Generations of movie fans count It’s a Wonderful Life as the most beloved and timeless Christmas movie in cinematic history.
The 1946 film stars Hollywood legend Jimmy Stewart as the hapless and penniless George Bailey who needed a Christmas angel to show him what the world would be like without him.
It’s a wholesome family movie with a beautiful lesson at the end of it. Behind-the-scenes, however, was a very different story.
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According to reports over the past 70 years, the set of It’s a Wonderful Life was fraught with tension and feuding between Stewart and his co-star, Donna Reed.
It all began over Stewart’s hesitation at returning to the bright lights of Hollywood following a decorated military career during World War II.
Stewart had worked as an Air Force bomber pilot and had been away from his career for five years. Director Frank Capra had been too old to enlist, but he had joined the Army Corps.
Because of this experience, the actor was unsure he even wanted to return to making movies.
“There was a lot of insecurity on set, because Jimmy Stewart wasn’t sure if he wanted to act any more,” Reed’s daughter Mary Anne Owen said during the documentary The Making of It’s a Wonderful Life.
“He thought it was too frivolous, but Lionel Barrymore and others talked him into it.”
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She added: “They were both different people coming back from those experiences going into the making It’s a Wonderful Life.“
Owen said that, surprisingly, when the movie first hit cinemas, it didn’t usher in any immediate box office success. The movie failed to make a profit and recoup its $2.3 million (approx. $3.4 million) budget when it opened.
Stewart took this hard, she claims, and blamed Reed for the film’s failings.
“Jimmy Stewart couldn’t understand why the movie didn’t do well, but that’s why they never did another movie together. He blamed her, because she wasn’t as well known,” she revealed.
“She was quite happy when it came out. I mean, she passed away in ’86, but by the early ’80s it was on constantly. We always watched at Christmas and she was so happy that it was so popular.”
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Reed, who played George’s wife Mary in the holiday film, had appeared in minor roles throughout the ’40s, and the black-and-white picture marked her big break as a leading lady.
“This movie made an icon of Donna Reed,” film historian Jeanine Basinger said in the documentary.
Director Frank Capra borrowed Reed “on loan” from MGM and she was surprised to find the set was “filled with tension”.
Stewart’s attitude impacted the production and Reed, who was only 25, was then treated as a “scapegoat” for the film’s lack of success.
Unsurprisingly, the pair never worked on a movie together ever again.
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Reed herself still had fond memories making the film and was pleased at its popularity as an enduring Christmas classic.
In 1982, during an American Film Institute tribute to Frank Capra, Reed said: “When I finished making that film, I thought perhaps I might not make any more movies.”
“I suppose I knew on some deep level that I would never have another experience in a film to equal it.”
Stewart, who died in 1997, went on to praise his co-star after her death in 1986, finally putting an end to over 50 years of speculation.
“I’ll always remember her as a wonderful woman and as my wife in It’s a Wonderful Life,” he told Associated Press.
“I don’t know of anybody who could have played the role better. She was absolutely marvellous.”