Cagney brought such bantanweight energy to his Depression- and WWII-era
movie roles that it's hard to tell whether the cinematic rise of the urban
underclass would have had as much pizzazz without him. No film retrospective
fails to include the breakfast scene in 1931's "The Public Enemy,"
where he jams a grapefruit half into his yappy girlfriend's face. The act is
still shocking for its suddenness, and, in our PC age, a bit of enviable audacity.
"White Heat," the title of his 1949 film, is as good a description of
him as it is a clue to the story, and his tap dance glissando across the stage
as George M. Cohan in 1942's "Yankee Doodle Dandy" seemed a perfect
expression of his infectious, irrepressible buoyancy.


Online Meetings Made Easy with GoToMeeting Try it Free for 45 days use Promo Code Podcast

 



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Cagney brought such bantanweight energy to his Depression- and WWII-era
movie roles that it's hard to tell whether the cinematic rise of the urban
underclass would have had as much pizzazz without him. No film retrospective
fails to include the breakfast scene in 1931's "The Public Enemy,"
where he jams a grapefruit half into his yappy girlfriend's face. The act is
still shocking for its suddenness, and, in our PC age, a bit of enviable audacity.
"White Heat," the title of his 1949 film, is as good a description of
him as it is a clue to the story, and his tap dance glissando across the stage
as George M. Cohan in 1942's "Yankee Doodle Dandy" seemed a perfect
expression of his infectious, irrepressible buoyancy.

Online Meetings Made Easy with GoToMeeting Try it Free for 45 days use Promo Code Podcast