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20 unusual facts about Spencer Tracy


20,000 Years in Sing Sing

20,000 Years in Sing Sing is a 1932 American black-and-white drama film starring Spencer Tracy and Bette Davis, and set in Sing Sing Penitentiary, the notorious maximum security prison in New York State.

Adam's Rib

The following morning, married lawyers, Adam and Amanda Bonner (Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn) read about the incident in the newspaper.

It stars Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn as married lawyers who come to oppose each other in court.

Colleen Later

There she met Bud Later from Beverly Hills, California who had been an actor in many movies, mainly as a double or extra, working with many famous actors like Bing Crosby, Spencer Tracy, Gregory Peck, and Shirley Temple.

Desk Set

Desk Set (released as His Other Woman in the UK) is a 1957 American romantic comedy film directed by Walter Lang and starring Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn.

Richard Sumner (Spencer Tracy), the inventor of EMERAC (used as a homoiophone metonym for ENIAC) and an efficiency expert, is brought in to see how the library functions, to figure out how to ease the transition.

Edward, My Son

The screenplay closely adhered to the original script, the only major change being Arnold Boult's conversion from British to Canadian so Spencer Tracy wouldn't have to struggle with an accent.

Edward, My Son is a 1949 American/British drama film directed by George Cukor that stars Spencer Tracy and Deborah Kerr.

Hare Remover

(Bugs comments to the audience, "I think Spencer Tracy did it much better. Don't you, folks?")

Harold Kruger

His last film credit was as Spencer Tracy’s double in The Old Man and the Sea.

Kettleman North Dome Oil Field

Boom Town the 1940 epic film about wildcatting in the early oil industry, and about those maverick 'wildcatters' turned loose upon windswept plains of Oklahoma, starred Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy as oilmen.

Libeled Lady

Warren Haggerty (Spencer Tracy), the managing editor, turns in desperation to former reporter and suave ladies' man Bill Chandler (William Powell) for help.

Libeled Lady is a 1936 screwball comedy film starring Jean Harlow, William Powell, Myrna Loy, and Spencer Tracy, written by George Oppenheimer, Howard Emmett Rogers, Wallace Sullivan, and Maurine Dallas Watkins, and directed by Jack Conway.

Remembrance Rock

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer had announced, in 1941, a film "American Cavalcade" that was to star Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, playing husband-and-wife teams from different periods of American history.

She Wanted a Millionaire

She Wanted a Millionaire is a pre-Code 1932 movie starring Joan Bennett and Spencer Tracy.

The Murder Man

The Murder Man is a 1935 crime-drama film starring Spencer Tracy, Virginia Bruce, and Lionel Atwill, and directed by Tim Whelan.

Steve Grey (Spencer Tracy) is a hotshot New York newspaper reporter, specializing in murder.

The Sea of Grass

The novel was adapted for a 1947 film of the same name directed by Elia Kazan and starring Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy.

When Time Ran Out

The survivors' hazardous walk across the island was largely copied from a 1961 volcano disaster film with Spencer Tracy and Frank Sinatra, The Devil at 4 O'Clock.

Wife vs. Secretary

The picture was the second time that year that Harlow and Loy worked together, also both appearing during 1936 in Libeled Lady also starring William Powell and Spencer Tracy, with Harlow billed first.


Anna Kashfi

The actress made her debut screen appearance using the stage name Anna Kashfi as a Hindu girl in The Mountain (1956) for Paramount with Spencer Tracy and Robert Wagner.

Anna Seghers

It was published in the United States in 1942 and produced as a movie in 1944 by MGM starring Spencer Tracy.

Blue-plate special

" The first book publication of Damon Runyon's story, "Little Miss Marker," was in a 1934 collection entitled Damon Runyon's Blue Plate Special. A Hollywood columnist wrote in 1940, "Every time Spencer Tracy enters the Metro commissary, executives and minor geniuses look up from their blue plate specials to look at the actor and marvel.

Carl Zimmerman

Zimmerman was known for representing clients such as Academy Award winners, Spencer Tracy, Paul Muni and Claudette Colbert.

Edward J. Flanagan

A 1938 film starring Spencer Tracy, Boys Town, was based on the life of Father Flanagan, and Tracy won an Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance.

Jack Dawn

Dawn worked with many of Hollywood's legendary performers, including Laurel and Hardy, Greta Garbo, Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Bert Lahr, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley, Greer Garson, Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Lucille Ball, Ingrid Bergman, Elizabeth Taylor, Frank Sinatra, Gene Kelly, Ginger Rogers, Lana Turner, Fred Astaire, and Betty Hutton.

Jimmy Hawkins

His first roles—as a two-year-old—were uncredited – Spencer Tracy's The Seventh Cross and Lana Turner's Marriage Is A Private Affair at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios.

John Ericson

He then went on to appear in a series of films which included Rhapsody, The Student Prince, Green Fire (all in 1954), and opposite Spencer Tracy in Bad Day at Black Rock (1955).

John Harvey Gahan

In 1956 he married Marguerite Depugh who had been a nurse for Spencer Tracy’s son John, and was at the time a nurse to Roy Rogers and Dale Evans children.

John Sturges

He made imaginative use of the widescreen CinemaScope format by placing Spencer Tracy alone against a vast desert panorama in the suspense film Bad Day at Black Rock for which he received a Best Director Oscar nomination in 1955.

Leading man

Less frequently, the epithet has been applied to an actor who is often associated with one particular actress, for example, Errol Flynn was Olivia de Havilland's leading man in several films, Spencer Tracy had a similar association with Katharine Hepburn; used in this sense, however, the woman is usually described as the leading lady of the man.

Lucille Carroll

In 1942, Hepburn signed a contract with MGM to appear in a picture, Woman of the Year, the first of many in which she appeared with Spencer Tracy.

Mel's Drive-In

Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn are out for a drive and Tracy pulls into Mels and orders Oregon Boysenberry ice cream, then has a minor traffic altercation with a black man.

Nicholas Georgiade

Georgiade had a minor role as a detective in the star studded 1963 film, It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World which starred Sid Caesar, Ethel Merman, Spencer Tracy, Mickey Rooney, and Milton Berle among others.

Shanghai Madness

Shanghai Madness is a 1933 American drama film directed by John G. Blystone and starring Spencer Tracy, Fay Wray, Ralph Morgan and Albert Conti.

The Devil at 4 O'Clock

On the fictional Pacific island of Talua in French Polynesia, some 500 miles from Tahiti, Father Doonan (Spencer Tracy), has been relieved of his duties by Father Perreau (Kerwin Mathews).

The Show Off

The film has been remade a number of times, in 1930 with Hal Skelly and Doris Hill as Men Are Like That, in 1934 as The Show-Off with Spencer Tracy, Madge Evans, and Lois Wilson in a different role, and in 1946 as The Show-Off with Red Skelton.