Bogart's disputes with Warner Bros. over roles and money were similar to those the studio had with other less-than-obedient stars, such as Bette Davis, James Cagney, Errol Flynn, and Olivia de Havilland.

James Francis Cagney, Jr. ( July 17, 1899March 30, 1986 ) was an American actor, first on stage, then in film, where he had his greatest impact.

Although he won acclaim and major awards for a wide variety of performances, Cinema had changed in the ten years since Walsh last directed Cagney ( in The Strawberry Blonde ), and the actor's portrayal of gangsters had also changed.

Cagney himself had the idea of playing Jarrett as psychotic ; he later stated that " it was essentially a cheapie one-two-three-four kind of thing, so I suggested we make him nuts.

Cagney attributed the performance to his father's alcoholic rages, which he had witnessed as a child, as well as someone that he had seen on a visit to a mental hospital.

Cagney played Martin " Moe the Gimp " Snyder, a lame Jewish-American gangster from Chicago, a part Spencer Tracy had turned down.

When the film was released, Snyder reportedly asked how Cagney had so accurately copied his limp, but Cagney himself insisted he had not, having based it on personal observation of other people when they limped: " What I did was very simple.

Cagney had worked with Ford before on What Price Glory ?, and they had gotten along fairly well.

" Ford walked away, and they had no more problems, even though Cagney never particularly liked Ford.

While watching the Kraft Music Hall anthology television show some months before, Cagney had noticed Jack Lemmon performing left-handed.

While Cagney was not nominated, he had thoroughly enjoyed the production.

Cagney worked with MGM on the Western film Tribute to a Bad Man, a role that had originally been written for Spencer Tracy.

Cagney had hoped to spend some time tracing his Irish ancestry, but time constraints and poor weather meant that he was unable to do so.

Cagney had concerns with the script, remembering back 23 years to Boy Meets Girl, in which scenes were re-shot to try to make them funnier by speeding up the pacing, with the opposite effect.

On Zimmerman's recommendation, he visited a different doctor, who determined that glaucoma had been a misdiagnosis, and that Cagney was actually diabetic.

Zimmerman then took it upon herself to look after Cagney, preparing his meals to reduce his blood triglyceride level, which had reached alarming proportions.

Such was her success that, by the time Cagney made a rare public appearance at his AFI Lifetime Achievement award ceremony in 1974, he had lost and his vision had markedly improved.

As Cagney recalled, " We shot it in twenty days, and that was long enough for me.

As a young man, Cagney became interested in farming – sparked by a soil conservation lecture he had attended – and during his first walkout from Warners, he found a farm in Martha's Vineyard ; owning a farm had long been a dream of his.

Cagney was a fitting choice for the role of Cohan since, like Cohan, he was an Irish-American who had been a song-and-dance man early in his career.

The role had been sought by Ava Gardner, but Cagney persuaded MGM to cast Doris Day, who was excited to play opposite Cagney.

She had been a chain cigarette smoker for years, and Cagney remarked in his autobiography that when the cancer struck, " she didn't have a chance.

Richard Schickel of Time magazine felt that " Eddie Murphy exuded the kind of cheeky, cocky charm that has been missing from the screen since Cagney was a pup, snarling his way out of the ghetto ".

He grew up watching James Cagney on film in local theaters and, having been told many times how much he resembled him, figured if Cagney could become famous, so could he.

Lange has also been the recipient of the James Cagney Directing Fellow Scholarship Award from the American Film Institute along with the Paul Robeson Award from Oakland's Ensemble Theatre.

However, in her autobiography, Clarke stated that Cagney had told her prior to that take what he planned to do.

Eight years later Hedda Hopper told Adams she recalled writing about him at the time and he replied by reciting back to her, " Nick Adams, gas station attendant from New Jersey, did an impersonation of Jimmy Cagney and a scene from Glass Menagerie.

Notable American films from the war years include the anti-Nazi Watch on the Rhine ( 1943 ), scripted by Dashiell Hammett ; Shadow of a Doubt ( 1943 ), Hitchcock's direction of a script by Thornton Wilder ; the George M. Cohan biopic, Yankee Doodle Dandy ( 1942 ), starring James Cagney, and the immensely popular Casablanca, with Humphrey Bogart.

In the film, Cagney plays a race car driver who tries to " protect " his younger brother Linden, who is also a driver, from being distracted by his girlfriend, Blondell.

At the same time, Cagney must hide his own neurotic girlfriend, played by Dvorak, from his younger brother.

Bogart was gunned down on film repeatedly by Cagney and Edward G. Robinson, among others.

The film vaulted him from fourth place to first in the studio's roster, finally exceeding James Cagney, and more than doubling his salary to over $ 460, 000 per year by 1946, making him the highest paid actor in the world.

The ceremony was attended by some of Hollywood's biggest stars, including Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, Judy Garland, David Niven, Ronald Reagan, James Mason, Bette Davis, Danny Kaye, Joan Fontaine, Marlene Dietrich, James Cagney, Errol Flynn, Gregory Peck and Gary Cooper, as well as Billy Wilder and Jack Warner.

His next film, Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye, was another gangster movie, which was the first by Cagney Productions since its acquisition by Warners.

While compared unfavorably to White Heat by critics, it was fairly successful at the box office, with $ 500, 000 going straight to Cagney Productions ' bankers to pay off their losses.

However, as soon as Ford met Cagney at the airport, the director warned him that they would " tangle asses ", which caught Cagney by surprise.

Encouraged by his wife and Zimmerman, Cagney accepted an offer from Miloš Forman to star in a small but pivotal role in the 1981 film Ragtime.

The film was shot mainly at Shepperton Studios in London, and on his arrival at Southampton aboard the Queen Elizabeth 2, Cagney was mobbed by hundreds of fans.

Flubbed lines and miscues were all committed by his co-stars, many of whom were in awe of Cagney.

After being inundated by movie fans, Cagney sent out a rumor that he had hired a gunman for security.

Cagney did not just live there, he turned it into a working farm by selling some of the dairy cattle and replacing them with beef cattle.

The 1934 accusation stemmed from a letter from a local Communist official found by police which alleged that Cagney would be bringing other Hollywood stars to meetings.

Cagney was cleared by U. S. Representative Martin Dies, Jr. on the House Un-American Activities Committee.

Cagney alleged that, having failed to scare him and the Guild off, they sent a hitman to kill him by dropping a heavy light onto his head.