Frank Capra's Why We Fight ( 1942 – 1944 ) series was a newsreel series in the United States, commissioned by the government to convince the U. S. public that it was time to go to war.

Capra's family was Roman Catholic.

Capra's only prior exposure to films, however, was in 1915 while attending Manual Arts High School.

In many of Capra's films, the wise-cracking and sharp dialogue was often written by Riskin, and he and Capra went on to become Hollywood's " most admired writer-director team.

Nonetheless, Capra's vision about the film's significance was clear:

" Glazer describes how " John's accidental transformation from drifter to national figure parallels Capra's own early drifting experience and subsequent involvement in movie making ... Meet John Doe, then, was an attempt to work out his own fears and questions.

Although the project had an excellent pedigree with stars Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, the film was not a success, and Capra's eyebrow-raising statement, " I think State of the Union was my most perfect film in handling people and ideas " has few adherents today.

Biographer Joseph McBride argues that Capra's disillusionment was more related to the negative effect that the House Un-American Activities Committee ( HUAC ) had on the film industry in general.

Capra's final theatrical film was with Glenn Ford and Bette Davis, named Pocketful of Miracles ( 1961 ), a remake of his 1933 film Lady for a Day.

Capra's final film, Rendezvous in Space ( 1964 ), was an industrial film made for the Martin Marietta Company and shown at the 1964 New York World's Fair.

His son Frank Capra, Jr. – one of the four children born to Capra's second wife, Lucille Capra – was the president of EUE Screen Gems Studios, in Wilmington, North Carolina, until his death on December 19, 2007.

The film was based on a stage play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, and along with Frank Capra's It Happened One Night ( released the same year ) is considered to be the defining film of the screwball comedy genre.

The film was Capra's last feature, and although it was not the commercial success he hoped it would be, he " gushed about Falk's performance.

Colbert was noticed by the theatrical producer Leland Hayward, who suggested her for a role in Frank Capra's film For the Love of Mike ( 1927 ), now believed to be lost.

Capra's " first, last and only choice " for the pivotal role of the eccentric Longfellow Deeds was Gary Cooper.

Noted reviewer Graham Greene was effusive that this was Capra's finest film to date, describing Capra's treatment as " a kinship with his audience, a sense of common life, a morality ..." Variety noted " a sometimes too thin structure the players and director Frank Capra have contrived to convert (...) into fairly sturdy substance.

" Joseph McBride in a later biography notes that Capra's emphasis on theme rather than people was evident in the film ; he also considered the film a financial " debacle.

The song was later used in Frank Capra's propaganda film, The Battle of China.

Capra's directing style relied on improvisation to a great extent.

Film historian Richard Griffith speaks of Capra's “... reliance on sentimental conversation and the ultimate benevolence of ordinary America to resolve all deep conflicts .” “ Average America ” is visualized as "... a still tree lined street, undistinguished frame houses surrounded by modest areas of grass, a few automobiles.

Many of these stories have their backgrounds in movies, for example Topolino nel favoloso regno di Shan Grillà ( 1961 ) is based upon Frank Capra's Lost Horizon ( 1937 ); not to talk about all the stories starring Snow White or the Seven Dwarfs, obviously based on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs ( 1937 ).

With the sound era, films like All Quiet on the Western Front ( 1930 ) ( and its much darker German counterpart Westfront 1918 ), Howard Hawks ' Road to Glory ( 1936 ) and Grand Illusion ( 1937 ), focused on the futility of war for non-American soldiers whilst Hollywood produced American soldiers featuring in World War I comedies such as Buster Keaton's Doughboys ( 1930 ) and Wheeler & Woolsey's Half Shot at Sunrise ( 1930 ), or exciting tales of the U. S. Marine Corps putting down rebellions in Central America, China, and the Pacific Islands in films like Frank Capra's Flight ( 1930 ), The Leathernecks Have Landed ( 1936 ) and Tell it to the Marines ( 1926 film ).

The " Apple Annie " story transformed into Capra's Lady For A Day ( and Pocketful of Miracles ) has long been considered a natural source for a stage musical and a number of prominent writers, including Jerry Herman, David Shire and Richard Maltby Jr ; the team of John Kander and Fred Ebb have all worked on unfinished and unrealized adaptations.

Possibly to downplay Capra's gaffe, Rogers then called third nominee George Cukor to join the two Franks on stage.

She then joined Glenn Ford and Ann-Margret for the Frank Capra film A Pocketful of Miracles ( 1961 ) ( a remake of Capra's 1933 film, Lady for a Day ), based on a story by Damon Runyon.

The first film was shown on the giant screen was Frank Capra's The Bitter Tea of General Yen starring Barbara Stanwyck and the Music Hall became the premiere showcase for films from the RKO-Radio Studio.

In 1993 Republic won a landmark legal decision reactivating the copyright on Frank Capra's 1946 RKO film It's a Wonderful Life ( under NTA, they had already acquired the film's negative, music score, and the story on which it was based, " The Greatest Gift ").

" After a brief stint at United Artists, Bernds quit and went to work at Columbia, where he worked as sound man on many of Frank Capra's ' 30s classics.

The Capra's body may be made of different materials depending on local tradition, such as carpet or red cloth with adornments sewn on: traditional colourful cloth, embroidered handcerchiefs in Suceava, beaded ornate women's textile girdles in Bacău, reed ( Phragmites australis ) seed heads in Botoşani and Iaşi, goat pelts in Vrancea and in Mehedinţi, fabric ribbons or coloured paper in Neamţ and in Giurgiu etc.

Film historian Michael Medved agrees with and understands Capra's impressions, noting that he walked away from the movie business because " he refused to adjust to the cynicism of the new order.

Capra's synopsis: " Dealt with who, what, where, why, and how we came to be the U. S. A .— the oldest major democratic republic still living under its original constitution.

The name " Capra ", notes Capra's biographer Joseph McBride, represents his family's closeness to the land, and means " she-goat ".

He notes that the English word " capricious " derives from it, " evoking the animal's skittish temperament ", adding that " the name neatly expresses two aspects of Frank Capra's personality: emotionalism and obstinacy.

Capra also directed a film for MGM during this period, but soon realized he " had much more freedom under Harry Cohn's benevolent dictatorship ", where Cohn also put Capra's " name above the title " of his films, a first for the movie industry.

In Frank Capra's 1936 Film Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, the eccentricities of the main character are attributed to his having become " pixelated ", or falling under the influence of pixies.

They eventually settled in an Italian ghetto in Los Angeles, where Capra's father worked as a fruit picker and young Capra sold newspapers after school for the next 10 years, until he graduated high school.

" His films soon established Capra as a " bankable " director known throughout the industry, and Cohn raised Capra's initial salary of $ 1, 000 per film to $ 25, 000 per year.

Capra wrote of this period and recalled the confidence that Cohn placed in Capra's vision and directing:

In 1941 Capra directed Meet John Doe ( 1941 ), considered by some to be Capra's most controversial movie.

However, the film was believed to be in the public domain at the time, and as a result Markle and Holmes responded by returning Capra's initial investment, eliminating his financial participation, and refusing outright to allow the director to exercise artistic control over the colorization of his films, leading Capra to join in the campaign against the process.

In only his tenth movie, he co-starred with one of the " grand dames of the silver screen ," Barbara Stanwyck, in Frank Capra's critically acclaimed but commercially unsuccessful The Miracle Woman ( 1931 ), and the movie's failure to attract an audience disappointed Capra tremendously.