30s Hitch: Elstree Calling (1930) - Taking one for the team

NOTE: Since this isn't a Hitchcock feature, I felt no strong desire to devote my full attention to it, either. That said, I actually did watch pretty much the whole thing, fast forwarding where I couldn't take more than a few seconds.

EDIT (10/26/2023): 

Well, thanks to a number of people, from Rebecca Lee at The Gallery of Anna May Wong YouTube channel, Michelle Yim of Red Dragonfly Productions and Tom Shane, admin and group expert at the Anna May Wong Facebook Group page, I've had to review the materials I have on hand relating to this film. 

I have been historically dismissive about Elstree Calling as Hitchcock, but it seems that he had more of a hand its execution than I (or he) would have liked to admit. The criticism as follows doesn't require altering but the history of the production does require more expansion. Please read the Addendum: Corrections and Additional Information at the end of this entry.

My original post begins here:

Hitchcock told Truffaut that there was nothing of interest regarding his contribution to "Elstree Calling". I concur. However, as England's first musical, it bears some review. Hitch's contribution is a running gag in between skits and performances of a man trying to watch the revue on his "television" (it's not a television, but this may be the first reference to the nascent technology)(1). 

As for the skits? They are, in a word, to modern eyes, pretty rough going. The emcee, Tommy Handley, acts a wittering idiot and we start with a performance by Teddy Brown whose xylophone skills are notable. He's fine but this goes on too, too long. The same could be said of almost every skit and some are outright chauvinistic and/or racist. The Three Eddies, for example. These are three Englishmen in blackface. Blackface. 

At one point, Handley returns and introduces Helen Burnell and The Chorus Ladies from the Adelphi Theater Revue for a number and then, sigh, as an aside to "the gentlemen in the audience" announces he has all the ladies names and phone numbers..."at the police station." 

What lent some interest to her and her act is that it was filmed in Pathéchrome. I don't know that this is the first color sequence in film in the UK, but it is certainly an early one. Sadly, it's pretty bad; the singing is warbling, the stage too cramped for decent choreography (and it's not decent choreography, anyway). Helen isn't bad, but she leaves a lot to be desired. She isn't Isadora Duncan, let's say, and leave it at that.

There is a bright spot. It's an odd one, but it works in a strange way. Throughout the film, Shakespearean actor Donald Calthrop (who had worked with Hitchcock in Blackmail, Murder!, and Juno and the Paycock) had been attempting to perform portions of the Bard's play and would be interrupted by some issue or other. Finally, he feels his moment has come and and what appears is supposed to be "Taming of the Shrew" with Anna May Wong. It's so, so, well strange. A kind of pre-Monty Python intro (not as funny, but slightly amusing) leads to a woman singing about being a bridesmaid but never a bride.

Anna May Wong leans into the absurdity fully and chews out Calthrop's Petruchio in Cantonese. It's one of those performances that stands out because she's so committed to it while understanding just what kind of movie she's in. Self-awareness goes a long way to shoring up substandard material. The skit eventually revolves/devolves into a pie-throwing melee. I might go so far as to say that it's the most successful of the performances.

There is one other tonally different skit that almost works. A couple is holding one another on a couch in a dark room. The man asks the woman what she's afraid of, they embrace more deeply. Cut to a malevolent face in close-up (not bad cinematography...maybe Hitch had something to do with this?*) then pull back to reveal the man with a gun in his hand. Cut to crane shot over the couple, sound of two shots being fired. Jump to gunman. A look of shock on his face, beat, "oh, my god, I'm in the wrong flat!"

A later act does hold some interest, as well; Russian dancing followed by The Balalaika Choral Orchestra. 

There are more but at this point, little that is relevant to Hitchcock and nothing that I feel would prove that the film is little more than a curiosity beyond historical interest. There is more blackface (much too much more), more odd vaudevillian performances, another performance in color by Helen Burnell, this time dancing with Jack Hulbert, "Britain's Fred Astaire." Britain does not come out looking good here.

"Elstree Calling" was supposed to be Britain's answer to Paramount on Parade and other Hollywood revue films and I've seen enough of early U.S. musicals and variety flicks to know that if nothing else, Hollywood's directors and cinematographers knew enough to keep the cameras moving; there is no camera movement to speak of, though the camera comes to life during Anna May Wong's section. 

One last return to Hitch's interlude. Our old guy finally gets some reception only to hear "good night, everybody" and end.

Hitchcock was right. His interludes are lackluster, at best. I know this was part of a contractually bound quota he had to film, and it proves interesting to see how contractual obligations lead to the most uninspired and uninspiring projects for even the greatest artists. 

If nothing else, at least, both Hitchcock and Wong didn't lose anything for doing this and comported themselves with a degree of competence  (the subversive element of Wong's piece renders it by far, the most interesting moment in the film).

*It may well be that Hitchcock did direct the "thriller" skit. Matt Barry says as much, but I don't have any textual support at hand for that other than Matt's. 

ADDENDUM: CORRECTIONS AND MORE INFORMATION

As much as I would like to let stand both Hitchcock's and my downplaying of his involvement in this mess, I'm afraid I can't do that.  I'm turning to Charles Barr first for what Hitchcock did work on and to note that this was a rush a job from John Maxwell the co-owner of British International Pictures, which accounts for the lackluster work here. (2) Next, I'm drawing on Patrick McGilligan's work to take a look at the behind the scenes machinations that actually led to Hitchcock's deeper involvement.(3)

According to Barr, Hitchcock was responsible - as noted - for the framing scenes of the unsuccessful TV reception gag. However, he also directed Calthrop's repeatedly interrupted Shakespeare scenes, and yes, the Taming of the Shrew sketch with Anna May Wong. Lastly, Barr cites that Hitchcock did, in fact, direct the "thriller" skit. Latterly, Barr and Alain Kerzonkouf presented a fuller account of the film's productions. (4)

The background provided by McGilligan (3) adds a bit more depth to this fiasco and makes more comprehensible what a troubled project this was from the outset. 

British International Pictures was "obsessed with cost efficiency", thus the idea of mounting a revue or anthology type film of the order that Hollywood had produced was very probably doomed from the start, particularly given how cheap, even by early sound era standards, the sets look. 

The main producer was Adrian Brunel who was looking to impress by producing (and even directing) his third film of the year. McGilligan states that Brunel was angling to get Hitchcock to do a musical (we will see how tragically things went when he actually thought he would direct a musical with Waltzes from Vienna a few years later), but it seems Walter Mycroft, the story department head and Val Valentine (who had collaborated with Hitchcock on other films) were tasked with Brunel "in stitching together the semblance of a story line spotlighting the best0known routines of vaudeville and radio personalities". 

Additionally, Elstree Calling was low-budgeted for a twelve-day shoot. Initially, Hitchcock was only called on to direct the framing segments; however, when Maxwell saw Brunel's rough footage, he found the film "a crushing bore" and ordered retakes. Brunel tried to find an ally in Mycroft who demurred that were he, Mycroft, seen to be siding with Brunel, he would be reported on to Maxwell (by studio spies). 

Mycroft sided with Maxwell, who fired Brunel and assigned Hitchcock to retakes and re-edits. This also included reshoots of other (uncredited) segment directors' work, as well. Hitchcock claimed to have worked on Elstree Calling for only a day, but this is obviously in contradiction to what we have of the project's history.

The film, from what little I've been able to gather was better received in the United Kingdom than in the U.S. The Nottingham Evening Post called it "an excellent production, full of life and movement" (5). Variety, by contrast, found the material "old where it is not amateurish" and "It has none of the flash extravagance which characterizes the revue type of talker coming from America, and In contrast with those shown here, looks small time despite its cast." (6)

NOTES

1. Donald Spoto implies that Hitchcock directed all of Donald Clathrop's performances throughout the film (Spoto 1992, p. 39). If that were true, then it would likewise imply that Hitchcock directed Anna May Wong, which would render this both fascinating and disappointing. Fascinating because of the meeting of these two worthies and disappointing because of the end result. As much as I think Miss Wong's contribution is a highlight, it's not the best example or use of her considerable talent. In contrast are Spoto's own words in , "Hitchcock supervised Gordon Hacker in one or two sequences, but no one remembered the director being around for the shooting more than six or seven hours, and Hitchcock could never recall anything about his presence on it." (Spoto 1999, p. 122).

ADDENDUM: this in patent contradictions to what has been found in other sources. See Barr and McGilligan.

2. Barr, pp. 227-228.

3. McGilligan, pp. 132-133.

4. Kerzonouf and Barr, pp. 88-97.

5. Image of a clipping at Reid, Brent on Film.

6. Variety review, February 26, 1930.

Bibliography

Barr, Charles. English Hitchcock. Cameron and Hollis. Dumfrieshire, Scotland. 1999.

McGilligan, Patrick. Alfred Hitchcock: A Life in Darkness and Light. ItBooks/Harper Collins. New York. 2004.

Reid, Brent. Alfred Hitchcock's Collectors' Guide: Elstree Calling (1930). Brent on Film. 22 March 2019. https://www.brentonfilm.com/alfred-hitchcock-collectors-guide-elstree-calling-1930. Retrieved 26 October 2023.

Spoto, Donald. The Art of Alfred Hitchcock: Fifty Years of His Motion Pictures. Anchor Books. New York. 1992.

Spoto, Donald. Alfred Hitchcock: the Dark Side of Genius. Little, Brown, and Company. New York. 1999.

Variety Staff Writer. "Film Review - Elstree Calling". Variety. Wednesday, February 26, 1930, p. 42. retrieved from the Internet Archive, 26 October 2023. https://archive.org/details/variety98-1930-02/page/n249/mode/2up. 

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