The Old Fashioned Way
Brief Synopsis
Cast & Crew
William Beaudine
W. C. Fields
Joe Morrison
Baby Le Roy
Judith Allen
Jan Duggan
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
The Great McGonigle, head of a traveling repertory troupe, evades a warrant for his arrest and boards a train, appropriating a ticket for a sleeper car while his impoverished troupe sleep in their seats. The troupe arrives in a small town and boards at Mrs. Wendelschaffer's hotel. McGonigle is informed that the theater has sold only seventeen dollars worth of tickets for his show. Later, toddler Albert Pepperday single-handedly destroys McGonigle's dinner, after which McGonigle is coerced into giving Albert's mother Cleopatra, the wealthiest woman in town, an informal music audition. McGonigle assures Cleopatra a part in his play, which causes the entire town to purchase tickets. In addition, McGonigle gives Wally Livingston, his daughter Betty's suitor, an audition, and he, too, joins the cast as a singer. When a sheriff from New Philadelphia comes to collect from McGonigle, Cleopatra acts as benefactress and pays the bill. The curtain rises and the troupe runs through the melodrama "The Drunkard," after which McGonigle performs sleight-of-hand. During the show, Wally's wealthy father tries to convince Wally to leave the troupe and return to college; and Cleopatra, who was never actually called on stage, leaves the theater humiliated. The show ends after Albert throws a tomato in McGonigle's face. McGonigle receives a telegram from the next playhouse informing him that his show has been cancelled. After he overhears Betty refusing Wally's proposal because she is afraid of leaving her father, he lies to her, saying he has a job in New York. He gives his blessing to the couple and he then clears out of the hotel and starts a traveling medicine show.
Director
William Beaudine
Cast
W. C. Fields
Joe Morrison
Baby Le Roy
Judith Allen
Jan Duggan
Tammany Young
Nora Cecil
Jack Mulhall
Samuel Ethridge
Ruth Marion
Richard Carle
Larry Grenier
Ruth Marion
William Blatchford
Joe Morrison
Jeffrey Williams
W. C. Fields
Samuel Ethridge
Judith Allen
Donald Brown
Tom Miller
Joe Mills
Emma Ray
Dell Henderson
Clarence Wilson
Otis Harlan
Dorothy Bay
Oscar Smith
Maxine Elliott Hicks
Lew Kelly
Davison Clark
Oscar Apfel
Crew
Claude Binyon
Charles Bogle
Ralph Ceder
Emanuel Cohen
Jack Cunningham
Frank Dazey
Walter Deleon
John B. Goodman
Mack Gordon
Paul Jones
William Le Baron
William Lipman
J. P. Mcevoy
Lex Neal
Harry Revel
Benjamin Reynolds
H. M. Walker
Garnett Weston
Phil G. Wisdom
Hal Yates
Adolph Zukor
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The working title of the film was Grease Paint. Although opening credits claim that the cast list includes the "cast of the original Drunkard company," the earliest production had its premiere in New York in 1843. According to a news item in Daily Variety, the film included cast members of a Los Angeles production at the Little Theatre Mart which had its premiere on July 6, 1933 and ran for several years. Cast lists for the Los Angeles production were not available. Furthermore, performers W. C. Fields, Joe Morrison, Judith Allen and Samuel Ethridge appeared as characters in the frame story as well as performing in The Drunkard within the film, and were therefore credited twice in the end credits. For more information on the play, see the note above for the 1935 film The Drunkard. According to a modern source, Fields used the storyline of Paramount's 1927 film Two Flaming Youths, in which he starred (see AFI Catalog of Feature Films, 1921-30; F2.5909), as the basis for a 1929 screenplay called Playing the Sticks. Although Playing the Sticks never materialized into a film, modern sources note that its storyline was used in The Old Fashioned Way. Modern sources also indicate that a portion of this film was later released as a short film called The Great McGonigle.
Miscellaneous Notes
Released in United States 1934
Released in United States 1982
Released in United States 1982 (Shown at FILMEX: Los Angeles International Film Exposition ("Marathon of Mirth": Comedy Marathon) March 16 - April 1, 1982.)
Released in United States 1934
