Exit Smiling is a 1926

1926 in film

-Events:*August - Warner Brothers debuts the first Vitaphone film, Don Juan. The Vitaphone system used multiple 33⅓ rpm disc records developed by Bell Telephone Laboratories and Western Electric to play back audio synchronized with film....

 comedy film

Comedy film

Comedy film is a genre of film in which the main emphasis is on humour. They are designed to elicit laughter from the audience. Comedies are mostly light-hearted dramas and are made to amuse and entertain the audiences...

 directed by Sam Taylor

Sam Taylor (director)

Sam Taylor was a film director, screenwriter, and producer, most active in silent film era. Taylor is best known for his comedic directorial work with Harold Lloyd and Mary Pickford....

 and starring New York and London revues star Beatrice Lillie

Beatrice Lillie

Beatrice Gladys "Bea" Lillie was an actress and comedic performer. Following her 1920 marriage to Sir Robert Peel in England, she was known in private life as Lady Peel.-Early career:...

 on her first (and her only silent) film role and Jack Pickford

Jack Pickford

Jack Pickford was a Canadian-born American actor. He was best known for his tabloid lifestyle, marriage to the top starlets of his day, and being of the famous Pickford acting family.-Early life:...

, the brother of star Mary Pickford

Mary Pickford

Mary Pickford was a Canadian-born motion picture actress, co-founder of the film studio United Artists and one of the original 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences...

. The film was also the debut of actor Franklin Pangborn

Franklin Pangborn

Franklin Pangborn was an American comedic character actor. Pangborn was famous for small, but memorable roles, with a comic flair. He appeared in many Preston Sturges movies as well as the W.C. Fields films International House, The Bank Dick, and Never Give a Sucker an Even Break...

. The film's failure at the box office is often attributed to the subtlety of Ms. Lillie's comic performance. This film is available on dvd from the Warner Archives Collection.

Plot

The travelling theatre troupe's worst actress, Violet (Beatrice Lillie) dreams of all she could be if she only had the right opportunities. Jimmy (Jack Pickford) is a runaway bank clerk who joins the troupe as a lead actor.

Cast

• Beatrice Lillie
  Beatrice Lillie
  Beatrice Gladys "Bea" Lillie was an actress and comedic performer. Following her 1920 marriage to Sir Robert Peel in England, she was known in private life as Lady Peel.-Early career:...
  
   - Violet
• Jack Pickford
  Jack Pickford
  Jack Pickford was a Canadian-born American actor. He was best known for his tabloid lifestyle, marriage to the top starlets of his day, and being of the famous Pickford acting family.-Early life:...
  
   - Jimmy Marsh
• Doris Lloyd
  Doris Lloyd
  Hessy Doris Lloyd was an English actress.She appeared in over 150 films between 1920 and 1967, including the 1933 low-budget Monogram Pictures version of Oliver Twist, in which she played Nancy...
  
   - Olga
• DeWitt Jennings
  DeWitt Jennings
  DeWitt Clarke Jennings was an American film actor. He appeared in 153 films between 1915 and 1937.-Biography:...
  
   - Orlando Wainwright
• Harry Myers
  Harry Myers
  Harry C. Myers , sometimes credited as Henry Myers, was an American film actor and director. He was born in New Haven, Connecticut, and died in Hollywood, California from pneumonia...
  
   - Jesse Watson
• Tenen Holtz
  Tenen Holtz
  Tenen Holtz was a Russian actor. He appeared in nearly 60 films between 1926 and 1961.He was born Elihu "Elye" Tenenholtz in the hamlet of Azran, near the city of Rovne and came to the United States the age of ten...
  
   - Tod Powell
• Louise Lorraine
  Louise Lorraine
  Louise Lorraine was an American film actress.-Life and career:Born Louise Escovar in San Francisco, California in 1904, Louise Lorraine's rise to film happened quite accidentally....
  
   - Phyllis Tichnor
• Franklin Pangborn
  Franklin Pangborn
  Franklin Pangborn was an American comedic character actor. Pangborn was famous for small, but memorable roles, with a comic flair. He appeared in many Preston Sturges movies as well as the W.C. Fields films International House, The Bank Dick, and Never Give a Sucker an Even Break...
  
  - Cecil Lovelace