New York: The John Day Company, 1931.
Price: $1,000.00
Hardcover. First edition. Fine in an externally very good plus dustwrapper with several internal brown paper tape repairs, and some overall soiling. At the whim of a dying Croesus, ten people, including a prostitute, a prizefighter, a bum, a stockbroker, a stenographer, etc., are each given a million dollars. Basis for the 1932 film *If I Had a Million.* The film was broken into segments following the fortunes of the various newly minted millionaires, each segment with its own director. The directors included James Cruze, H. Bruce Humberstone, Ernst Lubitsch, Norman Z. McLeod, Lothar Mendes, Stephen Roberts, William A. Seiter, and Norman Taurog. Appearing in the film (most as the recipients of windfalls) were Gary Cooper, Charles Laughton, George Raft, Jack Oakie, Richard Bennett, Charles Ruggles, Alison Skipworth, and W.C. Fields. The Fields and Skipworth segment, where they use their new found fortune to buy a fleet of cars and hire drivers to run road hogs off the road, is a comic classic. The premise also inspired the popular 1950s television series *The Millionaire.*.
Item #55825
