Stubs - Speedway

Speedway (1929) Starring William Haines, Anita Page, Ernest Torrence, Karl Dane, John Miljan. Directed by Harry Beaumont. Story by Byron Morgan. Adapted by Alfred Block, Ann Price, Byron Morgan. Producer (None Credited). USA Black and White. Run time 82 minutes. Silent, Melodrama            .

The Indianapolis 500 has been the subject of several films. The Crowd Roars (1932), and its remake, Indianapolis Speedway (1939) may be more famous but one of the first was Speedway (1929), which came at the end of the silent era. In fact, it is noted as William Haines last such film.

At the time of the film, the Indianapolis 500 had only been around since 1911, held on Decorations Day, as it was known from its inception in 1868 to 1967, when federal law made "Memorial Day" the official name. Not all of the traditions surrounding the modern race were in place at the time, either. The Purdue All-American Marching Band, had been the host band since 1919 but no one sang"Back Home Again in Indiana" before the race until 1946. And, finally, the tradition of buttermilk in the winner's circle didn't get started until winner Louis Meyer requested a glass in 1933. However, the race still had 33 contestants, speeds of over 100 miles an hour and very little in the way of safety features when Speedway was made.

There is not much written about the pre-production of the film except it went into production on May 15, 1929 and utilized actual footage from that year’s race.

The film opens prior to the race, with Bill Whipple (William Haines) behind the wheel of a racecar driving through the streets of Indianapolis. But it turns out that he is being towed by a truck driven by Dugan (Karl Dane). Bill is more interested in trying to impress and pick up the ladies. So much that he actually gets out of the car to pursue two women driving nearby. He goes so far as to hop into their car until the end up at the police station and the driver points out that her father is a policeman. Bill jumps out of the car and walks the rest of the way.

Dugan (Karl Dane) is one of  Jim MacDonald's (Ernest Torrence) crew.

Dugan arrives with the car but the owner Jim MacDonald (Ernest Torrence) is nonplused that Bill is not with the car.  Mac, as he’s called, has been trying to win the race for 16 years and plans to make another run.

His chief rival, Lee Renny (John Miljan) arrives at the track with a larger crew. He is more of a favorite in the race but also a dirty racer. Mac accuses him of purposefully running into his car at an earlier race at Altoona.

In this publicity shot Dugan ends up doing all the heavy lifting
while Bill Whipple (William Haines) doesn't try to help.

Bill is lazy and unambitious. He makes Dugan do more of the work. And when other workers wonder why Mac keeps him on, it is known that Bill is good with motors.

But Bill is not that interested in anything but girls, and, of course, eating lunch. After changing, he goes down to a local eatery, where the other racers and their crews give him a hard time. He finally finds a seat and gives the waitress (Polly Moran) grief while he pretends to go over the menu.

Patricia (Anita Page) looks in vain for some place to sit in the crowded restaurant.

Through the open door, he spies Patricia (Anita Page) who is coming into the restaurant. The seat opens up next to Bill and he tries to look sexy when Patricia enters. However, she is not impressed. When she decides to take the open seat, there are no others, she is beaten to it by another racing crew member. To stop him, Bill pours water in the seat before he sits down. After seating in the water, the man gets up and leaves and Patricia, once again goes to sit down. Bill trades places with her and ends up sitting in the still wet seat.

In the overly long lunch counter seen, waitress (Polly Moran) calls out
an order while Bill and Patricia look on.

For the next several minutes, Bill tries several ploys to catch Patricia’s eye and make her laugh. However, she is not amused. When she asks to pay her half of the 95-cent bill, he rips it in two. In a huff, she goes to the register to pay and leaves. Bill takes a bite of his hash and then tells the waitress to put a lily on it.

He chases Patricia out to her car. Without invitation, he jumps into her car. The only way she can get rid of him is to lose on her gloves on the street. When he goes to retrieve it, she drives off.

Later, we learn how close Bill is with Mac and his wife (Eugenie Besserer). Apparently, they have adopted Bill as their own and know that he may never stop being a child.

The next day, Patricia shows up at the track. She is there to see Renny but Bill makes another attempt to impress her. He ends up giving her back her glove. One of Renny’s crew tells him that he should try to get Bill away from Mac because of his capabilities. Renny agrees and says he’ll take care of it.

Mac needs a part and tells Bill he wants him to fly immediately to Chicago to get it. However, Bill is afraid to fly but Mac insists he go.

On the cab ride to the airport, Bill spies Renny and Patricia. They each drive off in different directions. Bill makes the cab driver pull over and he pretends to be injured and lies in the road. Patricia drives by and thinks he’s been run over by the cab driver. She insists on taking Bill to the hospital at the airport.  In order to keep him upright, she has to put one of her arms around him.

When a motorcycle cop spies her driving with one arm, he follows to verify that Bill is actually injured. But when they get to the airport Bill gets out of the car while the officer goes to get orderlies with a stretcher for him. As a result, the cop gives Patricia a ticket.

In order to get out of flying, Bill insists to the pilot that Mac expects the pilot to bring back the part and that he’ll wait for him.

When another pilot offers to fly Bill back to the race track, he pretends not to be afraid to fly. When Patricia, whose father owns the airport, gets wind of it, she insists that she be the one to fly Bill back. She tries her best to scare him with her aerial maneuvers but the plane starts to break apart. Bill has a parachute and helps to save Patricia.

The next day the papers are full of the story. Renny insists that Bill take some publicity photos driving his car around the track. But when Mac gets wind of it, he tells Bill never to sit in Renny’s car again. However, Bill decides that he’d have more of a chance if he goes with Renny and quits Mac.

Renny offers Bill the opportunity to race his car for not only the time trials but also in the race itself and Bill jumps at the opportunity.

While Bill is going through the time trials, and winning the pole position, Mac is being examined by the track doctor (Alfred Allen). He tells Mac that his heart couldn’t handle more than a few miles of racing. Mac decides to have Dugan drive in his place.

On race day, Renny tells Bill that he plans to race the car. Feeling depressed, Bill is confronted by Patricia who tells him that he got played by Renny and should never have left Mac, who had been good to him. Back at gasoline alley, Bill is comforted by Mac’s wife.

Patricia watches the race from her car in the infield.

Meanwhile, Dugan is not much of a racer and is four laps off the lead and Renny is the leader of the race. Patricia goes to Mac and tells him to take Bill back and let him race for him. When Bill hears the announcement to report to Mac and be ready to race, he jumps at the chance.

Bill takes over from Dugan and not only manages to make up the four-lap deficit but to take the lead of the race. With only a few laps to go, Dugan fakes getting a splinter in his eye so that Mac will have the opportunity to win the race.

In another publicity photo, Mac and Dugan watch
 as Bill finally gets serious with Patricia.

During the switchover, Renny regains the lead but Mac manages to catch him and win. In the winner’s circle, though, Mac’s health issues catch up to him and he passes out. Mac recovers with Dugan, Bill and  Patricia watching over him. He’ll be okay and chides Bill for faking his injury. Bill promises to finish what he’s started with Patricia.

Released on September 7, 1929, Speedway met sort of mixed reviews. Mordaunt Hall in his review in The New York Times calls it a “breezy piece of nonsense.” He’s not far wrong with his assessment. There is definitely a lot of nonsense thanks in part to the performance of William Haines. At the time of this release, Haines a popular actor was near the peak of his fame. Haines would make the transition to sound successfully but his career would be over by 1934 when he had to make a decision whether or not to hide his homosexuality. He chose not to. For more details about Haines, please see our review of Show People.

In Speedway, his, what Hall calls “coxcombry and cheek”, get old fast. You have to wonder what man would think a woman could be interested in him after his such forward and bizarre behavior. Patricia was right to try and put as much distance between Bill and herself when she could. Only in films does the woman relent and start to like such an obnoxious man. She might have been grateful that he saved her life but Bill is someone we’re told will never grow up. By the way, coxcombry means conceited arrogance or foppishness; I had to look it up.

Anita Page looks good doing practically anything in Speedway.

Patricia is played by the strikingly beautiful Anita Page, whom Hall credits with being “The good looks of this production…” as well as giving “a nice performance as Patricia.” Hers is unfortunately one of those roles where the audience might be begging her to do the opposite of what the script says she must. I’m not saying that Renny was a better choice but Bill feels like settling to me. I don’t know what the chemistry was like between her and Haines in other films but she seems to be too good for this one.

Anita Page, also called "the girl with the most beautiful face in Hollywood" got into films when she was discovered by a man who was handling actress Betty Bronson’s fan mail. He also wanted to be an actor’s agent and arranged for Page to get a screen test for Paramount. She ended up signing with MGM, because she felt “MGM was the studio."

Her first film with the studio was the comedy-drama Telling the World (1928), opposite William Haines. This was followed by  Our Dancing Daughters (1928) opposite Joan Crawford, as well as  Our Modern Maidens (1929) and Our Blushing Brides (1930). Page made the successful transition to sound and starred in the first talkie and musical to win Best Picture, The Broadway Melody (1929).

Among her other firsts was that she was one of the firsts to live in the then new Chateau Marmont, which opened in February 1929. She was also an early subject of studio and glamour photographer George Hurrell, and her photograph was his first to be published.

By 1933, however,  Page quit films at the age of 23 when she was denied a pay raise when her contract with MGM expired. She wasn’t through with acting entirely, making one more film in 1936, Hitch Hike to Heaven (1936). She would return again in 1961, playing a nun in The Runaway, and again in 1996 when she made several low-budget horror films.

Ernest Torrence, who played Mac, was usually cast as a villain in his films, so this was casting against type for him. He does manage to make Mac a sympathetic character despite his history in films to that point. The Scottish-born Torrence appeared in the silent classic Tol’able David (1921). Among his other films are The Covered Wagon (1923), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923), Ruggles of Red Gap (1923), Peter Pan (1924), The King of Kings (1927), and Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928). Like the other leads, he would make a successful transition to sound but his career would be short-lived after that. His last film was I Cover the Waterfront (1933), after which he died of complications from gall stones surgery.

Like Torrence, John Miljan made his career playing mostly villains for four decades in Hollywood. He seems perfectly cast as the villain and rival racer Lee Renny. Sneaky and underhanded he manages to, at least briefly, come between Bill and Mac, though his actions push Patricia away and into Bill’s arms. Miljan, too, would make the transition to sound, serving as what’s called the host in in the promotional trailer for The Jazz Singer, inviting audiences to see the upcoming landmark film. He is best remembered as General Custer in Cecil B. DeMille's film The Plainsman (1936). His final film role was as Chief Tomache in The Lone Ranger and the Lost City of Gold (1958).

Overall, this film is disappointing. It makes you wonder what audiences were willing to tolerate in the late 1920s. There is some action but the film is, as Hall describes, a “breezy piece of nonsense.” Most of which I put at the feet of William Haines. From just watching this film it is hard to imagine why he was a big star at the time. I have to imagine that he’s much better in other films; he’s too goofy here. Unless you’re hard up for entertainment, there are better films about racing and romance than Speedway.