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The House That Shadows Built

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Genre
  
Documentary

Duration
  

Language
  
English

7.2/10
IMDb

Distributor
  
Paramount Pictures

Country
  
United States

The House That Shadows Built kayfrancisfilmscomwpcontentuploads201412193

Release date
  
1931 (1931)

Producers
  
Adolph Zukor, Jesse L. Lasky

Genres
  
Documentary, Short Film, Musical, Black-and-white

Cast
  
Groucho Marx
(Caesar's Ghost),
Harpo Marx
(The Merchant of Wieners),
Chico Marx
(Tomalio),
Zeppo Marx
(Sammy Brown),
Ben Taggart
(Mr. Lee, Theatrical Agent),
Charles Ray
((archive footage))

Similar movies
  
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,
King Kong
,
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,
Ed Wood
,
American Beauty
,
The Cyberpunk Educator

The House That Shadows Built (1931) is a feature compilation film from Paramount Pictures, made to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the studio's founding in 1912. The film was a promotional film for exhibitors and never had a regular theatrical release.

Contents

The film includes a brief history of Paramount, interviews with various actors, and clips from upcoming projects (some of which never came to fruition). The title comes from a biography of Paramount founder Adolph Zukor, The House That Shadows Built (1928), by William Henry Irwin.

Marx Brothers segment

The film is known for a six-minute segment starring the Marx Brothers, with Davison Clark playing Mr. Lee, Theatrical Producer, which was intended to promote their forthcoming 1931 film Monkey Business (Clark later played the role of the frustrated Passport Official in Monkey Business and would also appear in the war scene in Duck Soup). The segment, containing material which was never included in any other Marx Brothers film, is a re-working of the first scene of their first successful Broadway revue I'll Say She Is (1924), which Groucho considered to have been the funniest work in the Brothers' career. Except for a few name changes and additional gags, the scene is almost completely the same as the script used for the stage production. Some of the gags from I'll Say She Is were worked into the lobby scene in The Cocoanuts (1929), and a bit involving a series of Maurice Chevalier imitations was incorporated into the script of Monkey Business.

The Marx Brothers' segment is currently available as a special feature on the direct-to-DVD documentary film Inside the Marx Brothers, albeit in poor condition. Recently, Marx Brothers fans have begun referring to their segment simply as I'll Say She Is, in light of its source material.

Scenes from silent Paramount films

  • Sarah Bernhardt in Queen Elizabeth (1912) produced in France
  • J. K. Hackett, playing a dual role in The Prisoner of Zenda (1913)
  • Dustin Farnum in The Squaw Man (1914)
  • Mary Pickford in A Good Little Devil (1914)
  • Geraldine Farrar in Carmen (1915)
  • Robert Edeson and Theodore Roberts in The Call of the North (1914)
  • Blanche Sweet in The Captive (1915)
  • Vivian Martin and Jack Holt in Giving Becky a Chance (1917)
  • Olga Petrova and Mahlon Hamilton in The Undying Flame (1917)
  • Jack Pickford and Robert Gordon in Huck and Tom (1918)
  • Sessue Hayakawa, Fannie Ward, and Jack Dean in The Cheat (1915)
  • Marie Doro in The Heart of Nora Flynn (1916)
  • Elliott Dexter, Kathlyn Williams, and Raymond Hatton in The Whispering Chorus (1918)
  • Dorothy Gish in Battling Jane (1918)
  • Douglas Fairbanks in Headin' South (1918)
  • Mary Pickford in The Little American (1917)
  • Elliott Dexter in The Squaw Man (1918)
  • Gloria Swanson and Elliott Dexter in For Better, for Worse (1919)
  • John Barrymore in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920)
  • Charles Ray in Homer Comes Home (1920)
  • Lon Chaney, Betty Compson, Thomas Meighan and J. M. Dumont in The Miracle Man (1919)
  • Lillian Gish in True Heart Susie (1919)
  • Gloria Swanson and Thomas Meighan in Male and Female (1919)
  • Betty Compson in The Little Minister (1921)
  • Wallace Reid and Theodore Roberts in The Roaring Road (1919)
  • Mae Murray in On With the Dance (1920)
  • Gareth Hughes and May McAvoy in Sentimental Tommy (1921)
  • Rudolph Valentino and Agnes Ayres in The Sheik (1921)
  • Conrad Nagel, Bebe Daniels, William Boyd, and Wallace Reid in Nice People (1922)
  • The Covered Wagon (1923)
  • Betty Bronson and Mary Brian in Peter Pan (1924)
  • William S. Hart and Kathleen O'Connor in Wild Bill Hickok (1923)
  • Adolphe Menjou and Florence Vidor in The Grand Duchess and the Waiter (1926)
  • Noah Beery, Billie Dove, and Jack Holt in The Light of Western Stars (1925)
  • The Ten Commandments (1923)
  • Wallace Beery and Raymond Hatton in Behind the Front (1926)
  • Pola Negri and Rod La Rocque in Forbidden Paradise (1924)
  • Richard Dix in The Vanishing American (1925)
  • Emil Jannings and Lya De Putti in Varieté (1925) produced in Germany
  • Ronald Colman, Ralph Forbes, and Noah Beery in Beau Geste (1926)
  • Clara Bow in It (1927)
  • Harold Lloyd and Constantine Romanoff in The Kid Brother (1927)
  • George Bancroft in Underworld (1927)
  • Gary Cooper, Charles Buddy Rogers, and Richard Arlen in Wings (1927)

    • Silent film performers in unidentified silent films

  • George M. Cohan, possible films: Broadway Jones (1917), Seven Keys to Baldpate (1917), and Hit-The-Trail Holliday (1918)
  • George Beban
  • Elsie Ferguson, possible films: The Lie (1918) and The Avalanche (1919)
  • Dorothy Dalton
  • Marguerite Clark, possible film: The Prince and the Pauper (1915)
  • Billie Burke, film clip is most definitely from The Land of Promise (1917)
  • Ethel Clayton
  • Lila Lee
  • Pauline Frederick
  • Bryant Washburn
  • Irene Castle

    • The Lon Chaney Sr. segment is one of only two short sequences which survive from The Miracle Man (1919). The other clip is featured in one of Paramount's Movie Milestone series, Movie Memories (1935), showcasing the studios' greatest achievements. This latter clip shows both a segment from the conclave in Chinatown as well as the healing scene which is in The House That Shadows Built. A nitrate print of Movie Memories is reportedly at the UCLA Film and Television Archive but has not yet been preserved.

    Then-current Paramount stars

    The film moves on to show segments with Paramount players of the 1931–32 season, including George Bancroft, Nancy Carroll, the Four Marx Brothers, Charles Rogers, Clive Brook, Phillips Holmes, Sylvia Sidney, Eleanor Boardman, Frances Dee, Jackie Searl, Kay Francis, Judith Wood, Regis Toomey, Peggy Shannon, Jackie Coogan, Lilyan Tashman, Eugene Pallette, Anna May Wong, Juliette Compton, Stuart Erwin, William Boyd, Miriam Hopkins, Wynne Gibson, Jack Oakie, Ginger Rogers, Robert Coogan, Carmen Barnes, Charlie Ruggles, Richard "Skeets" Gallagher, Mitzi Green, Richard Arlen, Carole Lombard, Fredric March, Claudette Colbert, Paul Lukas, Tallulah Bankhead, Gary Cooper, Ruth Chatterton, Marlene Dietrich, and Maurice Chevalier.

    These stars are announced as appearing in upcoming films, including some never produced or released by Paramount:

  • An Entirely Different Woman with Marlene Dietrich (never produced, based on the German novel Eine Ganz Andere Frau by Georg Froschel)
  • No One Man from the Rupert Hughes novel
  • Daughter of the Dragon with Anna May Wong, Warner Oland, and Sessue Hayakawa
  • 24 Hours with Clive Brook, Kay Francis, and Regis Toomey
  • Girls About Town with Kay Francis, Lilyan Tashman, and Eugene Pallette
  • Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde with Fredric March and Miriam Hopkins
  • Personal Maid with Nancy Carroll
  • Uncertain Woman with Claudette Colbert (based on Edgar Wallace novel The Girl from Scotland Yard, never produced)
  • The Road to Reno with Charles Rogers and Lilyan Tashman
  • The Round-Up with Eugene Pallette, Stuart Erwin, Skeets Gallagher, and Frances Dee (not produced by Paramount until 1941)
  • Silence with Clive Brook, Marjorie Rambeau, and Peggy Shannon
  • A Farewell to Arms with Gary Cooper and Eleanor Boardman (Helen Hayes replaced Boardman in the final film)
  • My Sin with Tallulah Bankhead and Fredric March
  • Ladies of the Big House
  • Huckleberry Finn with Jackie Coogan, Mitzi Green, Junior Durkin, and Jackie Searl
  • Rich Man's Folly with George Bancroft
  • The Man With Red Hair (horror film based on novel Portrait of a Man With Red Hair by Hugh Walpole, never produced)
  • The Lives of a Bengal Lancer filmed by Ernest B. Schoedsack (not made until 1935, using footage shot in India by Schoedsack in 1931)
  • Tomorrow and Tomorrow with Ruth Chatterton

    • Scenes are shown that were shot for the following films:

  • An American Tragedy with Phillips Holmes, Sylvia Sidney, and Frances Dee
  • Secrets of a Secretary with Claudette Colbert, Herbert Marshall, and Georges Metaxa
  • Sooky directed by Norman Taurog, with Jackie Cooper and Robert Coogan
  • Murder by the Clock with William Boyd, Lilyan Tashman, Regis Toomey, and Irving Pichel
  • Monkey Business with the Marx Brothers (see above section)
  • Stepdaughters of War with Ruth Chatterton and directed by Dorothy Arzner (never released)
  • The Smiling Lieutenant directed by Ernst Lubitsch with Maurice Chevalier, Claudette Colbert, Charlie Ruggles, and Miriam Hopkins

    • References

    The House That Shadows Built Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA

    The House That Shadows Built IMDb The House That Shadows Built themoviedb.org