His Girl Friday

Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell are an unforgettable comedic duo in Howard Hawks' 1940 adaptation of the hit Broadway comedy The Front Page, written by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur.

Walter Burns (Cary Grant) is a conniving newspaper publisher desperate to woo back his paper’s brilliant star reporter Hildy Johnson (Rosalind Russell), who also happens to be his estranged wife. Hildy is threatening to quit the newspaper business and settle down with a new beau. But as Walter knows well, she has a weakness: she can’t resist a juicy scoop. When the controversial death-row trial of Earl Williams draws her back into the newsroom — and into thrill of her spirited relationship with Burns — Hildy is forced to question where her true passions lie.

Replete with electric dialogue and memorable physical comedy, His Girl Friday brilliantly captures the fast-talking, frenetic pace of the newsroom and affirms the trope, seen across the genre of the screwball comedy, that true love springs from mutual passion and adversity.

Director Howard Hawks graduated from Cornell in 1918 and studied mechanical engineering.

Part of our "Screwball Comedies" series. Courtesy of Columbia Pictures and Swank Motion Pictures.