When a movie has a title like 'Levi and Cohen, the Irish Comedians', I'm willing to watch it but I won't have very high expectations. Even so, this movie disappointed me.
Quite a few early vaudeville turns recorded their acts for the motion-picture camera, but this usually required the artistes to report to Edison's (or some other entrepreneur's) film studio. Bringing the act to the camera made more sense than trundling the heavy and unwieldy movie camera to a vaudeville theatre. As such, we have very few films of vaudeville acts photographed in their native habitat, the two-a-day stage.
'Levi and Cohen' starts with a pageboy crossing a stage proscenium to remove one act's card from an easel and to reveal the card for the next act. I was very excited by this prosaic detail, as it indicated that I was about to witness an actual vaudeville performance in a vaudeville house, 1903 vintage. This being a silent film, I did rather wonder how a turn with the bill matter 'The Irish Comedians' (implying heavy reliance on brogues and stage Irish) would convey the flavour of their act with no soundtrack to record the cross-talk.
Two men enter 'in one', in front of a painted backcloth. They're both wearing outrageous 'Oirish' costumes and make-up, including elaborate side-whiskers. One 'Irishman' repeatedly slaps the other. In 1903 (and for some years afterwards), one of the most popular comedy teams in America were Weber and Fields, their act consisting largely of Lew Fields pushing and slapping the much smaller Joe Weber. Audiences enjoyed this, just as they later enjoyed seeing Abbott slap Costello. So, I figured that the appeal of Levi and Cohen depended on one of them smacking the other.
Apparently not. The slapping persists for a few seconds, and then the audience (apparently having known in advance what to expect) start baptising Levi and Cohen with spoilt foodstuffs and eggs, which they've conveniently brought into the theatre. I can't guess how much of this movie was staged. There actually were some vaudeville acts so famously dreadful that the audience armed themselves with rubbish-tip artillery before entering the theatre. Most notoriously, when Willie Hammerstein booked the Cherry Sisters, he set up a stand outside the theatre, selling rotten fruit ... so that audiences could buy some to throw at the Cherry Sisters!
I would love to know whether this film constitutes an actual performance of Levi and Cohen, with a genuine audience revealing an authentic reaction to this comedy team, or whether what we see here has been staged for our benefit. I was surprised to learn that veteran cameraman 'Billy' Bitzer photographed this short movie; he certainly never described it in his memoirs. As I can't tell what this film is actually depicting, I shan't even rate it.
Quite a few early vaudeville turns recorded their acts for the motion-picture camera, but this usually required the artistes to report to Edison's (or some other entrepreneur's) film studio. Bringing the act to the camera made more sense than trundling the heavy and unwieldy movie camera to a vaudeville theatre. As such, we have very few films of vaudeville acts photographed in their native habitat, the two-a-day stage.
'Levi and Cohen' starts with a pageboy crossing a stage proscenium to remove one act's card from an easel and to reveal the card for the next act. I was very excited by this prosaic detail, as it indicated that I was about to witness an actual vaudeville performance in a vaudeville house, 1903 vintage. This being a silent film, I did rather wonder how a turn with the bill matter 'The Irish Comedians' (implying heavy reliance on brogues and stage Irish) would convey the flavour of their act with no soundtrack to record the cross-talk.
Two men enter 'in one', in front of a painted backcloth. They're both wearing outrageous 'Oirish' costumes and make-up, including elaborate side-whiskers. One 'Irishman' repeatedly slaps the other. In 1903 (and for some years afterwards), one of the most popular comedy teams in America were Weber and Fields, their act consisting largely of Lew Fields pushing and slapping the much smaller Joe Weber. Audiences enjoyed this, just as they later enjoyed seeing Abbott slap Costello. So, I figured that the appeal of Levi and Cohen depended on one of them smacking the other.
Apparently not. The slapping persists for a few seconds, and then the audience (apparently having known in advance what to expect) start baptising Levi and Cohen with spoilt foodstuffs and eggs, which they've conveniently brought into the theatre. I can't guess how much of this movie was staged. There actually were some vaudeville acts so famously dreadful that the audience armed themselves with rubbish-tip artillery before entering the theatre. Most notoriously, when Willie Hammerstein booked the Cherry Sisters, he set up a stand outside the theatre, selling rotten fruit ... so that audiences could buy some to throw at the Cherry Sisters!
I would love to know whether this film constitutes an actual performance of Levi and Cohen, with a genuine audience revealing an authentic reaction to this comedy team, or whether what we see here has been staged for our benefit. I was surprised to learn that veteran cameraman 'Billy' Bitzer photographed this short movie; he certainly never described it in his memoirs. As I can't tell what this film is actually depicting, I shan't even rate it.