The Sport Parade

Dartmouth football heroes Johnny Baker (William Gargan) and Sandy Brown (Joel McCrea) -- famed for their Baker-to-Brown passing game -- go their separate ways after graduation: Johnny to the editor's desk of a newspaper sports page and Sandy to the promotional schemes of a wrestling manager nicknamed Shifty. The friends' paths merge again when Johnny helps Sandy out of tough economic times, but their renewed friendship teeters toward permanent collapse when both men woo a lovely newspaper illustrator (Marian Marsh).

Running just under an hour, SPORT PARADE stars Joel McCrea as a sportwriter who accidently becomes a champion wrestler. In this capacity, he becomes involved with crooked promoters (just as though pro wrestling was a legitimate sport!). Since the main crook is played by comic actor Walter Catlett, it's difficult to take any of this film seriously--if indeed it was meant to be so taken. The best moments belong to Robert Benchley as a sublimely inaccurate radio sportscaster. SPORT PARADE was cowritten by the prolific Corey Ford, who later cheerfully admitted he knew nothing about the subject of wrestling but was just following studio orders by churning out this indifferent little charade.