FAQ

Both hoping to one day own their own ranch during the Great Depression (1930s), two migrant field workers -- the mentally-disabled Lennie Small (Lon Chaney Jr.) and his friend and caretaker George Milton (Burgess Meredith) -- take jobs on a California ranch. Unfortunately, George correctly predicts that the ranch's sadistic owner Curley Jackson (Bob Steele) and his flirtatious wife Mae (Betty Field) will become Lennie's downfall.

Of Mice and Men is based on a 1937 novella, also titled Of Mice and Men, by American author John Steinbeck. The screenplay for the movie was written by Eugene Solow. The story has been retold in numerous films, including Von Mäusen und Menschen (1981), Of Mice and Men (1968), Von Mäusen und Menschen (1992), National Theatre Live: Of Mice and Men (2014), and Of Mice and Men (2015).

John Steinbeck took a line from robert Burn's poem, "To a Mouse": "The best-laid plans of mice and men go oft awry."

George refers to pillow pigeons. He means head lice.

Mae holds an advertisement for the Palace Theater, which is showing Australien in Flammen (1939), Dick und Doof als Studenten (1940) (called Chumps at Oxford, which may have been the film's working title), and Zenobia, der Jahrmarktselefant (1939). Like this film, all are from Hal Roach Studios.

Susie introduces her two friends as Marlene Dietrich and Hedy Lamarr. One of them calls her Greta Garbo and she responds with Garbo's signature line, "I vant to be alone."

Compare it to the mercy shooting of Candy's (Roman Bohnen) dog earlier in the movie. Realizing that Lennie is doomed to a life of despair, George wants to spare him his fate.

No, she's known only as "Curley's wife."

The key difference is in the character of "Curley's Wife". In the book, we never learn her name, but in the movie, she is called Mae. There are also a number of scenes added showing her domestic life with Curley and his father, explaining why she is so lonely that she speaks with both Lennie and the black stablehand, Crooks. A scene of George and Slim at a saloon in town is added, which adds several minor female characters to the story. In what was probably a concession to the Production Code, George is shown handing the gun he killed Lenny with to a sheriff, who wraps it in a bandanna.

The film's music was the first film score of composer Aaron Copland. Unusual for the time, director Lewis Milestone allowed Copland to compose without interference, and made no cuts to Copland's work. Copland received Oscar nominations for Best Musical Score and Best Original Score. The "Barley Wagons" segment (played during the harvesting segment) of Copland's "Music for Movies" is drawn from this film.