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Wikipedia / The Stolen Jools

The Stolen Jools is a 1931 American pre-Code comedy short produced by the Masquers Club of Hollywood, featuring many cameo appearances by film stars and featured players of the day. The film was distributed by Paramount Pictures to raise funds for the National Vaudeville Artists Tuberculosis Sanitarium. The UCLA Film and Television Archive entry for this film says—as do the credits—that the film was co-sponsored by Chesterfield cigarettes to support the "fine work" of the NVA sanitarium.

The film, being made for charity, has an unusually large cast of actors who volunteered to appear. Studios represented included Paramount, Warner Bros., RKO, MGM, Fox Film, and Hal Roach.

For decades the film was unavailable for viewing, although at least one 35mm release print was known to survive in private hands. Home-movie distributor Blackhawk Films offered reprints to the collectors' market in the 1970s. Another print was found in the United Kingdom in the 1990s, under the British release title The Slippery Pearls.

Plot

At the "Screen Stars Annual Ball", Norma Shearer's jewels are stolen. The police must find them and return them to her. Private detective Eddie Kane investigates by trailing movie personalities and interrogating them. The mystery is solved by child performer Mitzi Green, who witnessed the robbery.

Cast

The original film did not include credits; most of the players were instantly recognizable by audiences of the day. Eddie Kane, the only actor who appears throughout the film, mentions many of them by name as they appear.

  1. At the Police Station

  2. Wallace Beery

  3. Buster Keaton

  4. Jack Hill

  5. J. Farrell MacDonald

  6. Edward G. Robinson

  7. George E. Stone

  8. The Law

  9. Eddie Kane

  10. Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy

  11. At the Victim's House

  12. Our Gang: Farina, Stymie, Chubby, Mary Ann Jackson, Shirley Jean Rickert, Echo, Wheezer, Pete the Pup

  13. Polly Moran

  14. Norma Shearer

  15. Hedda Hopper

  16. Tete-a-Tete

  17. Joan Crawford

  18. William Haines

  19. On the Porch Swing

  20. Dorothy Lee

  21. At Breakfast

  22. Victor McLaglen

  23. Edmund Lowe

  24. El Brendel

  25. In the Hotel

  26. Charlie Murray

  27. George Sidney

  28. Winnie Lightner

  29. Fifi D'Orsay

  30. Warner Baxter

  31. Irene Dunne

  32. At Lunch

  33. Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey

  34. In the Movie Studio

  35. Richard Dix

  36. Claudia Dell

  37. Lowell Sherman

  38. At the Newspaper Office

  39. Eugene Pallette

  40. Stuart Erwin

  41. Skeets Gallagher

  42. Gary Cooper

  43. Wynne Gibson

  44. Charles "Buddy" Rogers

  45. On the Telephone

  46. Maurice Chevalier

  47. Under the Tree

  48. Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

  49. Loretta Young

  50. On the Street

  51. Richard Barthelmess

  52. Charles Butterworth

  53. Couples at Home

  54. Bebe Daniels and Ben Lyon

  55. Barbara Stanwyck and Frank Fay

  56. In a Movie Scene

  57. Jack Oakie and Fay Wray

  58. The Bearded Man

  59. Joe E. Brown

  60. In the Projection Room

  61. George "Gabby" Hayes

  62. "Little Billy" Rhodes

  63. Solving the Mystery

  64. Mitzi Green

  65. Master of Ceremonies

  66. Bert Lytell (not seen in current prints)

  67. (Uncredited):

  68. Robert Ames

Reception

The Stolen Jools had enormous star power for audiences of 1931, and its benevolent message also appealed to America's theater owners. The film found record-breaking acceptance across America, as Film Daily reported: "A world record for day-and-date bookings will be established tomorrow with the release to 2,264 theaters from coast to coast of The Stolen Jools, the NVA Week-sponsored short subject, in which 55 stars appear. All major [theater] circuits and many independent groups are included in the booking. The policy of the RKO Palace, which only runs a newsreel in addition to vaudeville, will be changed to include the subject."

The Stolen Jools was referenced in an all-star The Voice of Hollywood short of 1932, hosted by John Wayne. In this novelty short, Eddie Kane appears in character as the detective, still looking for the stolen jewels.

Original vs. current versions

The original-release print included fragments of popular songs (for example, Dorothy Lee sings a few phrases of the song "I Love You So Much" from the Wheeler and Woolsey comedy The Cuckoos). When Blackhawk was preparing the film for home-movie release, company officer David Shepard tried to clear the rights to the music, only to find opposition: "To clear music rights in a film (any film) at that time, one had to deal with an iron maiden called Miss Mingle at the Harry Fox Agency in New York. Harry Fox Agency then had monopoly representation of virtually all music publishers for so-called 'sync rights.' Miss Mingle would not consider licensing sync rights unless one could first prove to her that one had a license on the film itself. To show her that the film had fallen into the public domain or was never copyrighted in the first place cut no ice with her." With this avenue closed to Shepard, he was forced to delete the song snippets from the Blackhawk reprint. However, another home-movie distributor, Thunderbird Films, had its own print of The Stolen Jools with the music intact, and issued reprints in competition with Blackhawk.

Actor Bert Lytell appeared in the original-release print at the very end of the film, asking movie audiences to donate to the NVA's charity appeal. Current film and video versions in circulation do not include Lytell's curtain speech.

See also

References