It Happens Every Spring

It Happens Every Spring Information

It Happens Every Spring is a 1949 comedy film starring Ray Milland and directed by Lloyd Bacon. The story of a baseball pitcher is completely fictitious, and the main character King Kelly is not based on or related to the actual player.

Cast

Ray Milland as Vernon K. Simpson / King Kelly
Jean Peters as Deborah Greenleaf
Paul Douglas as Monk Lanigan
Ed Begley as Edgar Stone
Ted de Corsia as Jimmy Dolan
Ray Collins as Prof. Greenleaf
Jessie Royce Landis as Mrs. Greenleaf
Alan Hale Jr. as Schmidt
William Murphy as Tommy Isbell

Plot

A college professor is working on a long-term scientific experiment when a baseball comes through the window, destroying all of his glassware and spilling the fluids that the flasks and test tubes contained. The pooled fluids combine to form the (fictitious) chemical "methylethylpropylbutyl," which then covers a large portion of the baseball. The professor soon discovers that the fluid, along with any object with which it makes contact, is repelled by wood (cf. Alexander Fleming's serendipitous discovery of penicillin).

Suddenly, he realizes the possibilities and takes a leave of absence to go to St. Louis to pitch in the big leagues, where he becomes a star and propels his team to the World Series.

Production

Alan Hale, Jr. has a small role as a catcher on the college baseball team.

Although the home team is "St. Louis", and both St. Louis major league teams (the Cardinals and the Browns) played at Sportsman's Park at the time, the exteriors for the movie were filmed in Los Angeles' Wrigley Field, which was built to resemble Wrigley Field in Chicago.

A novelization of the film was written by Valentine Davies.

Reception

New York Times critic Bosley Crowther found the film trying, particularly Valentine Davies's "monotonous" script. He did have measured praise for Paul Douglas, however.

Leonard Maltin gives the film three and a half stars, calling it "a most enjoyable, unpretentious picture".