The Big Benefit

Never mind the fictitious ramblings of the original poster, who obviously never saw this short. There are no nightclub cutaways, no overhead angle etc. I just saw this short at MoMA, NYC, where this and other Universal shorts haven't been seen in 80 years (part of a current series). The short itself is a charming blend of genuinely talented youngsters imitating their adult counterparts.

The grafting mayor of the town has starting charging money for the public swimming pool, so about eighty kids get together to throw on an imitation of the benefit show they saw last week to raise money to buy tools and dig their own pool on a vacant lot.

I don't like the trope of kids putting on a show.It was common, particularly for short subjects, but early exposure to Carl Switzer's singing in OUR GANG shorts turned me off early; the point of such movies is how bad the kids are at performing, which strikes me as ill-natured and pointless.

Some of the kids are actually pretty good in their efforts, but then the movie-makers substitute the performers they are imitating... and they are great. So we get to see halves of great vaudeville acts and wish we had the wholes.

Take a look at that cast list: unless you're a vaudeville historian, the only one you might recognize is Bill Robinson, the great Black tap dancer. His all-too-brief appearance here shows his enormous charisma, and is misshot for his dancing. Other acts are shot better, and they are very enjoyable. However, they should have forgotten the framing device and just offered us the real acts.

I've only seen one clip from this movie, but fortunately that clip is most likely the single most interesting part of the entire film: Bill Robinson's turn. Apparently the entire movie is a filmed record of a New York theatrical benefit, which explains why Robinson's act (and presumably the other acts as well) is weakened by frequent cutaways to a nightclub audience.

I pride myself on my knowledge of obscure American vaudeville acts (and even more obscure British variety acts), but some of the turns on this bill are so obscure that even I've never heard of them. I was relieved to verify that the 'Edith Evans' listed here is NOT Dame Edith Evans, the classical actress!

I've never understood why Bill Robinson was nicknamed 'Bojangles'. He performed in single-plate tap shoes that gave crisp tones, unlike some of his contemporaries (such as the dance teams Buck & Bubbles and Stump & Stumpy) who performed in double-plate tap shoes that DID create jangly syncopated effects. The song 'Mister Bojangles' was inspired by Robinson's career, but is definitely NOT about him; fortunately, he never ended up like the broken-down hoofer in that song.

Throughout his long career, Bill Robinson's most popular routine was his stair dance, in which he tap-danced up a flight of steps and down the other side. Robinson had no 'official' version of this dance, varying the steps, tempo and music at his whim. The footage here is crude, and this is hardly the best Bill Robinson performance I've ever seen (performers seldom do their best work at benefits!), but ANY footage of Bill Robinson -- especially if it shows him dancing -- is worthy of attention.

Here he performs to a slow version of 'Swanee River', dressed in his usual natty brown suit, matching bowler and shoes. Robinson's steps seem less inspired and more lacklustre than usual (again, this is a benefit performance), and he executes only one step here that struck me as novel: standing on the lowermost step of his plywood staircase, he balances on his left leg while extending his right leg as far up the steps as it will stretch ... then he pulls it back down, his foot striking each step in turn as if they were giant xylophone keys.

Except for those annoying cutaways to the audience, most of this routine is filmed in long shot, keeping Robinson in profile so that the stairs are parallel to the camera's axis. But there are a couple of shots filmed from above, looking down over Robinson's shoulder. This is a very unwieldy angle, but it does give us an excellent view of Robinson's feet ... so I watched eagerly. As he reaches the bottom of the stairs, he does a peculiar pivot on his left foot, which performs heel taps while his right leg seems to box the points of the compass. This is the sort of step I would associate with John Bubbles of Buck & Bubbles. John Bubbles once noted that he refused to teach any of his steps to rival dancers, but he challenged them to copy his steps by watching his performances. Bill Robinson's dance steps were surely copied far more often than he ever copied from anyone else, so I can overlook this one 'tribute' to another dancer.

I shan't rate this movie, since I've only seen one portion of it. I wish I knew who Pops & Louie were.