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Starring
James Stewart (as William J. 'Bill' Lawrence)
Barbara Hale (as Amy Lawrence)
James Gleason (as Harry Summers)
Fred Clark (as Mr. Andrew J. Woodriff
Alan Mowbray (as Leslie)
Paricia Medina (as Hildegarde Jonet)
Natalie Wood (as Phyllis Lawrence)
Tommy Rettig (as Tommy Lawrence)
Robert Gist (as Pete Spooner)
Lyle Talbot (as Fred Burns)
Director
Walter Lang
Release Date
The Jackpot
November 1, 1950
Packager/Distributor
20th Century Fox

The Jackpot was a 1950 comedy film based on a John McNutty article of the same name in The New York Times (February 19, 1949) about the true experience of James P. Caffrey of Wakefield, Rhode Island who won $24,000 worth of merchandise on August 28, 1948. From the CBS radio quiz program Sing It Again.

Plot[]

Bill Lawrence, employed at a department store in the Midwestern United States, supports a wife and two teenage kids on an annual salary of $7,500. Answering a phone call, he wins $24,000 worth of merchandise from a radio quiz program and is overwhelmed by prizes which range from the useful to the absurd, including a side of beef, 7,500 cans of soup, 1,000 fruit trees, a Palomino pony, a portable swimming pool, a diamond ring, a French maid, an interior decorator and portrait painter Hilda Jones.

All is well, until Lawrence is told that he must sell the prizes in order to pay an income tax of $7,000. When he tries to raise the money by selling the merchandise at the department store, his boss fires him. When he tries to fence the diamond ring in Chicago, he's arrested. Complicating matters, his wife suspects him of having an affair with Greenwich Village artist Hilda. Dealing with these problems, he gets help from reporter Harry Summers, who had been writing newspaper articles about Lawrence and his winnings. Bandleader Harry James made an uncredited appearance as a radio vocalist.

Awards[]

Screenwriters Henry and Phoebe Ephron, the parents of future writer/director Nora Ephron, were nominated for a Writers Guild of America Award.

Home Media[]

On December 6, 2012; the film was released to DVD via the manufacture on demand (MOD) 20th Century Fox Cinema Archives.

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Radio Version[]

A radio adaption broadcasted on April 26, 1951 on NBC's Screen Director's Playhouse received much press coverage because Stewart's co-star was Margaret Truman making her debut as a radio actress for a fee of $2,500. She received mixed reviews and noted that her father "enjoyed it!".

YouTube Video[]

Full Movie

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