Bringing Up Baby is an American screwball comedy film released by RKO Radio Pictures in 1938. The story was based upon the short story by Hagar Wilde which was originally published in Collier's Weekly magazine on April 10, 1937. Dudley Nichols adapted the story for screenplay. A real-life tame leopard was used for the role of Baby.
The film starts Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant as, Susan Vance, a ditsy but caring young lady, and David Huxley, an intelligent but romantically and professionally unhappy man. As a paleontologist, he is determined to assemble the skeleton of a Brontosaurus, but he is missing a bone which he goes in pursuit of for the duration of the movie. Simultaneously, he is embroiled in an adventure with Susan in trying to find a young leopard, known as Baby, a home on a farm. However, he soon becomes conflicted with his emotions towards her and for his fiancée who remains waiting for him to return.
The film script was tailored for Hepburn, often tying into her own personality into the role of Susan. She often struggled to contain her amusement on set, which delayed progress of the shooting and her comedic performance was coached by the vaudeville veteran Walter Catlett. Despite its big players and efforts, the film was a box office flop and Hepburn’s career was temporarily damaged by the reviews, and dd not recover until her performance in The Philadelphia Story (1940) two years later. However, its release to mainstream television resulted in positive praise, and it has since been adapted numerous times.
