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Since 1926, Capra's career has been eventful but straightforward. His one flop was For the Love of Mike, with Claudette Colbert, in 1927. The picture that made him tops in Hollywood was It Happened One Night with Claudette Colbert and Clark Gable in 1934. He had been discovered by Harry Cohn long before that, repaid his benefactor with hits like That Certain Thing (1928), Dirigible (1931), Platinum Blonde (1931), The Bitter Tea of General Yen (1933), Lady for a Day (1933). From 1930 to 1932, Capra worked only on pictures written by Jo Swerling. Then Capra, who by this time had the privilege accorded only to directors of proven worth, of collaborating on stories, got a new teammate, Robert Riskin, who had started writing scenarios at the age of 17. Lady for a Day, one of their early collaborations, got runner-up honors from the Motion Picture Academy and indirectly facilitated Capra's triumph the next year. Before Producer Cohn borrowed Clark Gable from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for It Happened One Night, Gable had been cast only in heavily romantic roles. Capra decided he was a comedian, directed him accordingly. Now Gable is called upon frequently for comedy roles.
Decision to transform Gable from a menace to a mountebank was characteristic of Capra. The formative period of his artistic career was spent teaching Mack Sennett actors to put curves on their custard pies. Regarding himself as an average cinemaddict, he feels sure that anything he enjoys will be enjoyed also by 10,000,000 other people. Old line directors, before talkies cramped their style, liked to stamp and bellow at their actors, strut and show off on the set. Like most of his contemporaries, Capra works without mannerisms, confers quietly with his actors and technical crew before each take. In Hollywood, long since ashamed of egoparading outside of working hours, it is now fashionable to have a private telephone number, small car, cottage on the beach and one wife at a time. Frank and Lucille Capra, as befits two of the community's most dazzling celebrities, spend most of the year in a vacation cottage at Malibu Beach, send two of their three children to the U. C. L. A. nursery school. Capra's present contract at Columbia calls for one more picture. A major subject of current Hollywood gossip is whether, now that Writer Riskin has left Columbia to join Sam Goldwyn, Director Capra will follow him next year.