Rambling 'Round Radio Row #6

I recently got a hold of the multi-disk set "Warner Brothers Big Band, Jazz & Swing Short Subject Collection". It's made up of over 11 hours of Vitaphone musical shorts. Disk 1 is a bit different in style, as it consists mostly of the "Ramblin' Round Radio Row" shorts. These mostly star Jerry Wald. Wald apparently was famous for a newspaper column on radio programs and this was parlayed into him getting the chance to produce these shorts.

This film, like the rest in the series, come off like a variety show with slightly better production values. You get a chance to see the actor Buddy Rogers (who would soon become Mary Pickford's husband and was the star of the Oscar-winning film "Wings") and an enjoyable group called the Three Keys--three black-Americans who are all but forgotten today but who managed to be included in a production geared for white audiences (that was a bit of an achievement in 1933). Also, in a first for the series, there was a guy who sang song for and with kids. All in all, a lot better than the previous short in the series (that was dreadfully uninteresting) and worth a look today.

Whether you like the kind of entertainment that these Vitagraph shorts have to offer you have to admit that they do preserve the acts of a lot of people who would be forgotten today. Jerry Wald later to be one of the big producers in Hollywood in the 50s serves as a bartender for these lounge acts.

I think the only name you might know is that of Buddy Rogers who maybe most famous as Mary Pickford's last husband. His career ran out of gas in the early 30s , but he probably is most famous for being one of the stars of Wings and one of his wife's classics My Best Girl.

The Three Keys I swore were the Mills Brothers and they seem to be a copycat act. Harriet Lee&her Boyfriends and Lew Conrad and orchestra are pretty obscure. Uncle Don Carney was the host of a popular children's radio program whose career went right in the toilet when he said something nasty on a live mike.

But these people and their acts are preserved for history and that's what's important with this Vitagraph short.

Rambling 'Round Radio Row #5 (1933)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Fifth entry in the series has Jerry Wald aboard a train with a group of people around him. He shows them how to properly mix a drink and then we jump to the music and comedy acts. Included here as The Three Keys doing "Them There Eyes", Harriet Lee and Her Boyfriend doing "A Great Big Bunch of You" and the highlight being Harry Rose, The Broadway Gesture, doing "I'm Just Wild About Harry". This entry in the series actually contains some of the best music we've heard so far. The highlight is certainly The Broadway Gesture who easily steals the film with his blend of rock and jazz. The comedy bits really aren't funny and the entire opening intro could have been replaced with a different music act but fans of these old shorts will want to check this one out.

Harry Rose -- who? -- introduces various acts to the audience. Rose, who calls himself the Broadway Jester, and no one says him nay, seems more interested in making and drinking cocktails than in the acts, although he does insist on telling jokes with too big a smile.

Short subjects like these were intended to bring the experience of a movie palace to the neighborhood theater. The big houses usually had a live show to accompany the movies. This one, despite the decency of the singers, and the interest in seeing Buddy Rogers making a movie appearance after his movie career had essentially ended, but he was doing well as a band leader.