6.4 /10 1 Votes
Directed by Herbert Wilcox Cinematography René Guissart Director Herbert Wilcox Music director Frederic Norton | 6.4/10 Starring Betty Blythe Initial release 1923 Screenplay Oscar Asche Cast Betty Blythe | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Produced by Herbert Wilcox
UFA
?Erich Pommer Written by Oscar Asche (play; Chu Chin Chow)
Herbert Wilcox (scenario) Music by Frederic Norton (Chu Chin Chow) Producers Herbert Wilcox, Erich Pommer Similar Decameron Nights, Tip Toes, The Blue Danube, The Only Way, The King's Cup |
Chu-Chin-Chow is a 1925 British-German silent adventure film directed by Herbert Wilcox and starring Betty Blythe, Herbert Langley and Randle Ayrton.
It was produced and directed in 1923 in Germany by Wilcox with financial assistance from the German UFA company. Wilcox may have had Erich Pommer also as a financier on the production. It is based on the extraordinarily successful stage musical Chu Chin Chow by Oscar Asche, with music by Frederic Norton, that ran in London from 1916 to 1921.
The film starred American actress Betty Blythe fresh from her scantily clad triumph in 1921's The Queen of Sheba at Fox. Sources state this film had early experimental synchronised sound but this process could only be viewed at the special theaters outfitted for the sound equipment. This film was released in the United States by MGM two years after its production with a drastically reduced footage count by almost half.
A sound film Chu Chin Chow, with the score intact, was made by the Gainsborough Studios in 1934, with George Robey playing the part of Ali Baba, Fritz Kortner as Abu Hassan, Anna May Wong as Zahrat Al-Kulub and Laurence Hanray as Kasim.