Why Casablanca was released much earlier than planned

War films are usually retrospective. Even “Casablanca”, the most famous film about World War II, while World War II was set in the recent past. The film was released in November 1942, after the United States joined the Allies, but it is set in December 1941, shortly before America entered the war.

As author Richard Osborne documents in “Casablanca Companion: The Movie Classic and Its Place in History,” filming of “Casablanca” took place on a Warner Bros. lot for 59 days, from May 25 to August 3, 1942. (Humphrey Bogart and Claude Rains were briefly called back on August 21 to shoot the very last scene after Jack Warner and Co. felt the film needed a stronger ending.) The cast and crew didn't think they had created anything remarkable, but the hand of fate intervened.

In “Casablanca,” the eponymous city is portrayed as a stopover for refugees, albeit a dangerous one, as it is controlled by the French Vichy government (effectively Nazi Germany). France had ruled parts of Morocco as a colony since 1912, and when France fell to the Nazis in June 1940, they got Morocco as a package deal. But Nazi-controlled control of the city was short-lived.

“Casablanca” had its premiere in Los Angeles on September 22, 1942, and was originally scheduled to be released in theaters in June 1943. Then the Allies launched “Operation Torch”: On November 8, 1942, Allied troops landed in North Africa and recaptured the country from the Nazis.

Every journalist knows the feeling of working on a story for months, only to have everything ruined by a new development. Warner Bros. was faced with this dilemma with “Casablanca.”

Jack Warner and producer Hal Wallis faced a dilemma. On the one hand, Osborne said, “a million dollars' worth of free advertising was thrown into their laps.” On the other hand, the film as shot did not reflect the rapidly changing political situation in Casablanca. Some at Warner Bros. suggested changing the film. (Wallis made arrangements to shoot a new final scene in which Rick and Captain Renault return to Casablanca as part of the Allied liberators.)

Warner ultimately decided they shouldn't do that. In a telegram to Warner Bros.' New York office, he said: “Just showed 'Casablanca' and it's impossible to change that film and make it consistent with the story we originally told. We want to tell the story of the (Allied) landing and everything else, that would have to be a completely new film and wouldn't fit into the present film. It's such a great film as it is.”

What they did The only thing that had to be changed was the release date, as Casablanca would not stay in the headlines forever. Warner continued: “We are the envy of the whole industry to have films called 'Casablanca' coming soon, and we feel we should take advantage of this big coup. Of course, the longer we wait to release the film, the less important the title is…”

Warner Bros. held its “Casablanca” premiere on November 26, 1942, and it opened in major theaters on Saturday, January 23, 1943. The very next day, January 24, the American public was introduced to the “Casablanca Conference.” From January 14 to 24, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill met in North Africa to host an Allied war strategy conference.

The additional publicity of the conference mixed (as Osborne notes) with the feelings of optimism in the American public after a series of Allied victories in the spring of 1943. The setting and the messages of resistance in “Casablanca” struck a chord Exactly the right time – “Casablanca” was the film of the year and not just because it is perfect.