The Jackpot

The Jackpot is a 1950 American comedy film directed by Walter Lang, with James Stewart and Barbara Hale in the lead roles. It features a young Natalie Wood. The screenplay was based on a John McNulty article, "The Jackpot", in The New Yorker (February 19, 1949), about the true experiences of James P. Caffrey of Wakefield, Rhode Island who won $24,000 worth of merchandise on August 28, 1948 from the CBS radio quiz program, Sing It Again. The film is mostly forgotten today, but was a successful vehicle for Stewart at the time. A radio adaptation, broadcast April 26, 1951, on NBC's Screen Directors Playhouse, received much press coverage because Stewart's co-star was Margaret Truman, making her debut as a radio actress for a fee of $2,500. She received mixed reviews, and noted that her father "enjoyed it".