Ambassador Will

Abraham Lincoln isn't the only iconic American political figure whose life journey in many ways parallels that of our freshly elected President Barack Obama.

Will Rogers entered life as part Cherokee Indian in 1879 Indian Territory, 25 miles NW from what is now Tulsa, Oklahoma. His father, Clement Rogers, was a rancher, a judge and a five-term Cherokee Democratic Senator. Young Rogers often quipped "My ancestors may not have come over on the Mayflower, but they met 'em at the boat." His mother died when he was only 11 years old.

Young Rogers yearned to be a cowboy and developed skills as a horseman and lariat artist (his rope tricks later got him into the Guinness Book of World Records). By the time he turned 21, at the turn of the 20th century, his thirst for knowledge and adventure had taken him to Argentina, where he learned the livestock trade while transporting pack animals from Buenos Aires to South Africa for use in the Boer War.

While in Johannesburg, Rogers joined Texas Jack's Wild West Show as "The Cherokee Kid" and went on to perform his act in Australia and New Zealand with the Wirth Brothers Circus. He had a natural stage presence, and upon returning to the states, continued performing in Vaudeville circuits from 1905 to 1915 in America, Canada and Europe. In 1915, these experiences culminated in a decade-long starring role on Broadway in the famous Ziegfeld Follies. Gradually Rogers embedded humorous commentary and homespun philosophy into his lasso routines to the increasing delight of audiences. Wry one-liners like "When the Okies left Oklahoma and moved to California, it raised the I.Q. of both states" and "Make crime pay - become a lawyer" endeared him to audiences.

His growing popularity rapidly propelled Will Rogers into simultaneous careers as an author, journalist, radio star and world famous Movie Star. But it was his keen understanding of politics combined with the opportunity to personally impact humanity that became his driving passion in life: "Live your life so that whenever you lose, you're ahead." His radio career began in 1922, and by 1930 he appeared regularly for the pharmaceutical firm E.R. Squibb & Sons and was regarded as one of the nation's primary molders of public opinion. Also in 1922, Rogers began writing a nationally syndicated newspaper column for the New York Times, criticizing dishonest politicians and the political influence of big business. The Saturday Evening Post subsequently hired him to serve as a goodwill ambassador-at-large, writing dispatches from Europe and the Soviet Union.

Will Rogers began flirting with the movie industry as early as 1916, when he was hired to write a screenplay. This resulted in starring roles in 71 motion pictures (sadly, most of them lost forever). One of his earliest sound films, released in 1931, was Ambassador Bill, which humorously paralleled his own life. In the film, Will stars as Bill Harper, an American ambassador to the revolutionary-ravaged fictional country of Sylvania. Bill is sent to replace the current ambassador who has experienced a nervous breakdown. The corrupt prime minister of Sylvania is attempting to steal power from the queen, until Ambassador Bill arrives to spread good humor and deliver a happy ending.

The stock market crash of 1929 and the resulting Great Depression had a profound impact on Will Rogers and his determination to make a difference in the lives of his fellow citizens. His voice was a reassurance to a demoralized population that they were not alone in their distrust of corrupt politicians and the greedy elite. Hundreds of quotes attributed to him during his career attest to his humanitarian nature and power of political persuasion. Here are a few timely examples:

"Diplomacy is the art of saying "nice doggie" until you can find a rock."

"We'll hold the distinction of being the only nation in the history of the world that ever went to the poor house in an automobile."

"We will never have true civilization until we have learned to recognize the rights of others."

"You can't say that civilization don't advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way."

"I am not a member of any organized political party, I am a Democrat."

"There is no trick to being a humorist with the whole government working for you."

"I don't make jokes, I just watch the government and report the facts."

"If we ever pass out as a great nation we ought to put on our tombstone, 'America died from a delusion that she has moral leadership."

"I love a dog, he does nothing for political reasons."

Will Rogers died in a plane crash in Alaska in August 1935, along with pioneer aviator Wiley Post, while testing the feasibility of flying freight from the U.S. to Asia.

The following was posted in The Oklahoma Gazette: "Many called him the future president of the United States. When he died, a squadron of airplanes dropped flowers over those attending the funeral services at Claremore airport and people scattered to gather the fallen blossoms. In Washington, D.C., Congress adjourned while the grief-stricken family received a well-publicized letter from President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. California’s governor ordered a day of mourning as flags flew at half-staff in Los Angeles County. An estimated 100,000 reportedly paid their respects at Forest Lawn cemetery. Church bells tolled in 100 cities nationwide in remembrance. For two silent minutes, more than 12,000 theaters darkened across the country and all Hollywood studios stopped production."

When asked to reflect on his career, Will Rogers would respond in his inimitable drawl: "Had there been no Ziegfeld and no Follies, I would today have been 12 miles north of Claremore, Oklahoma, plowing for corn, slopping the hogs, running my own still and knocking the Republican Party, for that is considered one of the chores in my country ... "

In our next post, we'll look at some of the wonderful films made by Will Rogers at the peak of his career. Meanwhile, click here to enjoy Man of the Year, a rare 30-min 1956 TV kinescope produced by WRCA TV in association with The Saturday Review - and brought to you courtesy of the Internet Archive.

Industrial Strength Max

While Max Fleischer is best known for his Betty Boop, Popeye and Superman cartoons, few realize his role as an artist in the creation of innovative industrial, technical and scientific films. We asked our colleague Ray Pointer to tell us more about Fleischer as an artist in his own right.

Max Fleischer always claimed that his career as an artist began when he first stood up in his crib and scrawled on the wallpaper. While born in Austria, he was four years old when he, his older brother Charles, and his parents arrived in New York harbor in 1887. His first glimpse of America was The Statue of Liberty, which made such an indelible impression, that he came to see the fields of engineering and mechanics as the "art form of the 20th Century."

It was said that Max had a natural ability to understand vague or complicated concepts and translate them into drawings that communicated clearly. During his early school years he would draw maps for his class that taught geography better than those published in the text books. He continued his interest in drawing, and after graduating from Public School, he took formal instruction at The Art Student's League and Cooper Union.

Before entering the animation field, Max Fleischer was a cartoonist for The Brooklyn Daily Union in the early 1900s. He had admired newspaper cartoons as a youth, and after working as an errand boy at $2.00 per week he eventually attained the position of staff cartoonist while still in his teens, becoming the youngest cartoonist in the nation. He later became a successful Photoengraver, Airbrush Artist, Technical Illustrator, and eventually, Art Editor for Popular Science Magazine. But it was not until 1914 that Fleischer ventured into the realm of animated cartoons.

Fleischer's boss, Waldemar Klaempffert, had seen some of the first commercially produced animated cartoons which were jerky and lifeless. Knowing Max's knowledge of art, photography and mechanics, Klaempffert suggested that Max consider a means of making animated cartoons look better. The result, of course was The Rotoscope, which was the device that launched Max Fleischer's landmark 1920s series, "Out of the Inkwell."

Fleischer's role as the on screen artist in "Out of the Inkwell" served as a semi-documentary of the man as an established artist. This is particularly so since the early entries display art and animation by Fleischer and his long time associate, Roland "Doc" Crandall. As his studio grew and acquired additional staff, Fleischer continued to contribute his talents well into the 1930s, working on certain technical and special effects animation required of his theatrical cartoons for Paramount.

While Fleischer's animated works are best known through his various entertainment series, his studio engaged in several important scientific and industrial films. In 1923, Fleischer produced The Einstein Theory of Relativity in association with Dr. Garret P. Serviss and Dr. Albert Einstein, followed by Evolution for the Museum of Natural History. Because Evolution was based on the controversial Darwin's Theory, it was screened as part of the famous Scopes Trial led by William Jennings Bryan and defended by Clarence Darrow.

Fleischer made a number of technical and industrial films throughout his career. One of the earliest known to survive is The Electric Bell (1916). During World War I, he produced the first training films for the U.S. Army on subjects such as Contour Map Reading, and Firing a Stokes Mortar, Operating the Lewis Machine Gun, and Submarine Mine Laying. After the war, Fleischer made various industrial/commercial films for AT&T such as How the Telephone Talks (1924), That Little Big Fellow (1926?), and Now You're Talking (1927), which has been recently restored by The Library of Congress and The National Film Preservation Foundation.

But the most famous of these is Finding His Voice (1929), which was produced for Western Electric's Electrical Research Products Incorporated division. This short was made to explain the Variable Density sound-on-film recording and reproduction process for theater owners, projectionists, and recording engineers. It was done largely by the hand of Fleischer and his best friend, Frank Lyle Goldman, assisted by Fleischer staffers including Al Eugster. Fleischer produced other sponsored industrials such as A Jolt for General Germ for Lysol, Suited to a Tea for the India Tea Company, Step on It and Tex in 1999 for Texaco, and In My Merry Oldsmobile for General Motors' Olds Division, all from 1931 alone.

With the approach of World War II, Fleischer became less interested in producing animated comedy films. With his theatrical cartoon studio under the control of Paramount, Fleischer turned towards his main interest, film as an educational tool. During the 1940s, he was head of the Animation Department at the Jam Handy Organization in Detroit, Michigan, where he supervised important productions for military training and industrial promotion. Many times he lent his hand to the actual art work that was used, and the film News Sketches by Max Fleischer is typical of Fleischer's flair for clever writing and attractive illustration. This example clearly displays the inking style of "Out of the Inkwell" and further establishes Fleischer's artistic skill, which has never really been fully realized.

This is one of the major differences in the inevitable comparisons between the works of Walt Disney and Max Fleischer. While both men achieved great things within their own right, it is clear that Fleischer was a far more accomplished artist. Examples of Disney's early artwork and animation display a primitive drawing ability, something he came to realize with his drive to reach his own artistic goals. The result of his success was achieved through the direction and skill of others, while Fleischer was clearly an accomplished artist in the truest sense. This is the distinction that led to his becoming eclipsed by the light of the Disney achievements, which were the result of aggressive business practices that Fleischer, having an artist's mentality, failed to realize.

News Sketches by Max Fleischer represents his work of the mid 1940s, and is an important discovery since the only widely seen example from his Jam Handy period has been Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Thanks to Rick Prelinger and Prelinger Archives, this period of Max Fleischer's career has been saved for future generations to discover and gain further insight to the man whose name is known only from the top of 1930s title cards.

Great thanks, Ray! You can learn more about the world of Max Fleischer and other animation pioneers by visiting Ray Pointer's Inkwell Images website. You can also read our earlier Bijou interviews with Ray here and here.

So You think You Know George O'Hanlon

For 30 years before becoming known as the patriarch on the 1960s TV cartoon series The Jetsons, George O'Hanlon was a very familiar face on movie screens and TV sets around the world. Born in Brooklyn NY in 1912, the teenage O'Hanlon was determined to break into movies and at age 20 began his remarkable career as an extra in a 1932 B-movie mystery called The Death Kiss, featuring Bijou favorite Bela Lugosi. Perhaps he was attracted to the limelight by his famed cousin, Virginia O'Hanlon, the subject of the popular and perennial newspaper editorial "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus."

Over the next ten years O'Hanlon honed his skills as an actor playing bit parts in 25 minor and major films, such as Hollywood Hotel (1937), Brother Rat (1938) and Hell's Kitchen (1939).

While teaching a cinema course at USC, director/writer Richard Bare conceived an idea for Warner Bros. Bare had been inspired by the successful Pete Smith Specialty series of MGM theatrical shorts that featured filmmaker/narrator Pete Smith commenting whimsically on humorous situations being played out onscreen. Bare hired O'Hanlon as the star and co-writer for a series of one-reel short subjects concerning an eccentric character named "Joe McDoakes."

Bare and O'Hanlon devised each installment around a title beginning with the words "So You ..." followed by the the key words to the plot. The first in the series was "So You Want to Give Up Smoking," released in November, 1942. As his narrator, Bare hired Art Gilmore, an up and coming voice artist, fresh from his fourth screen role as FDR's voice in Yankee Doodle Dandy.

Gilmore served as the driving narrative force in every short, verbally tying together an otherwise loose assortment of zany, frantically-paced comedy bits, peppered with one-liners, sight gags and occasional spoofs of (then) contemporary pop culture. Clearly, some of the outrageous gags were inspired by the output of WB cartoon pioneers such as Chuck Jones, Tex Avery and Bob Clampett. For example, in the very funny So You Want to Be a Detective, our hero opens a cabinet door and a dead body falls to the floor, followed by another and another and another - until seven bodies are piled up. This entire episode plays like a live-action cartoon.


In So You Want to be a Gambler, Joe catches gambling fever as Gilmore narrates: "Here is Joe McDoakes, the inveterate, incurable gambler. The man who simply has to have a bet. Joe will bet on anything, take either side, give you odds and spot you six." Joe swindles a nickel from a paperboy and the fever escalates to the pinball machine. Then in a loony sequence reminiscent of a Tex Avery cartoon, Gilmore's narration becomes that of a sportscaster: "Now the champ is ready for action; wrists, fingers and knuckles relaxed and flexible, left foot forward, weight balanced... his precision-like movements and perfect timing show years of rigid training - steady Joe, steady." Then Joe fires off the pinball and the zany sound effects and music provide an energetic segue into Joe's next level of gambling fever and a final gag where Joe scores three lemons on a slot machine and the machine pays out --- with lemons. (Did they really permit pinball gambling and slot machines in drugstores in 1948?). You can enjoy this short here courtesy of Turner Classic Movies.

Certainly the McDoakes films were influenced by the ubiquitous output of comedy shorts from RKO and Columbia. For example, Edgar Kennedy had been starring in his own "average man" series for RKO since 1931, and releasing six shorts a year. The Kennedy shorts shared certain similarities such as a wife and extended eccentric family, and plots structured around buying a used car, settling a gambling debt, promoting a zany invention or the latest get-rich-quick scheme.

However, the Bare/O'Hanlon/Gilmore creative collaborations held their own, and were distinguished by their unique blend of silliness and satire. At the outset, each short would be filmed on a 3-day production schedule, but during the 1950s, three complete episodes would be filmed over a 4-day production schedule. Leonard Maltin, in his superb book "The Great Movie Shorts," writes; "The new pace of making the shorts did not seem to affect their quality. O'Hanlon and Bare worked very carefully on the scripts before shooting began, so the films could be planned for filming with a minimum of wasted time and effort."

Warner Bros. produced a total of 63 Joe McDoakes comedies at the rate of six per year over a span of 14 years, interrupted only by the war years. The series ended in 1956, in part due to the advent of television. Only Columbia Pictures would continue producing comedy shorts beyond that and until the Three Stooges finally wore out their welcome in 1959.

George O'Hanlon's career then shifted to the small screen in 1957, with an occasional role on the big screen. He was featured in one or more episodes of shows such as I Love Lucy, The Life of Riley, Sugarfoot, Maverick and The Red Skelton Show. Then in 1961, O'Hanlon would once again achieve pop culture celebrity status when he was hired by Hanna-Barbera to become the voice of George Jetson in a new futuristic animated TV series called The Jetsons.

More television roles followed in episodes of Mister Ed, Marcus Welby, Adam-12, The Partridge Family, Mission Impossible and many others. O'Hanlon's last role came when he starred once again as the voice of George Jetson in the big screen adaptation of The Jetsons. O'Hanlon had suffered a stroke leaving him almost blind and with little short term memory. He had to be coached while delivering what would be his final lines before his death in February 1989, prior to the film's release in 1990.

We share Leonard Maltin's lament in his book about the lack of public access to the McDoakes series: "This is criminal! The shorts exist, waiting to be seen again, perhaps rediscovered, and fully appreciated for the comic genius they are." Maltin wrote this in 1972, and the same can be said today as well about the films of Edgar Kennedy, Charlie Chase, Pete Smith, Laurel & Hardy, Leon Errol, Andy Clyde and other great comedy icons.

Movie Prologues

Imagine if when going to the movies instead of being barraged by commercials before the movie begins you were treated to a live stage show featuring performances by popular entertainers and accompanied by a live orchestra. There was a time when going to the movies in any major American city included all that, and more.

The history of the "movie prologue" intertwines the eras of silent and sound film; vaudeville and musical theater; stage and screen. Key aspects of this history are depicted in Warner Bros. backstage musical extravaganza Footlight Parade (1933). In the film, choreographed by Busby Berkeley, James Cagney plays Chester Kent, producer of Broadway stage musicals, who is financially challenged by the arrival of talking pictures and the demise of expensive live musicals, his bread and butter.

Kent convinces the owners of a theater chain to finance his production of short-form musicals to be performed live on stage as a prologue before the main feature. Each prologue would then be shuttled in rotation week by week to each of the theaters in the chain. The Depression made it increasingly hard to fill theater seats, but since the studios were charging theaters a flat rental fee for the movie, theater owners could afford to increase their audiences and income by financing the added attractions.

Several key characters in Footlight Parade were modeled after real-life impresarios and performers who pioneered the movie prologue. Cagney's role as producer Chester Kent, for example, is a thinly-disguised manifestation of Chester Hale. Hale had been creating and choreographing stage musicals since 1921. In 1929, according to the Internet Broadway Database (IBDB), two new musicals opened on Broadway; Broadway Nights and A Night in Venice; each choreographed by the team of Busby Berkeley and Chester Hale. Berkeley, of course, went on to a celebrated career choreographing major Hollywood musicals (including Footlight Parade), and Hale went on to direct the dance sequences in such classic films as Naughty Marietta (1935), A Night at the Opera (1935) and Rose Marie (1936).

The labyrinth of offices and rehearsal halls portrayed in Footlight Parade very much resembled the Los Angeles production offices of "Fanchon & Marco," who together were early participants in the creation of movie prologues. Fanny (Fanchon) and Mike (Marco) Wolff began their careers as a brother and sister dance team and eventually became producers and promoters of their own Broadway musical called Sunkist in 1921.


Time Magazine wrote; "Soon, the Southern & Pacific was transporting Fanchon & Marco's show up and down the west coast, then it was going all over the U.S. - 52 units a year. For the young Wolffs had had a bright idea. Small cinema houses wanted to stage shows but could not afford them. Fanchon & Marco offered units at a reasonable price, equipped them and rehearsed them in Hollywood, sent them out complete with costumes, scenery and songs. Their studio on Sunset Boulevard near Western became a factory for mass production of 15-minute shows. They needed bright youngsters who would work cheap. Janet Gaynor swung on a chandelier from the stage of Loew's State in Los Angeles; Myrna Loy's rice-powdered legs pranced in many a chorus; Bing Crosby, shaking with stage fright, croaked Mississippi Mud."

Fanchon & Marco developed many specialty acts including "The Fanchonettes," a chorus line of dancers similar to Radio City Music Hall's famous Rockettes.


Five separate groups of Fanchon & Marco girls, known also as the "Sunkist Beauties," would rotate among theaters up and down the west coast. Other performers that received paychecks from Fanchon & Marco and would achieve stardom included Cyd Charisse (at age 12), Joan Crawford and Judy Garland (as a Gumm Sister).

Another pioneer in mixing stage shows with movies was showman Samuel L. "Roxy" Rothafel, who founded New York City's 6000 seat Roxy Theater in 1927, and was the impresario for many of New York's premiere movie palaces such as the Strand, Rialto, Rivoli and Capitol. Roxy's stage shows were each built around a specific theme and employed a resident company of singers, dancers and musicians - just like in Footlight Parade.

Radio City Music Hall has long been a New York City landmark and considered the greatest Art Deco theater ever built. It opened its doors in December of 1932, the brainchild of John D. Rockefeller, RCA, and Roxy Rothafel. It was originally intended for live stage shows only, featuring a chorus line of dancing beauties billed as "The Roxyettes." But after the opening night show went on for over four hours, the theater was briefly closed, and the policy was promptly revamped to showcase a first-run movie accompanied by a one-hour stage show. Two weeks after the controversial opening, and with the revised format, Radio City Music Hall premiered its first film, The Bitter Tea of General Yen. But first, the Roxyettes shared the stage with 17 diverse stage acts, including the Flying Wallendas, Ray Bolger and Martha Graham.


According to Time Magazine, "The Rockettes came into being in 1925 when a hoofer named Russell Markert rounded up 16 girls to dance at the Skouras Brothers' Missouri Theatre in St. Louis. He called them the Missouri Rockets. When Broadway clamored for the troupe, Markert changed their name to the American Rockets and took them East. They danced in Publix theatres, in the Greenwich Village Follies. The late Producer Samuel ('Roxy") Rothafel signed them up for his Roxy Theatre as the Roxyettes. When Roxy went to the Rockefeller Center Music Hall in 1932, the Roxyettes went with him. When he left two years later, they became the Rockettes and stayed on at Rockefeller "

RKO Radio Pictures, owned by RCA, produced and distributed popular motion pictures routinely showcased at New York's Radio City Music Hall and Roxy Theater. In 1933, RKO's Van Beuren animation studio launched a new cartoon star called Cubby Bear. The first cartoon in the series, Opening Night (1933), served to commemorate the opening of Radio City Music Hall, while simultaneously paying homage to the Roxy Theater.

The cartoon features Cubby Bear attempting to sneak into the grand opening of the Roxy. Cubby gets lost in the cavernous theater, then entangled in trap doors only to end up conducting the theater orchestra on stage. The cigar-smoking mogul in the Roxy control room is an obvious salute to impresario "Roxy" Rothafel.

While the increased income from the movie prologues greatly helped movie theaters survive the Great Depression, the prologues did nothing for the financial bottom lines at the major studios. Accordingly, the studios reacted in several ways. One was to change the film licensing formula to a percentage of the ticket sales, and another was to dramatically expand the creation of theatrical short subjects - a staple of the smaller movie houses - in order to replace the costly live stage shows.

Soon, only the grandest and most successful of movie palaces could afford to continue the prologues, with the exception of some theaters like New York's Roxy, which continued showcasing them into the early 1950s (the Roxy was demolished in 1960). Radio City Music Hall continued the tradition of mixing stage and movie presentations until 1979, when it changed its policy to primarily showcasing spectacular stage shows, especially its annual Christmas and Easter extravaganzas, featuring The Rockettes.

Here for your enjoyment, with thanks to Turner Classic Movies, is the trailer for Footlight Parade. In 1992, this remarkable cinematic achievement was selected by The Library of Congress for preservation accreditation in the National Film Registry. The film cost an estimated $703,000 to produce (in 1933 dollars), and helped propel the careers of two cinematic icons: Dorothy Lamour, in her first screen appearance (uncredited), and Ann Sothern, in an early uncredited role.

One can only wonder what the live stage prologue must have been like that preceded first-run screenings of Footlight Parade.