Anita Garvin
Also Known As: Nita Garvin , Anna Frances "Anita" Garvin, Anna Frances Garvin
Biography: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Anita Garvin (February 11, 1907 – July 7, 1994) was an American actress and comedian who appeared in both silent and sound films. She is best known for her work with comedians Laurel and Hardy and Charley Chase. Garvin was born in New York City.] Her two sisters who danced in vaudeville encouraged her talents. At age 12, she lied to an agent saying she was "almost sixteen" and got a job being a bathing beauty for one of Mack Sennett's stage shows. The following year she joined the Ziegfeld Follies. She took pride in being the only woman allowed to touch Will Rogers's ropes. She also appeared in Earl Carroll Vanities. Garvin went on tour with the musical Sally staying with the show for two seasons, then decided to stay in California when the tour left that stop in 1924. In Hollywood, Garvin began working for Christie Film Company's comedies. She recalled her co-star Bobby Vernon dropping butter on the floor onto which she stepped and tumbled, cementing her career as a comedian. Charles Lamont brought her over to work for Educational Pictures. In 1926, Hal Roach took her under contract, where she appeared in many silent films with Charley Chase, James Finlayson, and Max Davidson as well as playing occasional supporting roles in feature films. Standing around 6 feet tall, "her regal countenance and deadpan expression" made her the perfect comic foil. Roach later considered her "one of his finest actresses." Reflecting upon her frequent co-star Stan Laurel, Garvin observed: "One thing about Stan--with apologies to a lot of directors--they thought they were directing him. And they thought they were directing the picture. But Stan was the one...He was very clever about it. The director was never cognizant of the fact that he was not doing all the directing. Stan's mind was going all the time, always thinking of gags and things to do. The script didn't mean a thing." Garvin appeared in a total of eleven Laurel and Hardy films. In 1928, she was teamed with Marion Byron as a short-lived female version of Laurel and Hardy. Along with Edgar Kennedy, Byron and Garvin appeared in A Pair of Tights, an "acknowledged masterpiece."
Department: Acting
Place of Birth: New York City, New York, USA
Adult: No
Birthday: February 11, 1906
Age: 119 years old
Gender: Female
Deathday: July 07, 1994
Popularity:
Known For:
Raggedy Rose
Overview: Rose, who works for a penny-pinching junk dealer, dreams of romance with wealthy bachelor Ted Tudor.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1926-11-06
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Move Along
Overview: Dreamy little comedy as down-on-his-luck Ham looks for work, gets thrown out of his rooming house and tries to make it on the street -- in the best, gag-filled 20s comedy style.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1926-07-24
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Many Scrappy Returns
Overview: Charley and his wife (Eugenia Gilbert) decide to teach a lesson to his brother (Eugene Pallette) who constantly battles with his wife (Anita Garvin). Through a misunderstanding, it isn’t long before the Chase’s knife-wielding barbarian of a cook (Bull Montana) thinks Charley has designs on his wife (Valentina Zimina).
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-01-09
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Forgotten Sweeties
Overview: Thurston's former sweetheart has married a big brute, and they move in down the hall from him.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-04-10
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Never the Dames Shall Meet
Overview: Chase makes tries to escape from a compromising situation with a dame he took to be his wife's sister.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-12-24
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Imagine My Embarrassment
Overview: Imagine My Embarrassment is a silent comedy short
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1928-09-01
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Off to Buffalo
Overview: Off to Buffalo is a comedy short
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-02-16
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Stepping Out
Overview: Charley goes out for an evening on the town without his wife.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-11-02
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Be Big!
Overview: Stan and Ollie are on their way to Atlantic City with their wives, when Ollie gets a phone call from a lodge buddy telling him that a stag party is taking place that night in their honor. Ollie pretends to be sick and sends the wives on ahead, promising that he and Stan will meet them in the morning. The pair dress in their lodge gear, but their wives return having missed their train. With no obvious escape route, Stan and Ollie take to a bed in fear and in response to Stan's plea of "What'll I do?", Ollie replies "Be big!".
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-02-07
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Their Purple Moment
Overview: The boys sneak out for a night on the town, unaware that Stan's wife has switched her grocery coupons for Stan's secret stash of mad money. The boys run up a huge tab treating a couple of girls to dinner at a snazzy nightclub and much trouble ensues.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1928-05-19
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Blotto
Overview: Stan fakes receiving a telegram so he can go to a club with Ollie and a bottle of his unsuspecting wife's liquor, but she overhears his plans.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-02-08
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Sailors, Beware!
Overview: A con artist and a midget dressed as her infant son, are unmasked aboard a ship by a steward.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-09-25
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Why Girls Love Sailors
Overview: Stan is a sailor whose girl gets kidnapped by a rough sea captain. Stan dresses in drag and seduces the captain but the captain's wife catches him. Stan and his girl beat a hasty retreat as the captain's wife fires off a parting shot.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-07-17
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With Love and Hisses
Overview: Dimwitted Cuthbert Hope is enlisted in the army, and gets himself and his sergeant in constant trouble.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-08-28
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Bertha the Sewing Machine Girl
Overview: Bertha Sloan loses her job as a sewing-machine girl and subsequently is employed as telephone girl with a lingerie manufacturing company. She soon falls in love with the assistant shipping clerk, Roy Davis, and is promoted to chief model for the firm, owing to the patronage of Morton, the wealthy and wicked manager. Bertha is about to take a position in Paris as designer when Morton lures her to his home.
Genres: Adventure Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1926-12-19
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Whispering Whoopee
Overview: Charlie hires three "party girls" to help him land a business deal.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-03-08
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Baby Brother
Overview: Joe Cobb is a wealthy child who longs for a baby brother. His nursemaid takes him to the other side where he meets some kids his age (the rest of Our Gang) where Joe offers three dollars for a baby. Farina finds a fellow African-American neighbor woman who lets him mind her infant which he then paints white and sells to Joe. The rest of the gang has set an assembly-line system that washes, dries, rocks, and feeds male and female babies.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-06-26
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The Sleuth
Overview: Stan is a detective who essentially relies on different costumes to successfully complete his investigations
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1925-06-30
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Fandango
Overview: Fandango, a short Lane made for Educational Pictures in 1928. It's pleasant enough, and amusing at times, as long as you don't require a plot or expect dimensional characters. If you want basic silent comedy chuckles, you'll get them. Our setting is Bullonia, "the land of romance, castanets, onions and sweet zephyrs of garlic." Actually, it looks rather like a back-lot version of Spain or Latin America. More to the point, the atmosphere suggests the Doug Fairbanks vehicle The Gaucho, which was in general release when this short was made.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1928-05-05
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Sleepless Hollow
Overview: Newlywed Harry Gribbon brings his wife home to meet his country family which includes their perspective choice for a daughter-in-law.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1936-05-08
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Show Business
Overview: The girls and their pet monkey create havoc on board a train carrying a traveling Broadway troupe.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-08-20
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Asleep in the Feet
Overview: The girls moonlight as taxi dancers in order to earn some extra money.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1933-01-21
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Going Ga-Ga
Overview: Anita and Marion realize that an abandoned baby they sneaked into an orphanage was kidnapped from a millionaire. For the reward, they proceed to break into the institution at night, dressed as men to beat curfew, to get the kid out again. This film survives only in very fragmentary form.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-01-05
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A Pair of Tights
Overview: Two girls are invited by one of the girls boy-friend's tight boss for dinner. On the way they stop for a cheap ice-cream. But swinging doors, ventilators, cops and a brat make it nearly impossible to get the ice cream even close to the car where the rest are waiting.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-02-03
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In the Grease
Overview: "IN THE GREASE" (1925) stars James Finlayson who must raise his kid by himself and also take over the unruly class room at the local schoolhouse.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1925-06-20
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Trent's Last Case
Overview: Who killed the vicious millionaire Sigsbee Manderson? Not that pretty wife of his, surely? Philip Trent investigates.
Genres: Crime Mystery
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-03-31
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The Single Standard
Overview: A bored socialite finds fleeting romance with an artist.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-07-27
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Movie Night
Overview: A family goes on its weekly outing to the movies. Complications ensue...
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-05-11
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Roaming Romeo
Overview: Belle-Hure and Horatio Babaorum escape from a Roman galley only to land in a Roman palace where they indulge in their antique antics!
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1928-07-29
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Our Modern Maidens
Overview: Young, vivacious Billie uses her charms on influential businessman Glenn Abbott in hopes of getting her secret fiancé Gil a diplomatic appointment. Meanwhile, Gil's affections meander to beautiful ingenue Kentucky, Billie's best friend.
Genres: Drama Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-09-08
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Murder at Midnight
Overview: Wealthy Mr. Kennedy shoots his secretary, Channing, during a parlor game, but it turns out the gun was loaded with real bullets. Luckily, criminologist Phillip Montrose is on hand to help the police. When Kennedy quickly ends up dead as well, the police think it's a tidy murder-suicide, but the family lawyer knows of a letter that voiced Kennedy's suspicions about someone who was out to get him. Soon, the cops are on the trail of a ruthless and clever killer who is one step ahead of even Montrose.
Genres: Mystery
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-09-01
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Swiss Miss
Overview: Stan and Ollie are mousetrap salesmen hoping for better business in Switzerland, with Stan's theory that because there is more cheese in Switzerland, there should be more mice.
Genres: Comedy Music
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1938-05-20
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Bright Lights
Overview: A city chap, who as the result of a ducking, is forced to wear "rube" clothes. He meets a cabaret dancer who thinks to have fun by kidding him and keeping up the bluff he goes to the cabaret in this make-up. His action finally necessitates calling the police and in making a getaway he dons a ballet girl's costume.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1924-09-14
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Book Bozo
Overview: Jimmy Aubrey plays a book agent and on his rounds of selling is induced to substitute for a local fistic star. His adventures in the prize ring furnish a great deal of comedy.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1925-08-15
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A Dangerous Peach
Overview: Al is the assistant shipping clerk. He plants himself on top of a mass of crates and fishes valises up with a line attached to a rod and reel. He accidentally catches his boss and the latter runs him ragged before he escapes. Al discovers a crate marked for a Mrs. Wilson - a police dog from Germany. He opens the crate. The hound runs free. Al pursues.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1925-02-18
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The Last Man on Earth
Overview: An epidemic has killed off all of the fertile men on earth, except for Elmer Smith, a hillbilly who lives out in a cabin in the Ozarks, when he is discovered, every woman on the planet begins fighting over him.
Genres: Science Fiction Comedy Fantasy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1924-11-02
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Topper
Overview: Madcap couple George and Marion Kerby are killed in an automobile accident. They return as ghosts to try and liven up the regimented lifestyle of their friend and bank president, Cosmo Topper. When Topper starts to live it up, it strains relations with his stuffy wife.
Genres: Comedy Fantasy Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-07-16
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Sally
Overview: Sally is an orphan who was named by the telephone exchange where she was abandoned as a baby. In the orphanage, she discovered the joy of dancing. Working as a waitress, she serves Blair (Alexander Gray), and they both fall for each other, but Blair is engaged to socialite Marcia. Sally is hired to impersonate a famous Russian dancer named Noskerova, but at that engagement, she is found to be a phoney. Undaunted, she proceeds with her life and has a show on Broadway, but she still thinks of Blair.
Genres: Music
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-01-12
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On With the Show!
Overview: With unpaid actors and staff, the stage show Phantom Sweetheart seems doomed. To complicate matters, the box office takings have been robbed and the leading lady refuses to appear. Can the show be saved?
Genres: Romance Music
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-07-13
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Upstream
Overview: A silent comedy set in an actor's boardinghouse. Some plot points are seemingly inspired by the Barrymore dynasty.
Genres: Comedy Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-01-30
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A Chump at Oxford
Overview: The boys get jobs as a butler and maid-- Stan in drag-- for a dinner party. When that ends in disaster, they resort to sweeping streets and accidentally capture a bank robber. The grateful bank president sends them to Oxford, at their request, and higher-education hijinks ensue.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-01-25
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The Skulls
Overview: This Spanish language film was produced simultaneously with the filming of the two English language Laurel and Hardy shorts Be Big! and Laughing Gravy. The two shorts were edited together into one continuous film. Laurel and Hardy read their lines from cue cards on which Spanish was written phonetically. At the time of early talkies, dubbing was not yet perfected.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: es
Release Date: 1931-04-18
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The Chiselers
Overview: Having been kicked out by their wives on a wintry night they attempt to smuggle their little dog into an apartment house where dogs are not allowed.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: fr
Release Date: 1931-02-07
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Two-Time Mama
Overview: The story involves various misunderstandings and entanglements that occur between two married couples, the Browns (Glenn Tryon & Vivien Oakland) and the Dazzles (Tyler Brooke & Anita Garvin). The two couples have apartments across the hall from one another, and all four plan to attend a costume ball together. But after each husband expresses unhappiness with his wife's costume the women angrily refuse to go to the party. The two husbands decide to go "stag" and pick up dates, but when Mrs. Brown changes her mind about attending, and Mr. Dazzle and Mr. Brown switch costumes, mix-ups result.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-01-29
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Feed 'em and Weep
Overview: Anita and Marion take a temporary job as waitresses in Max's diner, next to a train station. When the train stops off, pandemonium erupts when the passengers fill the diner and all want meals immediately. This film only survived in parts.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1928-12-08
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Merry Wives of Reno
Overview: Three couples raise a ruckus when they travel to Nevada for quickie divorces.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1934-04-18
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From Soup to Nuts
Overview: Inexperienced waiters (Laurel & Hardy) are hired for a swank dinner party.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1928-03-24
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The Battle of the Century
Overview: Fight manager takes out an insurance policy on his puny pugilist and then proceeds to try to arrange for an accident so that he can collect.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-12-31
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While the Cat's Away
Overview: Henry and Johnnie need to clean the apartment before the wives get home.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1936-01-04
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Yoo-Hoo
Overview: James Gleason picks up abused kid and tries to clean him up.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-10-04
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The Play Girl
Overview: When Madge, a clerk in a flower shop, is sent to a bachelor's apartment to deliver and arrange a bouquet, she discovers a guest, young and handsome Bradley Lane, taking a bath. She loses her job and becomes a playgirl until Bradley, her true love, asks her to marry him.
Genres: Romance Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1928-04-22
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The Motor Boat Demon
Overview: There is a boat race going on.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-01-02
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Creeps
Overview: Phil and Lou inherit property left by an eccentric uncle with the provision they occupy the house for thirty days. But their cousin, Anita, wants the property for herself and, with several hired-henchmen, sends "ghost" after "ghoul" through the house after the boys arrive.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1926-05-30
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Hats Off
Overview: Stan and Ollie are salesmen attempting to sell a washing machine; they fail constantly after several near misses. One would-be sale has them carrying the machine up a large flight of steps, only to find out that a young lady wants them to post a letter for her. The boys later get into an argument knocking off each other's hats, which eventually involves scores of others. A police van eventually carts all those involved away except Stan and Ollie, who afterwards try to find their own headgear amongst the hundreds of others lying on the street.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: de
Release Date: 1927-11-05
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The Charlatan
Overview: A woman goes to a sideshow fortune-teller to have her fortune told, and is astonished when the man looks into his crystal ball and goes into great detail about events in her past that few people ever knew about. Shaken, she leaves and later tells her girlfriend about the incident. The girlfriend insists that she invite the fortune-teller to a party they're having at her house. What the woman doesn't realize is that the "fortune-teller" is actually the ex-husband she abandoned years ago, when she took their daughter and ran off with her lover. When the "charlatan" is invited to the party, he sees an opportunity to take his revenge on his faithless ex-wife.
Genres: Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-04-13
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Dynamite
Overview: Wealthy Cynthia is in love with not-so-wealthy Roger, who is married to Marcia. The threesome is terribly modern about the situation, and Marcia will gladly divorce Roger if Cynthia agrees to a financial settlement. But Cynthia's wealth is in jeopardy because her trust fund will expire if she is not married by a certain date. To satisfy that condition, Cynthia arranges to marry Hagon Derk, who is condemned to die for a crime he didn't commit. She pays him so he can provide for his little sister. But at the last minute, Derk is freed when the true criminal is discovered. Expecting to be a rich widow, Cynthia finds herself married to a man she doesn't know and doesn't want to.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-12-13
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Sunk by the Census
Overview: Edgar is a census taker, but is primarily interested in finding a rich widow for his father-in-law (Billy Franey), so he won't have to continue to support him. All Pop wants to make him happy is a cow. When Edgar comes home with both a cow and a phony rich widow, the results are not what Edgar planned for.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-08-06
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Red Hot Rhythm
Overview: Walter, a songwriter who is in love with Mary, a nightclub singer, prefers to make a living by fleecing crackpot songwriters and promoting their creations. When Walter writes "At Last I'm in Love" for Mary, she promises to plug the song at the Frivolity Club, but he leaves in a huff when she flirts with Sam, a legitimate song publisher. On the street, he gives refuge to Claire, a girl accused of a theft, and hires her as his secretary. Mrs. Fioretta gives Walter a large sum to publish her song, "The Night Elmer Died," but Sam induces Mary to get Walter to stop the deal. When Walter discovers that Claire is having an affair with Sam, he returns to Mary at the club. A lost film.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-11-23
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Bested by a Beard
Overview: Leon Errol disguises himself as a mystic, in order to fool repo men.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-07-16
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Assistant Wives
Overview: Slapstick film about two married couples.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-12-04
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Fair But Foolish
Overview: The comedy occurs on shipboard where Jimmie is the object of attention for a pair of pickpockets who plan to use him to smuggle their ill-gotten off the ship. Arrested at customs, he manages to escape but gets caught again as he tries to rejoin his girl whose father is trying to remove her from his influence.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1925-11-29
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For Sadie's Sake
Overview: Chaos behind the scenes at a show.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1926-01-24
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His Silent Racket
Overview: James Finlayson manages to con Charley into becoming his partner in a failing dry cleaning shop that has been targeted by gangsters running a protection racket.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1933-04-29
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Modern Love
Overview: In order to keep her job, a young dress designer must keep her recent marriage a secret from her boss. An important client arrives from Paris and her boss decides to hold a dinner party for the man at the girl's house. When her husband finds out that the client wants to take her back to Paris so she can "study," he comes up with a plan to stop it, and it begins with his being the "server" at the dinner party.
Genres: Comedy Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-07-21
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My Swedie
Overview: Jack's honeymoon is interrupted by a letter from a former sweetheart threatening the exposure of a number of ardent love letters unless he remits $5,000. The letter falls into the hands of his wife and they contrive separately to recover the damaging missives. Each disguises as a Swedish servant girl and both are employed by the holder of the letters. They recover the letters after ransacking the house, and make their getaway after a number of exciting and humorous incidents.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1925-12-13
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Fighting Fathers
Overview: One of many LOST MGM silent films.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1927-12-10
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He Asked for It
Overview: Errol breaks the law once too often and comes up against a no nonsense judge.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-09-27
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Truth Aches
Overview: Errol loses his job because he cannot tell a lie, and when he gets involved with kidnappers, nobody will believe he is telling the truth.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1939-11-03
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Home Boner
Overview: Errol, a real estate salesman, returns from his honeymoon and moves into a model home, where he is constantly bothered by prospective buyers.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1939-03-10
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The Millionaire Cat
Overview: Comedy starring Bobby Clark.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-10-21
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