In which 1931 gangster film does James Cagney famously shove a grapefruit in Mae Clarke's face?

The 1931 gangster film in which James Cagney famously shoves a grapefruit into Mae Clarke’s face is The Public Enemy.

Directed by William A. Wellman and produced by Warner Bros., the film follows Tom Powers, played by Cagney, as he rises through Chicago’s Prohibition-era criminal underworld. The grapefruit scene occurs when Tom humiliates his girlfriend Kitty, played by Mae Clarke, during breakfast before leaving her for another woman.

The moment became one of early sound cinema’s most famous scenes. Wellman later said he added the grapefruit business after imagining a similar gesture during domestic arguments. Accounts differ on how surprised Clarke was: she said Cagney warned her before the take, although she did not expect the footage to appear in the finished film.

The Public Enemy is sometimes confused with Scarface or Little Caesar, other major early gangster films. It was Cagney’s breakthrough role, and the grapefruit gag was later parodied, including in Cagney’s 1961 comedy One, Two, Three.