The House Across The Bay - A Harsh Sentence
Steve Larwitt (George Raft), known in the press as the King of Broadway, has clawed his way up from humble East Side New York origins to become the wealthy owner of nightclubs, gambling dens and more. He has just married Brenda Bentley (Joan Bennett), one of his chorus girls; everything looks rosy until a fellow racketeer tries to bump him off. It's a near miss and Brenda is convinced they will try again.
She has a plan - she knows the IRS are investigating her husband's personal finances and she also knows he's been short-changing them. She quizzes their crooked lawyer Slant Kolma (Lloyd Nolan) to find out what sort of sentence he might get if caught. When he tells her "Some dough and one year in prison ... max", she figures the trade-off is worth it to keep him safely out of harm's way. So she quietly mails some incriminating evidence ...
The New York footage was primarily interior scenes filmed at a Southern California studio but two exterior shots were used to set the location ...
Then ... Larwitt's stomping ground was seen in this night-time view looking south down Broadway towards Times Square from W. 49th St (map). The swanky Yoeng's Chinese-American dining and dancing place (formerly Churchill's) is at far right at 1609 Broadway and two blocks down, on the corner of W. 47th St. at 1579 Broadway, is the Strand Theatre. Partially visible at upper left of center is the vertical Loew's State Theatre sign at 1540 Broadway.
... and Now, it's no surprise that three quarters of a century later such an entertainment mecca would bear little resemblance to its former self. Yoeng's, the Strand and Loew's State Theatres are long gone.
Then ... Larwitt takes Brenda and Slant for a day out at the races. While he's watching the action from the grandstand two G-men show up from the FBI to pull him in on tax evasion charges.
... and Now, obviously the director just used some handy stock footage because this is the Santa Anita race track in Arcadia, California, the nation's first horse-racing track (it opened on Christmas Day, 1934). In this recent photo taken at a summer concert the left end of the grandstand is the same section as in the Then image above. The grandstand has over the years been significantly upgraded and extended to almost 300 yards in length.
... from a vintage postcard ... this postcard image shows the grandstand as it was back in 1940 when the movie was released. A pedestrian footbridge (also visible in the Then image above) can just be seen linking the grandstand to the adjacent Clubhouse on the left.
At the trial he is sentenced to ten years at Alcatraz and Brenda is furious when she realizes Slant had deliberately bungled the defense because he was in love with her and wanted Larwitt out of the way.