What would Christmas Eve be without Frank Capra’s 1946 masterpiece It’s A wonderful Life? It was his last great film but it marked a new beginning for James Stewart. After serving in as a B17 bomber pilot in the 8th Air Force in the skies over Germany, Stewart came home with doubts about continuing his acting career. Before the war he was one of Hollywood’s most popular leading men, in such highly successful films as Destry Rides Again, Mister Smith Goes to Washington and The Philadelphia Story; but four years of combat in the most deadly theater of the war had left him greatly shaken and extremely insecure. Stewart was seriously considering returning to Indiana Pennsylvania to run the family hardware store. Capra’s biographer Joseph Mc Bride tells the story of how the director changed his mind. Stewart recalled “ Frank really saved my career. I don’t know whether I would have made it after the war if it hadn’t been for Frank.”
Capra called Stewart one day with an idea for a movie about a man who feels that his life has been a failure and wants to commit suicide, he expressed interest, but still had doubts as to “whether acting was an important enough profession for someone who had experienced what he had in the war.” Capra called on the master thespian, Lionel Barrymore, to convince him of the importance of his vocation, who told him “Jimmy, don’t ever forget that acting is the greatest profession ever invented. When you act you move millions of people, shape their lives, give them a sense of exultation. No other profession has that power.” However, Stewart replied , that he didn’t think acting was “decent,” Barrymore shot back, asking him “if he thought it was more ‘decent’ to drop bombs on people than to bring rays of sunshine into their lives with his acting talent.” Stewart was duly convinced, resolving that from then on, acting was to be his “life’s work.” We all know the rest.
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