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Roman Scandals

Screening on Film
Directed by Frank Tuttle.
With Eddie Cantor, Ruth Etting, Gloria Stuart.
US, 1933, 35mm, black & white, 92 min.

A history buff (Cantor) dreams of life in ancient Rome and through the magic of cinema finds himself transported to the days of the Emperor (played with villainous zeal by Edward Arnold). As an imperial slave, Eddie rises to the position of food taster before getting mixed up in a plot to murder the Emperor. One of the racier movie musicals, the film features one of Cantor’s infamous blackface performances and a slave-market sequence in which Berkeley convinced a number of the actresses to appear completely nude, a practice which undoubtedly ended with the rise of the Hays Code. This was the last feature Berkeley made for Samuel Goldwyn before his incredibly successful run with Warner Brothers.

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