The Cardboard Lover. 1928. USA. Directed by Robert Z. Leonard. Screenplay by Carey Wilson, based on the play Dans sa candeur naive by Jacques Deval. With Marion Davies, Nils Asther, Jetta Goudal, Andrés de Segurola, Tenen Holtz. World restoration premiere. DCP. Silent. 76 min.
For far too long, the achievements of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, Laurel and Hardy, and other male comics of silent cinema have overshadowed the masterful contributions of the comediennes who took their lumps and mugged and met cute alongside them, actresses like Mabel Normand, Bebe Daniels, Louise Fazenda, and Constance Talmadge. Thankfully, the past decade has seen a new appreciation for these “Funny Ladies,” with dedicated efforts to find, identify, preserve, and show their long-unseen work. Undercrank Productions has made an important contribution to this effort by restoring the films of Marion Davies and Alice Howell and returning these once-legendary stars to their proper place in the annals of making us laugh. To Save and Project premieres two of their latest discoveries: The Cardboard Lover, which Marion Davies made in 1928 when her popularity was at an all-time high (and not simply because she was William Randolph Heart’s mistress) between The Patsy and Show People, and which showcases her wicked gifts at mimicry; and Distilled Love, which perfectly illustrates Alice Howell’s ability to combine delicate pathos with slapstick roughhousing, playing a girl who’s driven off the farm when a slanderous Oliver Hardy accuses her of being a baby’s mother and who ends up wreaking havoc at a society party in the big city. The New York City–born Howell was one of the great knockabout clowns of the silent screen, a frizzy-haired forerunner to Lucille Ball and Carol Burnett whose persona of a slightly addled working-class girl was so beloved by audiences she even had her own starring series between 1917 and 1924. Mentioned in the same breath with Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and Max Linder (by one critic), and with Mabel Normand and Marie Dressler (by many others), Howell has been almost completely forgotten…until now.
Restoration produced by Undercrank Productions. Film preserved by Library of Congress; additional elements provided by the Blackhawk Film Collection and the British Film Institute.
Preceded by:
Distilled Love. 1920. USA. Directed by Vin Moore, Dick Smith. With Alice Howell, Oliver Hardy, Dick Smith, Eunice Murdock, Fay Holderness. DCP. Silent. 25 min.
Restoration produced by Undercrank Productions. Film preserved by Library of Congress.