She's My Lilly, I'm Her Willie

American performers Will Mahoney and his wife Evie Hayes were very popular in Australia, where I was raised: they were slightly before my time, but I've met several old-time Aussies who spoke very fondly of seeing Mahoney or Hayes (or both) in live performances.

Will Mahoney had some success in vaudeville as an eccentric dancer. His speciality was his dazzlingly proficient nerve taps, done with his right foot only. I'm not aware of anyone who did better nerve taps than Mahoney until Ann Miller came along: she could do nerve taps with BOTH feet, and she contrasted these with her sex appeal. Mahoney, lacking sex appeal, had to integrate his nerve taps with comedy material similar to Ray Bolger's, in which he pretends to miss a step and loses his balance. But Ray Bolger would skilfully recover his balance and go on to the next part of his routine (a much more impressive recovery), whilst Mahoney (as seen in this film) would do a clumsy pratfall, losing the pace of his routine while he got up and started dancing again.

This is one of those mini-musicals with a vague attempt at a plot. In 1934, the vogue for hillbilly musicians was ending and the vogue for Hawaiian musicians was starting, so I laughed at a gag here featuring a hillbilly ensemble called the Mountain Melodeers. Told that Hawaiian musicians are more popular, they start playing their bass and banjo on the high frets to sound like ukeleles.

I could have altogether done without the Five Spirits of Harmony, a quintet of annoying little black children who sing a-capella and talk in annoying "darky" dialect. One of them keeps kissing a boy who clearly doesn't want to be kissed.

Elsewhere, we briefly see two blonde girls who dance time steps on roller skates and do hitch kicks and airplane steps without the skates. I wanted to see more of their act, instead of all the screen time given to those black "chillun".

Al Christie's Educational studio was bottom of the barrel, so I was intrigued by an attempt here to dress up some stock footage of ocean liners with a series of optical-wipe transitions, with the wipes oddly in the shape of an inverted triangle.

The stupid plot has Mahoney stealing another man's name, then -- when the other man turns out to be a wanted criminal -- he has to prove he's no phony-baloney Mahoney by doing his vaudeville act. This all turns out to be part of his excessively Jewish agent's scheme to get him to perform on a cruise. Oy vey! My rating for this one: 6 out of 10, and Mahoney is especially endearing while performing the title song (although he swallows his lyrics). In a small role, Marion Martin is just a wee bit too sexy to be plausible.

Will Mahoney needs a break, so he goes on a weekend cruise under the name of a wanted fugitive. Apprehended, he has to prove who he is by being the master of ceremonies of a show, singing one of his old songs, and doing one of his eccentric tap dances.

Mahoney was a man who could tap up a storm, including some eccentric specialties. When vaudeville died in the US, he wound up in Australia, where he was popular for decades.

Besides Mahoney, there's a band that switches facilely between hillbilly music and Hawaiian, a pair of tap-dancing roller skaters, and an a capella children's chorus. Mahoney's big tap routine is still pleasing.

While there is a plot to "She's My Lilly, I'm Her Willie", this definitely takes a back seat to featuring a variety of singing and dancing acts. In particular, The Five Spirits of Harmony (known more commonly as The Cabin Kids) are featured...which is unusual because the group consisted of five young black kids and this is a mainstream short film.

The plot finds Will Mahoney tired of showbiz and in need of a vacation. But because he's an actor and producer, folks are always bothering him...and he just wants to get away from everything. So, when he boards the cruise ship for his getaway, he uses a fake name...which happens to be the name of a wanted fugitive.

While the plot idea is great, the film really didn't stick to it and was much more focused on various musical acts. This is a problem, as the short's sound isn't great. Plus, the style of the songs is very dated and worked much better back in 1934 than they would today. However, I must admit that Mahoney's tap dancing routine was pretty amazing to watch. Overall, a fair short at best...and a missed opportunity to really make the most of the plot.