1939 comedy
Rating: 14/20
Plot: W.C. Fields tries to save his circus while debt collectors and an annoying wooden man get in his way.
If I could somehow combine this with the Marx Brothers' circus comedy from the same year and cut out what doesn't work from both of them, I think I could end up with a classic comedy. It wouldn't make much sense, but would it really need to?
This might sound a little blasphemous, but I'm not sure Edgar Bergen was a great ventriloquist. His mouth movies like crazy in this thing, and it was really distracting. At the very least, Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd were better characters than he was a ventriloquist. I was surprised at how much screen time Bergen and McCarthy got in this thing, but I enjoyed seeing McCarthy on a pony or in an alligator (crocodile) or flirting with a babe. Later, Snerd and McCarthy and Bergen are in a hot air balloon talking to himself (read that again--it makes sesne), and it's one of those moments capable of making you question everything you thought you knew about life and puppets.
Of course, McCarthy is also unfortunately in blackface at one point. That's almost as shocking as seeing Shirley Temple in blackface.
W.C. Fields is in a comedic zone. No, not every gag lands, but watching him engage in verbal tiffs with a wooden man, practice his own ventriloquism, play ping pong, and jar with customers is a lot of fun. He's a natural at playing these shady buffoons and lots of fun to watch in this. Apparently, he turned down The Wizard of Oz to make this one. W.C. Fields as the wizard isn't that hard to imagine.
My neighbor at school bought a mirror with W.C. Fields on it from a Goodwill and thought it was the Penguin from Batman. He didn't even know who Fields was. I showed him a Fields' juggling routine on Youtube, and now he's happy that he's got a W.C. Fields mirror.
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