City boys : Cagney, Bogart, Garfield
Beginning with The Public Enemy, produced by Warner Bros. in 1931, James Cagney established a new cultural type on the American screen and in the world's imagination. That "type," later developed by Humphrey Bogart and John Garfield, was the urban tough guy - small, wiry, savvy, and street-smart. Often presented as a gangster, newspaper reporter, or private eye, the "city boy" seemed the quintessential product of urban America, although he was more a model for his
Print Book, English, ©1992
Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J., ©1992