VCI Entertainment has released a 90th Anniversary Blu-ray Special Edition of Rain restored by the Mary Pickford Foundation.

Based on W. Somerset Maugham’s 1921 short story, Miss Thompson, this was the second film version of the legendary 1922 play by John Colton and Clemence Randolph retitled Rain. The play, starring Jeanne Eagels, was so popular that it was revived in 1924 and again in 1926, all starring Eagels. The 1928 film version, retitled Sadie Thompson, earned Gloria Swanson an Oscar nomination in the title role. There would be a later version in 1953 called Miss Sadie Thompson starring Rita Hayworth.

This version, directed by Lewis Milestone (All Quiet on the Western Front) with a screenplay by Maxwell Anderson (Key Largo) stars Pickford’s daughter-in-law at the time, Joan Crawford, as Sadie.

Crawford, who was married to Douglas Fairbanks Jr. from 1929-1934, plays the prostitute newly arrived on the island of Pago-Pago who runs afoul of the visiting preacher played by Walter Huston. Lionel Barrymore had played the role opposite Swanson and José Ferrer would later play it opposite Hayworth. The third major character is the soldier seduced by Sadie, played in 1928 by Raoul Walsh and in 1953 by Aldo Ray. William Gargan (The Bells of St. Mary’s) has the role here.

The supporting cast in this pre-Code film includes Beulah Bondi (Make Way for Tomorrow) as Huston’s wife and Guy Kibbee (Gold Diggers of 1933) as the hotel owner.

A critical and commercial failure in its initial release, the film has developed a cult following over the years. Some have claimed that it is the best of the three film versions. Others, including Crawford herself, claimed it was the worst. Critics and audiences, as well as Crawford, have always maintained that her best 1932 performance was in that year’s Oscar winner, Grand Hotel, released six months earlier, in which her key scenes are opposite Swanson’s preacher, Lionel Barrymore.

Ten days after the release of Rain, another film about a prostitute, thinly disguised as a “floozy” in an exotic location, opened to rapturous critical and commercial response. That was Victor Fleming’s Red Dust, starring Jean Harlow opposite Crawford’s frequent co-star Clark Gable as the rubber plantation owner who falls for her and Mary Astor as the married woman who becomes her competitor for his affection.

Red Dust was coincidentally remade at the same time Rain was remade in 1953. Gable reprised his role in 1953’s Mogambo, directed by John Ford, for which both Ava Gardner in Harlow’s role and Grace Kelly in Astor’s role received Oscar nominations.

Extras on VCI’s 90th anniversary edition of Rain include two audio commentaries and the cut 1938 post-Code re-release version of the film.

Maugham, who died in 1965 at the age of 91, remains popular almost sixty years after his death. His works are constantly revived on British TV.

The author’s works were first filmed in 1915 and most recently in 2016. Film versions that are still readily available in addition to the three versions of Rain include three versions of Of Human Bondage written in 1915, one of The Moon and Sixpence written in 1919, two of The Letter written in 1924, three of The Painted Veil written in 1925, and two of The Razor’s Edge written in 1944.

The first Maugham work to appear on screen after Swanson’s Sadie Thompson was the 1929 version of The Letter for which Broadway’s Sadie Thompson, Jeanne Eagels, received a posthumous Oscar nomination for playing the plantation owner’s wife on trial for murder. Maugham had written the play for Gladys Cooper (The Song of Bernadette) who played the role in London. Katharine Cornell (Stage Door Canteen) played the role on Broadway. Bette Davis received an Oscar nomination for the 1940 remake two years before playing Cooper’s daughter in Now, Voyager.

Davis had of course come to prominence as the prostitute in the 1934 version of Of Human Bondage opposite Leslie Howard. Eleanor Parker and Kim Novak played the role in subsequent versions.

Greta Garbo, at the height of her fame, filmed The Painted Veil in 1934 between the better known Queen Christina and Anna Karenina. Herbert Marshall and George Brent co-starred in this romantic triangle drama set against a cholera background. Eleanor Parker starred in the 1957 version, retitled The Seventh Sin, opposite Bill Travers and Jean-Pierre Aumont. Naomi Watts, Edward Norton, and Liev Schreiber starred in the 2006 version made under its original title.

1942’s The Moon and Sixpence, inspired by the life of Paul Gauguin, stars George Sanders as the successful London stockbroker who abandons his wife and children to become a painter on an exotic island in the South Seas. Though frequently revived for British TV, it has never had a theatrical remake.

The most successful of all the films made from one of Maugham’s works is the 1946 version of The Razor’s Edge, starring Tyrone Power as the young man who goes off to Tibet to find himself, leaving behind a socialite fiancée, returning ten years later to face the music. Nominated for four Oscars including Best Picture, Supporting Actor (Clifton Webb), Supporting Actress (Anne Baxter), and Art Direction, it won for Baxter’s celebrated portrayal of a young woman who turns to the bottle after losing her husband and child in a horrible car crash. Herbert Marshall makes several appearances as Maugham.

It was remade in 1984 with Bill Murray in Power’s role, Catherine Hicks in Tierney’s, Theresa Russell in Baxter’s, and Denholm Elliott in Webb’s. A Blu-ray of this version will be released later this month.

This week’s new releases include the 4K UHD release of To Kill a Mockingbird and the first Blu-ray release of Arsenic and Old Lace.