Big Boy (film)

Big Boy
Directed by Alan Crosland
Written by William K. Wells
Rex Taylor
based on a musical comedy by Harold Atteridge
Starring Al Jolson
Claudia Dell
Louise Closser Hale
Lloyd Hughes
Noah Beery
Music by Rex Dunn
Alois Reiser
Sam H. Stept
Bud Green
Cinematography Hal Mohr
Edited by Ralph Dawson
Distributed by Warner Bros.
Release dates
  • September 6, 1930
Running time
 68 minutes
Country United States
Language English

Big Boy (1930) is an all-talking musical comedy film produced by Warner Bros. in 1930. The film was directed by Alan Crosland and stars Al Jolson. The film is based on the 1924 Broadway hit show of the same name in which Al Jolson also starred.

Synopsis

Al Jolson plays the part of a loyal stable boy and jockey to a rich family in the South that has been interested in horse racing and breeding horses for generations. (In a flashback we see Jolson's grandfather, who also worked for the same family back in 1870.) The young heir of the family, played by Lloyd Hughes, loses a lot of money by gambling and is blackmailed by the crooks he lost to for forging a check. They convinced Hughes to ask his mother to replace Jolson with another jockey for the family's racehorse who is named Big Boy but she refuses. Then the crooks frame Jolson and he is discharged for tampering with Big Boy. Jolson is replaced by a jockey who has been bought off to lose on purpose. Jolson then find works as a waiter in a fancy restaurant. While working there he uncovers the details about the race throwing plot and he reveals this to Hughes and then, with his help, outsmarts the crooks just in time to then ride Big Boy to victory.

Cast

Songs

Preservation

Because of the public apathy to musicals at the time of its release, some of the musical sequences were cut from the picture before release and it was advertised strictly as a comedy picture. This domestic release print survives complete and has been released by Warner Archive on DVD. The film seems to have been released in a longer version outside the United States where there was never any backlash against musicals. It is unknown whether a copy of this full musical version still exists.

References

External links