Min and Bill (1930)

Min and Bill is a 1930 American Pre-Code comedy-drama film starring Marie Dressler and Wallace Beery and based on Lorna Moon's novel Dark Star, adapted by Frances Marion and Marion Jackson. The movie tells the story of dockside innkeeper Min's tribulations as she tries to protect the innocence of her adopted daughter Nancy, all while loving and fighting with boozy fisherman Bill, who resides at the inn.

Min and Bill stars Marie Dressler (Min), Wallace Beery (Bill), Dorothy Jordan (Nancy), and Marjorie Rambeau (Bella, Nancy's ill-reputed mother), and was directed by George W. Hill. Dressler won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1931 for her performance in this film.

This film was such a runaway hit that it and its near-sequel Tugboat Annie, which reteamed Dressler and Beery in similar roles, boosted both to superstar status. Dressler topped Quigley Publications' annual Top Ten Money Making Stars Poll of movie exhibitors in 1933, and the two pairings with Dressler were primarily responsible for Beery becoming MGM's highest paid actor in the early 1930s, before Clark Gable took over that crown; Beery had a clause in his 1932 contract that he be paid a dollar per year more than any other actor on the lot.

Synopsis

Min Divot (Marie Dressler) runs a dockside inn. She has been raising Nancy Smith (Dorothy Jordan) as her own since her prostitute mother, Bella (Majorie Rambeau) left her at the inn as an infant. Min frequently argues with fisherman Bill (Wallace Beery). Despite Bill's near constant drinking, he and Min care for each other. She and Bill are the only ones who know the real identity of Nancy's real, still living, mother.

Actors