THE PAYOFF

US, 1942, 72 minutes, Black and white.
Lee Tracy, Tom Brown, Tina Thayer, Evelyn Brent, Jack LaRue?, Ian Keith, Robert Middlemass, John Maxwell.
Directed by Arthur Dreifus.


Lee Tracy had been very popular in the 1930s, usually playing the same kind of role, the journalist, the investigator, with a very offhand manner, charming everyone as well as irritating them, the touch of romance, and his continual swift talking. Tracy employs all this in this small budget feature from the early 1940s – with one of the lines from Tracy remarking that he did not want to experience the Chicago Gestapo.

The plot is familiar, the death of a high official, a murder mystery, the ups and downs of the investigation, gangsters and clubs, gambling and money.

The police continue the investigation, Lee Tracy tracking things down, having a reputation for honesty – and his discovering the truth about the owner of the nightclub, a femme fatale who gets involved with whom he flirts, and the revelation that the buyer of his newspaper is the secret head of all gangster activity in the city.

1. Small budget supporting feature of the early 1940s? Star vehicle for Lee Tracy – and his reputation in films of the 1930s?

2. The city setting, DA and office, nightclubs, journalists and poker playing, the streets, warehouse, newspaper offices? The musical score?

3. The title, gangsters, organised crime, money and bribes?

4. The murder of the DA, his report? The gun, the concierge giving the killer the gun? The later witness of the hunchback man, his letting McKay? know? His death? Information from the taxi driver?

5. The introduction to McKay?, a Lee Tracy character, swift-talking? Playing poker? The imitation of different voices to avoid contact? The information about the murder, his beating all the rest of the journalists to the murder scene? Interaction with the investigator, comment on his blue eyes?

6. The newspaper, Norris as owner, the role of the editor, Norris’s son and his keenness to be a reporter, giving the information to McKay?

7. Moroni, the suspect, McKay? interviewing him? The murder of the hunchback? Moroni going to Angus? The contact? His going to McKay’s? room, his death?

8. Angus, the club, McKay? going with the hundred dollars, Angus identifying it, the threat?

9. The background of Walker, his work with the DA, the payoffs? His having the money? Contact with the club? Giving the information and money to his daughter? His disappearance? The daughter, going to McKay?, in the room when Maroney was killed? Meeting Norris?

10. McKay?, Moroni’s death, the money and information, the key, the box? Getting the money, having breakfast?

11. McKay? hiding the money, going into the club, the encounter with Dawn, flirtation, her going to Angus’s room? His later confronting her, with the gun, pretending to be dead, his getting her to get the information?

12. The warehouse, the hold-ups, the thugs, the gun in the girl’s purse, McKay? and the others getting away?

13. The setup, the raid on the club?

14. Norris, revealed as the arch-criminal? McKay? telling him about his son? The warehouse, his death?

15. McKay?, deciding to conceal the truth about Norris, writing that he died heroically, this legacy for his son?

16. McKay? and Dawn – any possible future? Short time?