{"id":45175,"date":"2024-10-11T18:56:17","date_gmt":"2024-10-11T22:56:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=45175"},"modified":"2024-10-11T19:23:25","modified_gmt":"2024-10-11T23:23:25","slug":"the-bootleg-files-roadhouse-nights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2024\/10\/11\/the-bootleg-files-roadhouse-nights\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bootleg Files: Roadhouse Nights"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 882:<\/strong> \u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d (1930 feature starring Helen Morgan and Jimmy Durante). <\/p>\n

LAST SEEN: <\/strong>On YouTube. <\/p>\n

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO:<\/strong> None.<\/p>\n

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS:<\/strong> It fell through the proverbial cracks. <\/p>\n

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE:<\/strong> Nope.<\/p>\n

The 1930 feature \u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d is a production that is more famous for its back story and assembled talent and less celebrated for its contents. To be frank, it is among the most interesting and most boring films ever reviewed in The Bootleg Files series.
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\u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d was inspired by Dashiell Hammett\u2019s 1929 best-seller \u201cRed Harvest,\u201d but the great novelist rejected efforts by Paramount Pictures to acquire the screen rights to his work. Rather than create an unauthorized film version, Paramount contracted Ben Hecht to modify \u201cRed Harvest\u201d so the strongest plot elements of \u201cRed Harvest\u201d could be used as the foundation for a similar story. However, the screenplay offered in the final film is so wobbly that one must assume Hecht\u2019s work underwent significant rewriting by less talented scribes.<\/p>\n

Paramount assigned Walter Wanger to be the producer of \u201cRoadhouse Nights,\u201d which marked his first on-screen credit. He would later become one of the most influential independent producers in Hollywood history. Hobart Henley, a prolific (if somewhat undistinguished) actor and director of the silent films, was assigned to direct this film.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, \u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d carries all the vices that burdened most of the early talking pictures. Henley\u2019s direction is static and stagey, with long stretches of medium shots featuring actors who rarely engage in animated physical movement and tend to speak a tad too loud for normal conversations. Being a gangster movie, the film serves up the cinematic clich\u00e9 of the gangster who walks around with a permanent sneer, speaks in slow and deliberate tones, and keeps his verbiage in rough monosyllables. Not unlike many American films of that era, it is an endurance test for most of today’s viewers to sit through.<\/p>\n

The film involves bootlegger Sam Horner (Fred Kohler) who runs the roadhouse cited in the title \u2013 back in the 1930s, this was a euphemism for a nightclub that served liquor that was supposed to be outlawed by Prohibition. A Chicago reporter investigating Horner was killed by the hood, and his boozing colleague Willie Bindbugel (Charles Ruggles) follows up to patch together the interrupted reporting. With the help of Willie\u2019s one-time girlfriend Lola Fagan (Helen Morgan), who is now a singing headliner at Kohler\u2019s establishment, Horner gets his long-overdue comeuppance.<\/p>\n

\u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d gave Ruggles a starring turn, though in the course of his career he found a more lucrative niche as a comic character actor in scene-stealing supporting parts. Watching \u201cRoadhouse Nights,\u201d it is easy to see why he never secured leading man status \u2013 he was a pleasant presence who just lacked that certain je ne sais quoi<\/em> that separates stars from supporting actors.<\/p>\n

The film also offers a rare glimpse of singer Helen Morgan, whose film career was mostly defined by the 1929 \u201cApplause\u201d and the 1936 \u201cShow Boat.\u201d She wasn\u2019t the best actress and her film work between \u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d and \u201cShow Boat\u201d were mostly musical guest appearances that took advantage of her peerless singing.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of \u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d was the appearance of the vaudeville team of Clayton, Jackson and Durante in their only film together. They were Lou Clayton, Eddie Jackson and Jimmy Durante, and the trio were major vaudeville stars who specialized in musical novelties and knockabout comedy. \u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d does not capture the vibrancy of that act, but instead provides the trio with two musical numbers where Durante hogs the spotlight with his bombastic personality while Clayton and Jackson barely register. Durante also has a supporting role as Morgan\u2019s confidant, and the singer clearly enjoys sharing her scenes with the eccentric funnyman. (In their scenes, there is an oversized stuffed dog toy that has a prominent place on Morgan\u2019s table \u2013 this might have been used to hide a microphone needed for the early talkie recording technology to pick up their dialogue.) After the film was released, the trio broke up \u2013 Clayton left performing to become Durante\u2019s manager and Jackson continued to perform in revues and an occasional musical film while Durante was signed to a contract at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer that brought him to stardom.<\/p>\n

\u201cRoadhouse Nights\u201d opened to decent reviews but didn\u2019t really click with audiences and was quickly forgotten. The film was never commercially released in any home entertainment format, although a decent print is on YouTube. As for its source material, Dashiell Hammett\u2019s \u201cRed Harvest\u201d would later inspire such diverse films as Akira Kurosawa\u2019s \u201cYojimbo,\u201d Sergio Leone\u2019s \u201cA Fistful of Dollars\u201d and Walter Hill\u2019s \u201cLast Man Standing,\u201d but to date there have never been a direct adaptation of the work for the big screen. Go figure. <\/p>\n