It’s the same garbage they were doing to Buster Keaton over at Metro, and it’s a shame. Poor Lightner is stuck in this lugubrious position where she’s the circus’ patron saint but also the long suffering martyr to keep those laughs coming. Like, words can hardly do it justice, from the contrivances involved in ending the second act to the film’s finale, which involves characters suddenly professing feelings it’s doubtful they ever had in the first place and completely changing their attitudes off-screen. There’s also a minor subplot about the circus they work for running out of cash and the proprietor, ‘Pops’ Gowdy ( Guy Kibbee, continuing his career streak of always playing someone named ‘Pops’), being a drunk.īut the melodrama plot is so insanely bad. The rest of the time her character, Babs, is stuck in a love triangle with Joe ( Cook) and her sister ( Knapp). Winnie Lightner, one of the most jubilant screen presences of the early-30s, gets saddled with a maudlin melodrama where she’s only really allowed to let loose in the middle third of the picture. It’s not that Side Show is bad… well, maybe that’s the wrong way of putting it. I’m lucky this week– Side Show is another one of those films where I can point you to a 2-minute YouTube video and recommend that over the full 64-minute movie. I’ll never forget the night I had to wear a beard!” Outside of the fat woman and the living skeleton, I’ve played everyone’s part in this show. Sings a song about a woman who wears fig leaves, and how all the boys were waiting for the leaves to fall.There’s some implication that Lightner’s character regularly sleeps with her boyfriend in the same cabin, despite them not being married.

It’s a good reminder that in a lot of god-fearing towns back in the day, showing a movie on Sunday was sacrilege!

During one discussion about going out for a picnic, Evelyn Knapp’s character points out there will be no picture shows that night because it was a Sunday.

“We’ll have beer! That is if we can find a bootlegger!”.

Blackface, where Lightner dresses up as a dim African caricature.She also throws on brownface to be a dancing hula girl:.Another job she does at the fair: crossdressing as a carnival barker:.Star Lightner dresses in a hula skirt and has no qualms about flipping it up, down, and all around.Released by First National/Vitaphone/WB | Directed by Roy Del Ruth

Star Dog by A.M. Lightner