It seems indisputable that Lincoln Theodore Monroe Andrew Perry (1902-85) was and remains the most problematic performer in Hollywood history. As Stepin Fetchit, he played the ultimate caricature of the lazy, incoherent Black man, earning and losing a million dollars in the process. He was American cinema’s first Black star, before Sidney Poitier, before even Hattie McDaniel.
To many observers, both now and at the time, Fetchit was an embarrassment, an enabler of the worst kind of stereotyping by white filmmakers. To others, he can be seen as a talented and intelligent performer who was knowingly satirizing white attitudes. This was certainly Fetchit’s own understanding of what he was doing.
Fetchit’s achievements are undeniable. By the time he appeared in The Prodigal, he was the most popular Black actor in Hollywood and the first to receive featured billing. He was the first to obtain a long-term contract with a major studio. In six years, from 1929, he appeared in 26 pictures. His studio, Fox, publicized his extravagant lifestyle, his expensive suits and bevy of Chinese servants.
Donald Bogle represents Stepin Fetchit as a highly-gifted performer who consciously developed a character that would both delight and not threaten white audiences. Fully aware of the injustices his characters experienced, he creates them as beings so far removed from reality that they cannot be demeaned by their treatment: his characters were “inhabitants of detached, ironic, artistically controlled worlds”.
Ironist or not, Fetchit could not outrun the Civil Rights Movement and his work opportunities declined, though John Ford, a friend, gave him one last opportunity to shine in, fittingly, The Sun Shines Bright (1953). As the servant Jeff, Fetchit is the character who holds Judge Priest to his course and is the moral centre of the film.
Emma Dunn (1875-1966) was a British stage actor who travelled to the USA and worked extensively on Broadway. Her 1906 appearance in the first American production of Peer Gynt (1867), playing the protagonist’s mother despite being twenty years younger than the other actor, was typical of the way Dunn was frequently cast older than her actual age.
Dunn’s first screen appearance was in Muraice Tourneur’s Mother (1914), in which she recreated, silently, a role she had originated on Broadway. She made only a couple more silent pictures, but found plenty of work after the introduction of sound.
Dunn continued to play many mothers, including Jean Arthur’s in The Talk of the Town (1942) and Dr Kildare’s multiple times in the MGM series. She also played Mrs Jaeckel in Chaplin’s The Great Dictator (1941).
Emma Dunn was mother to the uxorious Lawrence Tibbett in The Prodigal, and ten years later played Mickey Rooney’s mom in Babes on Broadway.
Her final role was as Alexis Smith’s old nurse in The Woman in White (1948).
ZaSu Pitts called her a ferret. Katharine Hepburn kicked her in the backside, while Joseph Cotton pulled away a chair as she was sitting down. Joan Bennett sent her a skunk on Valentine’s Day. Elda Furry (1885-1966) was not the most popular person in Hollywood.
And understandably so. As one of the town’s two demon gossip columnists (with Louella Parsons), Hopper became far too influential than might be hoped for a right-wing racist, and she helped to destroy many people’s lives and careers, not least as a cheerleader for the blacklist during the HUAC years.
Prior to her career in yellow journalism, Hopper had been an actor, initially on the stage and in Hollywood from 1923. She made around 120 appearances, none of them memorable, and amongst which were parts in two MGM musicals: The Prodigal and Flying High. A few years later, her career in the doldrums, Hopper took up the poison pen. Subsequent acting roles were generally offered to keep her on side, and most of later appearances were playing herself (something she did less effectively than Helen Mirren in Trumbo [2015]).
Purnell Busch Pratt (1885-1951) had a strong bass singing voice and ambitions to perform in opera. This didn’t work out for him, which must have given him mixed feelings when he appeared alongside Lawrence Tibbett in The Prodigal.
Pratt did, however, appear on the Broadway stage, including as a regular member of George M Cohan’s troupe. He made a couple of films for New York companies before his career was interrupted by the First World War, but began his run of well over a hundred appearances in 1925. He was always a supporting player, normally in a credited role. He was the focus of the interpolated scene in Scarface (1932), in which, as a newspaper publisher, he makes a censor-required speech condemning gangsterism. He also played Captain Wood in DeMille’s The Plainsman (1936).
In addition to his featured role as the loathsome Rodman in The Prodigal, Pratt was uncredited in two other Metro musicals: A Night at the Opera, as the mayor welcoming the ‘aviators’, and Rosalie.
Esther Louise Worth (1902-94) was the youngest child in a family vaudeville act before starting her film career while a teenager. She was only 22 when she played Mrs Darling in the Betty Bronson version of Peter Pan (1924).
Ralston starred in dozens of films during the 1920s and made a successful transition to sound. But her career faltered, and in her autobiography, published in 1985, she asserted this was the work of Louis B Mayer, whose advances she had resisted. In a familiar story, he ensured she was greylisted at the major studios.
Ralston’s final leading role was in Henry Hathaway’s To the Last Man (1933), though she continued acting, mostly on the stage and in television, until the 1960s.
Ralston was very good as the female lead, opposite Lawrence Tibbett, in MGM’s The Prodigal.
The 1930 version of New Moon is unmistakably a pre-code picture, the two lovers having sex within the first fifteen minutes but remaining unmarried until almost the end. Even more strikingly, the sexual relationship is engineered, not by the philandering Lawrence Tibbett, but by Grace Moore, knowingly having fun with no intention of taking it seriously.
Tanya (Grace Moore) reveals to Michael (Lawrence Tibbett) that she knows a dirty song when she hears one
Moore was, by her own admission, no great shakes as an actor (she described herself as “like a singing Mae West with long hair”), but she is much more effective here than in A Lady’s Morals, where the virginal Jenny Lind gave her little scope to do anything but sing. Her Princess Tanya is bold, promiscuous and, at least in the first half, a cold-hearted opportunist, conspiring with her uncle and aunt to marry wealth. Moore’s performance is playful; notice the subtle reaction when Adolphe Menjou’s wandering hand finds her outstanding derrière.
Tanya reacts as Boris (Adolphe Menjou) cops a feel
Lawrence Tibbett gives a solid performance, the highlight being his fully-integrated rendition of the beautiful ‘Lover Come Back to Me’. He is also suitably vituperative when singing ‘What is Your Price Madam?’, a number by Stothart and Grey which holds its own with the songs retained from the original Romberg-Hammerstein score.
New Moon benefits from having two outstanding supporting players in Roland Young and Adolphe Menjou. Young, as the easygoing uncle, seems much more comfortable here than in the frenzy of Madam Satan and steals all his scenes. Menjou, as always, personifies debonair sophistication as ‘Bedroom Boris’. Gus Shy, the only member of the original stage cast to feature in the film version, was always an acquired taste, but he does, at least, get to die a noble death.
Tanya has driven an unfeasibly long distance, into dangerous country, for the pleasure of horse-whipping Michael
Jack Conway’s direction is above-average for Metro’s earliest musicals, especially in the first, boudoir comedy section. The second half, set in the fortress, is less interesting, though it features some excellent photography by Oliver T Marsh and impressive process shots. There is also a well-staged battle sequence that is quite unexpected in a musical. Apparently the effort of wrangling two Metropolitan Opera stars wore out Conway and Sam Wood completed the picture, which may explain some dropping off in the quality of the staging.
Nonetheless, while New Moon creaks like the ship the characters sail on, it remains eminently watchable.
Jeff Farraday is a hobo, riding trains with his friends Doc and Snipe. He often tells them that his family owns a great mansion in the South, but they do not believe him.
Snipe (Cliff Edwards) and Doc (Roland Young) listen to Jeff (Lawrence Tibbett) talk about his home
Some time later, Jeff returns home and is given a lift on a wagon by Hokey. As Jeff walks the final stretch, his mother Cynthia is inside the house, with her son Rodman, her daughter Christine, Christine’s husband George, and Carter Jerome, a friend of Rodman’s. Antonia, Rodman’s wife, is keeping them all waiting while she dresses.
Carter sneaks upstairs to Antonia, and jokes that he is safe from discovery because Rodman never enters Antonia’s bedroom. Carter asks her to go away with him because she is unhappy with Rodman. She refuses, even when Carter tells her he loves her.
Christine sends Rodman upstairs to hurry Antonia. He does not see Carter, who is on the balcony. Rodman criticizes Antonia’s dress and presumes she has bought it for some other man. Antonia insists she has had no lovers since she married him. She asks him to divorce her so she can go away, but Rodman refuses. When she tells him how unhappy she is, he slaps her face. Rodman leaves, and Antonia tells Carter she will go away with him tomorrow night.
Jeff is reunited with his mother, Cynthia Farraday (Emma Dunn)
Cynthia does not go out with the younger people, and is reunited with Jeff after five years. She forces him to take a bath and burns his dirty clothes, giving him some of Rodman’s. Jeff tells Cynthia he plans to leave before the family returns, but she tempts him with fried chicken. They talk in vague terms about why Jeff had to flee the town; it had something to do with Rodman. Finally, Jeff falls asleep.
At breakfast the next morning, the family discusses Jeff’s return. Christine says he is irresponsible, but Cynthia insists he can stay for as long as he wishes.
Jeff plays with Christine’s children and they break his bed. While the family goes to church, Jeff is reunited with the servants and meets Hokey again. Antonia has been riding all morning and meets Jeff when she returns. They have a late breakfast and get along well. But when Jeff asks how she came to marry a stuffed short like Rodman, Antonia leaves to join the family at church.
Jeff finds Doc and Snipe hiding from the dog, and invites them into the house. After an enormous breakfast, while Jeff goes to fetch drinks, Doc relieves Snipe of the silverware he has pocketed.
Antonia returns and finds them singing round the piano [Without a Song]. Rodman, Christine and George return.
Jeff arranges to jump a train with Doc and Snipe that evening. Jeff and Rodman are soon quarrelling. Jeff assures his brother that he will be leaving soon. Cynthia interrupts their argument and expresses her pleasure at having all her children together [Home Sweet Home].
That evening, Jeff is about to board a freight train with his friends when he sees Antonia getting onto a passenger train with Carter. Antonia confesses to Carter that she does not love him, but she has to get away. Jeff, having realised what is happening, lures Carter away, then takes Antonia off the train. He takes her back to the house and explains why he had to stop her from ruining her life.
Back at the house, Antonia tells Rodman she has been with Jeff and he forbids her from having anything to do with his brother. Later, while Antonia rides with the local hunt, Jeff, Doc, Snipe and Hokey are fishing on the river. They see the fox and hide it from the hunt. Antonia sees what they have done and joins them.
Antonia (Esther Ralston) looks on as Jeff quarrels with his brother Rodman (Purnell Pratt)
Carter finds Jeff and Antonia together and warns Jeff to keep out of other people’s business. Carter accuses Jeff of being Antonia’s lover and Jeff knocks him down. Rodman rides up and Jeff takes the blame for the altercation, apologizing to Carter. Before they leave, Carter goads Jeff again with the fact that he loves his brother’s wife. Jeff tells Doc and Snipe that they are leaving soon.
At the Hunt Ball that evening, Cynthia asks Jeff why he is so restless. Jeff tells her he promised to look in at a party being held by Naomie, one of the servants. Rodman accuses Antonia of snubbing Carter because she hates his friends. When Antonia denies that Jeff was responsible for the afternoon’s fight, Rodman leaves to fetch Carter.
At Naomi’s party, the food is being prepared [Chitlins]. Jeff and his friends arrive and Hokey gets involved in a fight. A woman goes into labour and Doc is required to help with the delivery. [By the Riverside (?)]. The baby is born [A Child is Born].
Antonia arrives. Jeff walks her back to the house and tells her he is leaving. They kiss and Antonia tells Jeff that he loves her and asks him to take her with him. But Jeff explains that, whatever his feelings about Rodman, he cannot take his brother’s wife. Back at the house, Rodman confronts them and accuses Jeff of running true to form. Jeff admits that he loves Antonia and would be happy to work to support her, but that he has to leave. Cynthia interrupts and tells them that Jeff going away will not fix anything. She tells Rodman, against his protests, that he must divorce Antonia because she does not love him. She tells Jeff to get wandering out of his system and to come back after the divorce. Jeff leaves with Doc and Snipe [Without a Song].
