Precode Picks #10

No Such Scene in the Picture We Have Access To, But We Can Dream, Can't We?Precode: Cagney with Blondell, Welcome to Hollywood, and Have a Hard SeatBLONDE CRAZY (1931) --- The first starring James Cagney after a quartet with him in support or unexpected lead (Public Enemy a surprise for Jim and employers). He was difficult from a start, demanding more money he knew he was worth, falling out also with the William Morris agency which he felt didn’t do enough for commissions they extracted. This was a star not afraid of courtrooms and immune to threats, which JL Warner issued regularly to no effect. Cagney said he’d as soon return home and enter agricultural college, or maybe study medicine, and yes, he was serious. We could all want to be James Cagney’s kind of movie star, spit in mogul eyes and make them like it. Being indispensable, which he was right off a start button, was advantage peers did not enjoy, like for instance Bogart, who’d do a lot of crawling before he’d walk,…