Damned Don’t Cry, The (Warner 1950, Joan Crawford, Steve Cochran)

The Damned Don’t Cry, traces the transformation of a poor laborer’s wife to the haughty, elegant mistress of a crime boss. Joan Crawford, in a typically hard-boiled role, leaves her husband and squalid surroundings behind intent on finding a better life. In the big city, she proffers love to a talented accountant who, with Crawford’s prodding, becomes allied with a mobster. Crawford quickly leaves her man for the powerful gang boss but ends up back where she began, wounded and wiser.

Vincent Sherman directed Joan Crawford three times in the span of just two years. After The Damned Don’t Cry, they teamed up for Harriet Craig (also 1950) and Goodbye, My Fancy (1951).

production details
USA | Warner Bros. | 103 minutes | 1950

Director: Vincent Sherman
Producer: Jerry Wald
Original Story: Gertrude Walker
Cinematography: Ted McCord
Editor: Rudi Fehr
Music: Daniele Amfitheatrof
Script: Harold Medford, Jerome Weidman
Production Design: Robert M. Haas, William L. Kuehl

cast
Joan Crawford as Ethel Whitehead
Edith Evanson as Mrs. Castleman
Morris Ankrum as Jim Whitehead
David Brian as George Castleman
Steve Cochran as Nick Prenta
Kent Smith as Martin Blackford
Hugh Sanders as Grady
Selena Royle as Patricia Longworth
Jacqueline deWit as Sandra
Richard Egan as Roy Whitehead
Bess Flowers as Restaurant Patron