TCM ready to party like it’s 1939

tonight’s 1939 lineup

8 p.m.: “The Wizard of Oz”

10 p.m.: “1939: Hollywood’s Greatest Year”

11:15 p.m.: “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”

1:30 a.m.: “Gunga Din”

By JAY BOBBIN

Gracenote

Many deem 1939 the best single year of films Hollywood ever has had ... which makes it prime for an every-Friday showcase on Turner Classic Movies throughout July.

While the daytime schedule also features attractions from 80 years ago, the lineup includes an opening-night overview at 10 p.m. with the special “1939: Hollywood’s Greatest Year,” narrated by Kenneth Branagh.

Led by one of the 1939 Oscar nominees for best picture, “The Wizard of Oz,” that evening also points out how many enduring movies weren’t up for that award – even with 10 slots – by including “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” and “Gunga Din.”

On the other hand, TCM’s entire July 12 prime-time schedule is comprised of two more of the best picture candidates for 1939: the Bette Davis-starring drama “Dark Victory” and what is widely considered one of the greatest movies ever made (if not the greatest), “Gone With the Wind,” which ultimately did receive that Academy Award along with nine others.

July 19 sees two more best picture nominees for 1939 featured, director Frank Capra’s “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” (starring James Stewart, who actually got second billing next to Jean Arthur) and the original screen version of “Goodbye, Mr. Chips” (with Robert Donat, who earned that year’s Oscar for best actor, as the title schoolteacher).

The Ginger Rogers comedy “Bachelor Mother” rounds out that night.

Finally, July 26 offers another duo of 1939’s best picture contenders: director William Wyler’s film of Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights,” with Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier as lovers Cathy and Heathcliff; and “Love Affair,” teaming Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer in the story that inspired “An Affair to Remember,” which in turn inspired “Sleepless in Seattle.”

However, that July 26 night on TCM opens with “The Women,” long regarded as one of movie history’s wittiest gatherings of actresses.

Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, Rosalind Russell, Joan Fontaine and Paulette Goddard are among the stars who help director George Cukor’s take on Clare Boothe’s play about female “frenemies” crackle.