Meet John Doe (1941)
Meet John Doe is a 1941 American comedy drama film directed and produced by Frank Capra, and starring Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck. The film is about a "grassroots" political campaign created unwittingly by a newspaper columnist and pursued by a wealthy businessman. It became a box office hit and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Story. Though the film is less well known than other Frank Capra classics, it remains highly regarded today. It was ranked #49 in AFI's 100 Years... 100 Cheers. In 1969, the film entered the public domain (in the USA) due to the claimants' failure to renew its copyright registration in the 28th year after release. It was the first of two features Capra made for Warner Brothers, after he left Columbia Pictures. His second film for Warners was an adaptation of the Broadway play Arsenic and Old Lace and was filmed in 1941 but not released until 1944 because the producers of the play wouldn't allow the film to be shown until the production closed.
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