Here’s looking at ‘Casablanca’

75 years later, we’ll always have these fun facts

You must remember this: Casablanca, perhaps the most beloved movie of all time, is celebrating its 75th anniversary.

Set in December 1941 in the Moroccan city of Casablanca, the film centers on Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart), owner of Rick’s Café Americain, and Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman), the wife of a Resistance leader, who sacrifice being together for a higher purpose: defeating the Nazis in World War II.

To commemorate, here are facts, observations and quotes related to a classic that ranks third on the American Film Institute’s (AFI) list of the 100 greatest films of all time.

❚ Casablanca is adapted from a 1940 play, Everybody Comes to Rick’s, written by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison.

❚ Casablanca is in North Africa. Casablanca was filmed at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, Calif.

❚ Casablanca premiered on Nov. 26, 1942, in New York, days after the British-U.S. invasion of North Africa. The film’s wide release came on Jan. 23, 1943, as President Roosevelt attended a conference of Allies in Casablanca.

❚ Casablanca’s writers said they didn’t know how the movie would end when filming started.

❚ Some have speculated that the title, which translates to “white house,” means that Rick represents FDR. Rick joins the Resistance in Casablanca the same month the U.S. entered the war.

❚ Casablanca won three Academy Awards, including best picture, director (Michael Curtiz) and screenplay.

❚ Casablanca established Bogart as a romantic leading man. He was shorter than Bergman, which required adjustments to make him look taller.

❚ Bergman, a Swede playing Norwegian Ilsa, wasn’t nominated for an Oscar for Casablanca, but she later won three.

❚ Memorable supporting players Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet

worked with Bogart on another classic, 1941’s The Maltese Falcon.

❚ Could Ronald Reagan have played Rick? Warner Bros. put out a press release saying he would co-star in the film, but that was a publicity move.

❚ If you have a great line, reuse it. Rick tells Ilsa four different times: “Here’s looking at you, kid.” (It’s No. 5 on AFI’s 2005 list of the 100 greatest movie quotes of all time.)

❚ The film has six entries on the AFI

list, including Rick’s parting line to Ilsa, “We’ll always have Paris,” before he sends her off with Resistance leader Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid).

❚ Capt. Louis Renault (a showstopping Claude Rains) decides not to turn Rick in when police arrive, inspiring the title of 1995’s The Usual Suspects. “Major Strasser has been shot,” he says. “Round up the usual suspects.”

❚ Renault, a regular at the barely concealed casino at Rick’s Café, delivers the all-time feigned-ignorance line: “I’m shocked, SHOCKED, to find that gambling is going on in here,” he says as he’s handed his winnings.

❚ Dooley Wilson, as Sam, sings As Time Goes By. But that isn’t him on the ivories: His piano part is dubbed.

❚ Nobody ever says “Play it again, Sam.” When Ilsa arrives at Rick’s, she makes a request: “Play it once, Sam, for old time’s sake.” When Sam hesitates, she persists: “Play it, Sam. Play As Time Goes By.” Later, Rick demands: “You know what I want to hear. Play it!”

❚ As Casablanca closes, with Rick, joined by Renault, firmly enlisting in the Resistance, he delivers the best closing line in film history: “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

Sources: American Film Institute, Snopes.com, IMDb, Westword.com, Time and USA TODAY research

PHOTOS BY WARNER BROS. VIA AP “Casablanca,” released Nov. 26, 1942, established Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart as romantic leads and led to some great lines.

Capt. Louis Renault (Claude Rains) is “shocked, SHOCKED” by the gambling.

No one in the film asks piano player Sam (Dooley Wilson) to “play it again.”