‘His Girl Friday’ Will Be Screened As Part Of Sag Harbor Cinema’s Really Funny Series

Sag Harbor Cinema’s Really Funny series continues on Sunday, July 7, with a 6 p.m. screening of the 1940 film “His Girl Friday” starring Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant. The screening at Pierson High School in Sag Harbor will be followed by a discussion with author and film critic Molly Haskel moderated by Wendy Keys, former executive producer of programming at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, and a board member of the Sag Harbor Cinema.

Considered one of the greatest American comedies ever made, “His Girl Friday” was directed by Howard Hawks and is an adaptation of the play “The Front Page” by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, which featured two male leads—an editor and an ace reporter. In a genial twist orchestrated by Hawks and screenwriter Charles Lederer, in “His Girl Friday,” the male newspaper editor (Grant) is vying to keep his best reporter and ex-wife (Russell) from leaving the job in order to re-marry.

“The marvel of ‘His Girl Friday,’” Haskell writes in “Holding My Own in No Man’s Land: Women and Men and Film and Feminists,” “is that a newspaper comedy about two men—the big-city editor trying to hold onto his suburbia-bound ace reporter—could with so little alteration be turned into a divorced-lover comedy about a male editor and a female reporter… The male buddy story is already a love story of the screwball variety … so it was not so much a stretch as a natural step into the open expression of sexual attraction, complicated and enhanced by the conflict between marriage and work for the professional woman.”

Sag Harbor Cinema’s “Really Funny” series is a summer line-up of 10 titles chosen by one of the finest names in American comedy, John Landis, director of “Animal House” and “An American Werewolf in London.” Of “His Girl Friday,” Mr. Landis said: “The genius idea of changing the sex of one of the leads of ‘The Front Page,’ this peerless comedy features career high performances of Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell.”

Covering an ample portion of film history, Mr. Landis’ “Really Funny” selection spans from Laurel and Hardy to Melissa McCarthy, and includes lesser-known treasures, such as Elaine May’s “A New Leaf,” made in 1971.

Comedy is the most unforgiving of genres,” he said. “You either laugh or you don’t. Highbrow, lowbrow, witty words or just slapstick, if it makes you laugh then it’s successful. These are of some of the many motion pictures that make me laugh. And laughter is the best way to deal with so much of life.”

The Really Funny series runs through September 22 at Pierson High School, 200 Jermain Avenue, Sag Harbor. The screening starts at 6 p.m. Tickets are $10 online and at the door. For reservations and more information, visit sagharborcinema.org.