Winner Take All was another hit for Warner Bros., and Cagney, who just a year earlier had gone on strike until the studio raised his salary from $400 to $1600 a week, staged another strike for the second but not the last time. Cagney would play boxers twice more, in The Irish in Us (1935) and City for Conquest (1940). He walks like a punch-drunk fighter," wrote Gerald Breitgan in the New York World-Telegram. "He carries with him a veritable smell of the shower room, of sweating body and sodden leather. Cagney gives such a fascinating picture of the boxer's conceit and stupidity that the original plot, which might have come from a novelette, is lost in the intricacies of his character," according to the Times of London. And critics were impressed with Cagney's portrayal. Winner Take All has some unusual plot twists - not many boxing pictures feature the fighter getting a nose job to fit in with his society sweetheart - that raise it above the run-of-the-mill. Cagney wrote that he was fascinated by Mizner and sat for hours listening to his stories. Mizner knew something about the fight game - his colorful past included managing several boxers in New York, as well as bilking miners during the Alaska Gold Rush, swindling rich speculators during the Florida land boom, and writing successful Broadway plays. Moving around is no problem.'" Winner Take All was written by Wilson Mizner, a true Hollywood character, screenwriter, raconteur, con man and bon vivant. ![]() Cagney recalled in his autobiography that another professional fighter, watching him spar, was certain that Cagney had fought professionally - his footwork proved it. ![]() He wins, but once he goes back to New York, he gets tangled up with a society dame and his ego gets out of control.Ĭagney trained for the role with a real-life boxer, former welterweight champion Harvey Parry, who has a role in the film. While there, he meets an impoverished young widow and her little boy, and returns to the ring to help them financially. In his first boxing role, Cagney plays an on-the-skids fighter who's drying out at a Southwest health spa. At that time, Cagney recalled in his autobiography, "I was still learning, and I went along making what was given to me." Winner Take All may have been routine, but Cagney wasn't. The New York Times review of Winner Take All (1932) begins, "After having been highly successful in his portrayals as a gangster, a gambler, a taxicab driver, a confidence man, and an automobile racer, James Cagney, the stormy petrel of the Warner Brothers studio, turns his attention.to impersonating a prizefighter." Critic Mordaunt Hall goes on to note that Cagney "is far more convincing than most players who elect to impersonate pugilists." Cagney so often played gangsters in his early movie career that it's easy to overlook the variety of his performances, and his dedication to getting it right, even in routine programmers. He finds Joan, but when he learns she is leaving with Roger Elliot, a man of her own class, he returns to Peggy and asks her to marry him. He finishes the fight in record time and without changing, jumps in a cab to try to catch the boat before it sails. During the fight, he learns that Joan is sailing that night. Pop sends for Peggy, but Jim tells her that he intends to marry Joan after his fight with the champion. Because he is so careful not to injure his reconstructed face, Jim's fights start to bore his audience. When Joan mentions that she is repulsed by his broken nose and cauliflower ear, Jim has plastic surgery, then is told by Joan that he is no longer colorful and different. They are amused by him in a condescending way. Jim starts to spend all his time with Joan's crowd, even though he has nothing in common with them. He is very attracted to her, but she keeps him at a distance. One evening, Jim is introduced to socialite Joan Gibson. ![]() Jim fights well and becomes a popular favorite. Jim reluctantly leaves Peggy and Dickie behind, promising to send for them later. Jim wins and gives Peggy his earnings, and when Pop hears about the fight, he arranges a professional fight for Jim in Chicago. Jim grows fond of the two, and when Peggy tells him that her husband's life insurance money will not cover more time at the ranch, Jim arranges to fight in a winner-take-all bout. There Jim meets widow Peggy Smith and her ailing son Dickie. Pop Slavin, manager of boxer Jim Kane, sends his charge to rest at a Western health ranch.
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