The Great American Broadcast (1941)

Director:

Archie Mayo

Writers:

Edwin Blum (writer)
Robert Ellis (writer)

Release Date:

9 MÁJUS 1941 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy

Plot:

After WWI two men go into radio. Failure leads the wife of one to borrow money from another; she goes on...

Cast

Alice Faye	...	Vicki Adams
Jack Oakie	...	Chuck Hadley
John Payne	...	Rix Martin
Cesar Romero	...	Bruce Chadwick
James Newill	...	Jimmy, a Singer
Charles Fuqua	...	Himself (as The Ink Spots)
Hoppy Jones	...	Himself (as The Ink Spots)
Bill Kenny	...	Himself (as The Ink Spots)
Deek Watson	...	Himself (as The Ink Spots)
Fayard Nicholas	...	Himself - dance team
Harold Nicholas	...	Himself - dance team
Harry Wiere	...	Wiere brother
Herbert Wiere	...	Wiere brother
Sylvester Wiere	...	Wiere brother
Mary Beth Hughes	...	Secretary

Runtime:

90 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Mirrophonic Recording)

Certification:

Finland:S | Sweden:Btl

Company:

Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation

Trivia:

Original 1919 Jess Willard-Jack Dempsey fight film footage used.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Take It or Leave It (1944)

Soundtrack:

The Great American Broadcast

Among the best of its type

Archie Mayo and the writers took a stock project (a show biz musical) and made it special. The plot line about the beginnings of radio doesn't get lost in the welter of specialty numbers nor does the love story intrude too much in the fun. We even get a sense of what it was like when radio was expanding from a hobbyist's pursuit to a a mass market entertainment industry. The cast is nearly top notch all around but the Wiere Brothers are a marvel, providing the best turn in the film despite competition from the Nicholas Brothers, the Ink Spots and the always professional and often underrated John Payne, Alice Faye and Jack Oakie. Payne was usually justified in sleepwalking through the roles Fox saddled him with, but in this outing he shows what he can do with a congenial plot, director and co-stars. The primary reason for watching this film is to see the Wiere Brothers at their antic best. They were a deft and whimsical European comedy trio--comedians, instrumentalists, dancers and jugglers--with a long lineage in Continental circus, ballet and opera, and their style may be baffling to tastes weened on hit-them-over-the-head roughhouse comedy. Nothing wrong with roughhouse, but the Wieres offer something gently different.