultaneously comments on how traditional social roles are defined by stereotypes of masculinity and femininity. The film literally takes this notion to its extreme when it depicts what the unwitting husband, wife, and lover (Jean Hagen), who are the subjects of the trial, would be like if their sexes were reversed. Meanwhile, the Bonner's crumbling marriage, one based on mutual respect and liberation from sexual stereotypes, requires a series of further role reversals to be put back together again. Adam wins his wife's sympathies by crying; Amanda apologizes by sending her husband a new hat.

Amanda ultimately wins her case and husband without giving up her principles. Adam learns about humility without losing his masculinity. But when the reconciled Bonners finally fall into bed together behind a curtain, the on-screen veil and their final unresolved argument about sex roles, competition, and sex differences cinematically deny their absolute integration as a unified couple. Like many screwball comedies that preceded it, Adam's Rib ends with a marital reconciliation that establishes the couple's unity without resolving the individuals' ongoing differences.

The writing, acting, and directing team that made Adam's Rib a success reunited in 1952 for a screwball comedy about a manager and his professional female athlete in Pat and Mike. The successful story formula from Adam's Rib further inspired a 1973 television series with the same name.

—Lauren Rabinovitz

Adam's rib In the second account of the creation of humankind in Genesis (2: 21–3), Eve or ‘woman’ was formed from the rib (or ‘side’) of Adam (that is, ‘man’) while he was in a deep sleep. In this account woman was created as a counterpart to man, for it was not good for man to be alone (Genesis 2: 18). God split Adam in two, and thus woman was the other half of man; this suggests the creation of an androgynous Adam initially which came to be split into ‘man’ and ‘woman’. By contrast, the first account of the creation of humankind, in Genesis 1: 26–30, has ‘Adam’ divided into two human beings, male and female, from the beginning: ‘And God created the adam in His image, in the image of God, He created him, male and female, He created them.’ These two humans have dominion over the earth.

The second creation account, in which Eve was formed from Adam's rib, is clearly not just an account of woman born of man, but rather of Adam split into two. Nevertheless, it has been used as biblical evidence to justify the subordination of woman within both Judaism and Christianity (especially when coupled with the story related in Genesis 3, in which Eve was tempted by the serpent, and in turn tempted Adam, to eat the fruit and disobey God; her punishment was pain in childbirth and subordination to her husband, along with expulsion from the Garden of Eden with Adam). This story may have jibed well with Galenic and Aristotlean views of the female body as an inferior version of the male body, rather than a separate ‘sex’ — scientific views which prevailed until the eighteenth century in the West. By contrast, modern scientific views, based on the sequence of embryological developments, see the female as the norm of humankind, and male anatomical difference as a modification of the female.

The creation of Eve from Adam's rib was a popular visual image in medieval church and cathedral sculpture. In modern culture ‘Adam's rib’ is a phrase sometimes used to represent the battle of the sexes, as illustrated by the 1950 film of that title. Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn star as married lawyers on opposite sides of the courtroom, in the trial of a woman charged with the attempted murder of the lover of her philandering husband, and, as a result, battling each other in the minefield of sexual politics not only at work but also at home.

In Judaism, according to a midrash, Eve was God's second attempt at creating woman. Lilith, God's first attempt, had left man after only a short time because of a dispute with him about her equality, which she was unwilling to forgo. She flew away and vanished into the air. She, like Adam, was made out of the dust of the ground, and she derived her rights from their identical origin.

In Islam, Eve is not mentioned by name in the Quran, but rather only as Adam's wife. However, various legends, probably of Rabbinic and Syriac origin, refer to Hawwa (the Arabic for Eve) by name and describe her creation from Adam's rib, the punishment both she and Adam received, and their travels over the earth, including pilgrimage to Mecca, where they are both said to be buried.

Jane Shaw

Adam's Rib ★★★★ 1950

Classic war between the sexes cast Tracy and Hepburn as married attorneys on opposite sides of the courtroom in the trial of blonde bombshell Holliday, charged with attempted murder of the lover of her philandering husband. The battle in the courtroom soon takes its toll at home as the couple is increasingly unable to leave their work at the office. Sharp, snappy dialogue by Gordon and Kanin with superb direction by Cukor. Perhaps the best of the nine movies pairing Tracy and Hepburn. Also available colorized. 101m/B VHS, DVD. Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Judy Holliday, Tom Ewell, David Wayne, Jean Hagen, Hope Emerson, Polly Moran, Marvin Kaplan, Paula Raymond, Tommy Noonan; D: George Cukor; W: Garson Kanin, Ruth Gordon; C: George J. Folsey; M: Miklos Rozsa. Natl. Film Reg. '92.