The Matinee Idol (1928)
Here's a real comedy of the theater, which takes you behind the scenes of a thrilling melodrama and shows you how they acted in the old ten-twenty-thirties. You'll learn how to make love and say nice things to your sweetheart.
66 min
The famous matinee idol and blackface comedian, Don Wilson, heads out of town to escape adulation. There, calling himself Harry Mann, he accidentally joins a traveling acting troupe, and falls in love with Ginger Bolivar, who runs the troupe and stars in their Civil War melodrama. Don's producer sees the play, and thinks it's a comic masterpiece, and just what Don's Broadway show needs. But when Ginger finds out she's been played for a fool, will she forgive Don? Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with Sony Pictures Entertainment, Inc. in 1997.
- Release date
- March 14, 1928
- Country of origin
- United States
Cast
- Bessie Love as Ginger Bolivar
- Johnnie Walker as Don Wilson - aka Harry Mann
- Ernest Hilliard as Arnold Wingate
- Lionel Belmore as Jasper Bolivar
- David Mir as Eric Barrymaine
- Joe Bordeaux as Auditoning Actor
- Sidney Bracey as Don's Valet
- Sidney D'Albrook as J. Madison Wilberforce
- Mary Gordon as Mother in Audience
- Dorothy Vernon as Mother in Audience
Crew
- Frank Capra · Director
- Robert Lord · Writer
- Ernest Pagano · Writer
- Elmer Harris · Writer
- Harry Cohn · Producer
- Philip Tannura · Cinematographer
- Arthur Roberts · Editor