I watched a real rarity last night. One of the typical kinds of Vaudeville acts involved jokes about and between, and even among different ethnic and/or religious groups. One of the very popular Vaudeville acts for over twenty years was that of Charles Murray and Lucien Littlefield playing respectively Clancy the Irishman and MacIntosh the Scotsman. They made a film in 1930 called "Clancy in Wall Street" which showcased their Vaudeville characters. Filled with Depression humor about Wall Street - and funny lines about Wall Street in general! - this is a very appealing little comedy about types and a time that certainly are no more. When this film began appearing at movie festivals in the late 1990's there were comments about its sound track. Well, nothing's changed there. The sound track still has a hiss in it, and it's loud at a few other times. Never so distracting, however, to interrupt the enjoyment.
Grand old fashioned entertainment. Well worth a look see. Lucien Littlefield made over 250 movies in a career that lasted a lifetime. He only lived 65 years, but was a performer from childhood until the day he died. Many will remember him as Ira Lazar in "The Cat and the Canary" (1927) or a foil for Laurel and Hardy, but his career with Charles Murray in Vaudeville was memorable, too. Charles Murray made over 275 movies, many of them shorts, so his filmography today is nearly unknown. How unfortunate! Also in this film are Elliott Nugent, Miriam Seegar, Reed Howes, and Aggie Herring.
My print's from Grapevine, and the quality is what you get, but it's the only print, as far as anyone knows. You get what you get, skips and jumps and hisses, none of which, believe it or not, interferes with the watching much.