BACK TO BEDFORD FALLS:

3. Vincent Price was among the actors who tried out for the role of Mr. Potter. Ginger Rogers was offered the part of Mary but turned it down. The script was originally written with Cary Grant in mind, but he did The Bishop's Wife instead. Capra bought the script and revised it under the auspices that Jimmy Stewart would take the role.

4. The town of Bedford Falls was just a set, and was torn down after the movie was filmed. However, the gym floor that opened into a pool actually existed then, and still exists now, at Beverly Hills High School. The Martini house in "Bailey Park" is also still standing, in La Canada Flintridge, California, and is a private residence. Seneca Falls, NY, claims to be the town the movie was based on, and there is a "It's a Wonderful Life" museum located there. Strangely, it is closed on Christmas Day.

5. The scene where Uncle Billy leaves the house drunk and then crashes into what sound like garbage cans off screen? A crew member had in fact accidentally dropped some equipment right then, and Thomas Mitchell (playing Uncle Billy) ad libbed, "I'm alright! I'm alright!"

6. Why is George Bailey sweating so much when he's on the bridge? Because they were filming in July, and it was 90 degrees when they shot that scene.

7. The young man who opened the swimming pool and looked like Alfalfa? Just as you may have suspected, that was indeed Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer.

8. Bobby Anderson played young George Bailey in the film, and the next year had a bit part in The Bishop's Wife. In the 1990s, he worked as a production assistant on Passenger 57 and Demolition Man. That's right: Sly Stallone has one degree of separation from It's a Wonderful Life.

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