Ship Ahoy

Ship Ahoy (1929)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Pat West is the star of this 9-minute Vitaphone short that features the performer re-creating his vaudeville act. Whenever one goes into these shorts you never really know what you're going to get other than a recorded performance of a part of history that has mostly been forgotten. The acts are either going to be entertaining or they're going to be really bad but more often than not they're at least interesting to watch. I found West's act to be pretty good and this includes a rather nice version of "Dumb Dora" that has the performer singing it well but also acting out some funny bits. I also thought the comedy routine was better than what you typically see in these shorts. This includes a sequence where West is joking on his family including his drunk father as well as fat women. I guess these are some of the earliest fat jokes to ever be recorded for film. Again, there's nothing ground-breaking here but the film is entertaining in its own way and West manages to make you pay attention to him.

Pat West was a stage and screen actor with a lot of credits and ability. In this one he shows up, deals with a couple of stooges, then goes into his sailor-suited act in which he sings a couple of songs and tells a bunch of jokes about his family. You can see the talent here, but this film doesn't really work more than as a record of a good stage act -- which is worth a lot in and of itself.

The issue is that this act is staged, modulated and shot as if Mr. West is in a vaudeville house and that is a big venue with a different sort of intimacy than a movie screen. This act, which might easily have been shot straight had Mr. West pitched it differently, or if it had been shot with more background action -- an audience, say. But as it is, it just doesn't quite work.

Pat West was unusual in that although he was big in Vaudeville, he managed to later create quite a niche for himself playing supporting and bit players in Hollywood. And, despite dying at 55, he managed to accumulate 149 credits (according to IMDb)! He was ubiquitous in films and I think his ordinary everyman reason is why.

As for West's singing and joke-telling abilities go, I think he made the smart choice going into films as an actor. In other words, the singing was only okay and the jokes were enough to say 'don't quit your day job'! He's dressed as a sailor and sings and tells jokes on a set made to look like a ship. The results are not terrible but not all that good.