Episode 40: It Happened One Night

Welcome to The RomCom Roundtable! Let’s go back…back to the beginning. We venture into cinema history with one of the original RomComs films: It Happened One Night. Starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, It Happened One Night is the story of Peter and Ellie. Ellie has recently eloped with a pilot King Wesley. Ellie’s father thinks Wesley is after his family’s fortune and separates Ellie from Wesley. Ellie runs away to New York City and along the way, she meets Peter, a journalist, who sees Ellie’s story as his ticket for his big break. This story has many of the elements we see in the RomComs of today. In today’s episode, we talk about the role of the film in movie history, the RomCom genre, and the history of the production of this movie. We also chat about movies of the 1930s, the experience of watching a film from the Golden Age of Hollywood, and the evolution of film scripts over the past century. We open the episode with some Oscars Trivia: Did you know this film swept all the major awards at the Academy Awards in 1934? A RomCom was the first to do so! We included links to the articles that we referenced in the episode during our discussion. Wrap Shot: It Happened One Night Trivia - It Happened One Night - Trivia & Fun Facts About It Happened One Night ‘It Happened One Night’ and the Case of the Curiously Modern Old Movies Also check out our previous episode with our discussion of Falling In Love at the Movies by Esther Zuckerman, whose book features It Happened One Night as one of the pioneering RomCom films! It Happened One Night is available on streaming platforms, DVD, and check out your local library to watch the film! Thank you to The Broken Spine in Tinker & Trade for sponsoring this episode! Thank you to our editor, Steve Angello ! We recorded this episode in March 2026. Don’t forget to follow the pod for future episodes and check out our socials on Instagram @theromcomroundtable! We are also on Buy Me a Coffee ! If you’d like to contribute, we appreciate your support, which allows us to bring you the best content here on the pod! Thank you!! You have a seat at the table! Send us questions for a future mailbag episode; your favorite books, movies, and music, which could be on a future episode; and your feedback! This podcast features music created using Groovepad. Episode cover art is designed on Canva Pro. © 2026 The RomCom Roundtable. All rights reserved.