Robert Riskin

Robert Riskin

Birth : 1897-03-30, New York City, New York, USA

Death : 1955-09-20

History

From Wikipedia Robert Riskin (March 30, 1897–September 20, 1955) was an American screenwriter and playwright, best known for his collaborations with director-producer Frank Capra.

Profile

Robert Riskin

Movies

Pocketful of Miracles
Screenplay
Boozy, brassy Apple Annie, a beggar with a basket of apples, is as much a part of downtown New York as old Broadway itself. Bootlegger Dave the Dude is a sucker for her apples -- he thinks they bring him luck. But Dave and girlfriend Queenie Martin need a lot more than luck when it turns out that Annie is in a jam and only they can help: Annie's daughter Louise, who has lived all her life in a Spanish convent, is coming to America with a Count and his son. The count's son wants to marry Louise, who thinks her mother is part of New York society. It's up to Dave and Queenie and their cronies to turn Annie into a lady and convince the Count and his son that they are hobnobbing with New York's elite.
You Can't Run Away from It
Screenplay
A reporter stumbles on a runaway heiress whose story could salvage his career.
Here Comes the Groom
Story
Foreign correspondent Pete Garvey has 5 days to win back his former fiancée, or he'll lose the orphans he adopted.
Here Comes the Groom
treatment
Foreign correspondent Pete Garvey has 5 days to win back his former fiancée, or he'll lose the orphans he adopted.
Half Angel
Screenplay
Nurse Nora Gilpin plans are to marry building contractor Tim McCarey and settle down. But one night a sleepwalking Nora slips into a provocative dress and goes to the home of startled lawyer John Raymond, for whom she doesn't care much during the day. She does not reveal her name and he cannot figure out where they have met, but they spend several hours together until she gets away before John notices.
Mister 880
Screenplay
The Skipper is a charming old man loved by all his neighbors. What they don't know is that he is also Mr. 880, an amateurish counterfeiter who has amazingly managed to elude the Secret Service for 20 years.
Riding High
Screenplay
A horse trainer who has fallen on hard times looks to his horse, Broadway Bill, to finally win the big race.
Magic Town
Producer
Rip Smith's opinion-poll business is a failure...until he discovers that the small town of Grandview is statistically identical to the entire country. He and his assistants go there to run polls cheaply and easily, in total secrecy (it would be fatal to let the townsfolk get self-conscious). And of course, civic crusader Mary Peterman must be kept from changing things too much. But romantic involvement with Mary complicates life for Rip; then suddenly everything changes.
Magic Town
Writer
Rip Smith's opinion-poll business is a failure...until he discovers that the small town of Grandview is statistically identical to the entire country. He and his assistants go there to run polls cheaply and easily, in total secrecy (it would be fatal to let the townsfolk get self-conscious). And of course, civic crusader Mary Peterman must be kept from changing things too much. But romantic involvement with Mary complicates life for Rip; then suddenly everything changes.
Magic Town
Story
Rip Smith's opinion-poll business is a failure...until he discovers that the small town of Grandview is statistically identical to the entire country. He and his assistants go there to run polls cheaply and easily, in total secrecy (it would be fatal to let the townsfolk get self-conscious). And of course, civic crusader Mary Peterman must be kept from changing things too much. But romantic involvement with Mary complicates life for Rip; then suddenly everything changes.
Library of Congress
Producer
A 1945 Oscar nominated short documentary about the Library of Congress. It is one of 26 documentary shorts produced between 1942 and 1945 by the U.S. Overseas Film Bureau, and intended to show foreign viewers something about America and it's values, this one focuses on the important institution in Washington D.C. which preserves written and other works that have been copyrighted, as part of the country's heritage.
The Thin Man Goes Home
Screenplay
On a trip to visit his parents, detective Nick Charles gets mixed up in a murder investigation.
The Thin Man Goes Home
Story
On a trip to visit his parents, detective Nick Charles gets mixed up in a murder investigation.
Meet John Doe
Producer
As a parting shot, fired reporter Ann Mitchell prints a fake letter from unemployed "John Doe," who threatens suicide in protest of social ills. The paper is forced to rehire Ann and hires John Willoughby to impersonate "Doe." Ann and her bosses cynically milk the story for all it's worth, until the made-up "John Doe" philosophy starts a whole political movement.
Meet John Doe
Screenplay
As a parting shot, fired reporter Ann Mitchell prints a fake letter from unemployed "John Doe," who threatens suicide in protest of social ills. The paper is forced to rehire Ann and hires John Willoughby to impersonate "Doe." Ann and her bosses cynically milk the story for all it's worth, until the made-up "John Doe" philosophy starts a whole political movement.
They Shall Have Music
Associate Producer
The future is bleak for a troubled boy from a broken home in the slums. He runs away when his step father breaks his violin, ending up sleeping in the basement of a music school for poor children.
You Can't Take It with You
Screenplay
Alice, the only relatively normal member of the eccentric Sycamore family, falls in love with Tony Kirby, but his wealthy banker father and snobbish mother strongly disapprove of the match. When the Kirbys are invited to dinner to become better acquainted with their future in-laws, things don't turn out the way Alice had hoped.
You Can't Take It with You
Scenario Writer
Alice, the only relatively normal member of the eccentric Sycamore family, falls in love with Tony Kirby, but his wealthy banker father and snobbish mother strongly disapprove of the match. When the Kirbys are invited to dinner to become better acquainted with their future in-laws, things don't turn out the way Alice had hoped.
Lost Horizon
Screenplay
British diplomat Robert Conway and a small group of civilians crash land in the Himalayas, and are rescued by the people of the mysterious, Eden-like valley of Shangri-la. Protected by the mountains from the world outside, where the clouds of World War II are gathering, Shangri-la provides a seductive escape for the world-weary Conway.
When You're in Love
Director
When You're in Love is a 1937 musical film starring Grace Moore, Cary Grant, and Thomas Mitchell. Moore sings "Minnie the Moocher" in one scene. She also sings the wonderful Ernesto Lecuono classic "Siboney" (though her Spanish is not perfection) drooled over by Cary Grant
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town
Screenplay
Longfellow Deeds lives in a small town, leading a small town kind of life. When a relative dies and leaves Deeds a fortune, Longfellow moves to the big city where he becomes an instant target for everyone. Deeds outwits them all until Babe Bennett comes along. When small-town boy meets big-city girl anything can, and does, happen.
The Whole Town's Talking
Screenplay
Ordinary man-in-the-street Arthur Ferguson Jones leads a very straightforward life. He's never late for work and nothing interesting ever happens to him. One day everything changes: he oversleeps and is fired as an example, he's then mistaken for evil criminal killer Mannion and is arrested. The resemblance is so striking that the police give him a special pass to avoid a similar mistake. The real Mannion sees the opportunity to steal the pass and move around freely and chaos results.
Carnival
Writer
"Chick" Thompson is a puppet-master in a traveling carnival whose wife dies in childbirth and leaves him with an infant son he names "Poochy." His father-in-law and the baby's grandfather sues him for custody of the baby and Chick takes his son and hides out for a couple of years. He joins his former assistants, Daisy and "Fingers", in a circus act only to find that the persistent grandfather is still on his trail.
Broadway Bill
Screenplay
Tycoon J.L. Higgins controls his whole family, but one of his sons- in-law, Dan Brooks and his daughter Alice are fed up with that. Brooks quits his job as manager of J.L.'s paper box factory and devotes his life to his racing horse Broadway Bill, but his bank- roll is thin and the luck is against him, he is arrested because of $150 he owes somebody for horse food, but suddenly a planed fraud by somebody else seems to offer him a chance...
It Happened One Night
Screenplay
A renegade reporter and a young heiress meet on a bus heading for New York, and end up stuck with each other when the bus leaves them behind at one of the stops.
Lady for a Day
Screenplay
Never-wed, poor, rough around the edges Apple Annie has always written to her daughter, Louise, in Spain that she is married and a member of New York's high society. Upon receiving unexpected word from Louise (who hasn't seen Annie since infancy) that she is en route to America with her new fiancé and his father, a count, so the three of them can meet her, Annie panics, despairing that her beloved daughter will be destroyed by the deception.
Ann Carver's Profession
Writer
Newlyweds experience marital problems when the wife's highly successful job as an attorney overshadows her husband's stagnant career.
Ex-Lady
Story
Although free spirit Helen Bauer does not believe in marriage, she consents to marry Don, but his infidelities cause her to also take on a lover.
Virtue
Screenplay
Given a second chance after her arrest for prostitution, Mae decides to go straight. Mae is soon befriended by kindly cab driver Jimmy Doyle who gets her work at a diner, where she meets Gert, another former prostitute. Mae and Jimmy fall in love, marry and save to buy a small business. Gert then pleads for money from Mae, which results in her unwitting involvement in a crime. Believing Mae has lied and cheated him, Jimmy threatens to leave her.
The Night Club Lady
Writer
A police commissioner investigates the murder of a nightclub owner who was under police protection.
American Madness
Dialogue
Socially-conscious banker Thomas Dickson faces a crisis when his protégé is wrongly accused of robbing the bank, gossip of the robbery starts a bank run, and evidence suggests Dickson's wife had an affair... all in the same day.
American Madness
Story
Socially-conscious banker Thomas Dickson faces a crisis when his protégé is wrongly accused of robbing the bank, gossip of the robbery starts a bank run, and evidence suggests Dickson's wife had an affair... all in the same day.
Shopworn
Dialogue
A waitress falls for a wealthy young man but has to fight his mother to find happiness.
The Big Timer
Dialogue
Loud-mouth hamburger flipper, Cooky, thinks he can box. His big chance comes when everyone else quits the gym when it is inherited by a dame.
The Big Timer
Story
Loud-mouth hamburger flipper, Cooky, thinks he can box. His big chance comes when everyone else quits the gym when it is inherited by a dame.
Three Wise Girls
Writer
Romantic comedy drama about three friends in New York. Cassie has come to New York and goes to work as a model where her friend Gladys works. She falls in love with wealthy young Jerry who is already married. Gladys has the same probelm with her man Phelps.
Men in Her Life
Writer
A wealthy ex-bootlegger comes to the rescue of a formerly rich society girl after her gold-digging fiancé leaves her stranded when he finds out she's broke. The bootlegger proposes a deal: he will settle her debts if she teaches him how to be "a gentleman".
Platinum Blonde
Dialogue
Anne Schuyler is an upper-crust socialite who bullies her reporter husband into conforming to her highfalutin ways. The husband chafes at the confinement of high society, though, and yearns for a creative outlet. He decides to write a play and collaborates with a fellow reporter.
The Miracle Woman
Screenplay
After an unappreciated minister dies, his daughter loses her faith in God, prompting her to open a phony temple with a con man. Can the love of a blind aviator restore her faith and happiness?
The Miracle Woman
Theatre Play
After an unappreciated minister dies, his daughter loses her faith in God, prompting her to open a phony temple with a con man. Can the love of a blind aviator restore her faith and happiness?
Arizona
Dialogue
A West Point graduate jilts his girlfriend but runs into her later at an Army outpost.
Arizona
Adaptation
A West Point graduate jilts his girlfriend but runs into her later at an Army outpost.
Many a Slip
Writer
Comedy centering on the question of whether a man's wife is or isn't pregnant.
Illicit
Theatre Play
Ann, a young woman with outrageously advanced ideas, has been living in sin with Dick, her lover, because of her conviction that marriage would destroy their love; but social pressure ends up paying off, so Ann and Dick get married.
Rough and Ready Reggie
Boxing Extra
After effeminate Reggie is picked on by the men at his club, a rough and ready ancestor appears to him and inspires him to become the ultimate he-man.
Rough and Ready Reggie
Writer
After effeminate Reggie is picked on by the men at his club, a rough and ready ancestor appears to him and inspires him to become the ultimate he-man.