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The Rogue Song (film)
Encyclopedia
The Rogue Song is a 1930
romantic
musical film
which tells the story of a Russian bandit who falls in love with a princess
, but takes his revenge on her when her brother rapes and kills his sister. It was directed by Lionel Barrymore
and Hal Roach
(uncredited) and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
. The film stars Lawrence Tibbett
who was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor
for his performance. Laurel and Hardy
have small roles, which were filmed at the last minute and interspersed throughout the film in an attempt to boost the film's box office
appeal. The Rogue Song is now considered a lost film
, although a number of fragments have survived.
in the year 1910. Yegor (Lawrence Tibbett), a dashing (as well as singing) bandit leader meets Princess Vera (Catherine Dale Owen) at a mountain inn. They fall in love
, but the relationship is shattered when Yegor kills Vera's brother, Prince Serge, for raping his sister, Nadja, and driving her to suicide
. Yegor kidnaps Vera, forcing her to live a life of lowly servitude among the bandits. Vera manages to outwit Yegor, who is captured by soldiers and flogged. Vera begs Yegor's forgiveness. Although still in love with each other, they realize they cannot be together, at least for the time being.
Another segment, in which Laurel swallows a bee, has also survived on the trailer
to the film, which has survived almost intact.
) production. It was also the screen debut of Lawrence Tibbett, who was a world renowned star of the Metropolitan Opera. The film is notable today as Laurel and Hardy's first appearance in color, although at the time of release they were only minor players in the film.
The movie was adapted by John Colton
and Frances Marion
from the operetta
Gypsy Love by Robert Bodansky and A. M. Willner
.
1930 in film
-Events:* November 1: The Big Trail featuring a young John Wayne in his first starring role is released in both 35mm, and a very early form of 70mm film and was the first large scale big-budget film of the sound era costing over $2 million. The film was praised for its aesthetic quality and realism...
romantic
Romance film
Romance films are love stories that focus on passion, emotion, and the affectionate involvement of the main characters and the journey that their love takes through courtship or marriage. Romance films make the love story or the search for love the main plot focus...
musical film
Musical film
The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
which tells the story of a Russian bandit who falls in love with a princess
Princess
Princess is the feminine form of prince . Most often, the term has been used for the consort of a prince, or his daughters....
, but takes his revenge on her when her brother rapes and kills his sister. It was directed by Lionel Barrymore
Lionel Barrymore
Lionel Barrymore was an American actor of stage, screen and radio. He won an Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in A Free Soul...
and Hal Roach
Hal Roach
Harold Eugene "Hal" Roach, Sr. was an American film and television producer and director, and from the 1910s to the 1990s.- Early life and career :Hal Roach was born in Elmira, New York...
(uncredited) and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
. The film stars Lawrence Tibbett
Lawrence Tibbett
Lawrence Mervil Tibbett was a great American opera singer and recording artist who also performed as a film actor and radio personality. A baritone, he sang with the New York Metropolitan Opera company more than 600 times from 1923 to 1950...
who was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor
Academy Award for Best Actor
Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...
for his performance. Laurel and Hardy
Laurel and Hardy
Laurel and Hardy were one of the most popular and critically acclaimed comedy double acts of the early Classical Hollywood era of American cinema...
have small roles, which were filmed at the last minute and interspersed throughout the film in an attempt to boost the film's box office
Box office
A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for admission to an event. Patrons may perform the transaction at a countertop, through an unblocked hole through a wall or window, or at a wicket....
appeal. The Rogue Song is now considered a lost film
Lost film
A lost film is a feature film or short film that is no longer known to exist in studio archives, private collections or public archives such as the Library of Congress, where at least one copy of all American films are deposited and catalogued for copyright reasons...
, although a number of fragments have survived.
Plot
The story takes place in RussiaRussia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
in the year 1910. Yegor (Lawrence Tibbett), a dashing (as well as singing) bandit leader meets Princess Vera (Catherine Dale Owen) at a mountain inn. They fall in love
Love
Love is an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. Love is central to many religions, as in the Christian phrase, "God is love" or Agape in the Canonical gospels...
, but the relationship is shattered when Yegor kills Vera's brother, Prince Serge, for raping his sister, Nadja, and driving her to suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
. Yegor kidnaps Vera, forcing her to live a life of lowly servitude among the bandits. Vera manages to outwit Yegor, who is captured by soldiers and flogged. Vera begs Yegor's forgiveness. Although still in love with each other, they realize they cannot be together, at least for the time being.
Cast
- Lawrence TibbettLawrence TibbettLawrence Mervil Tibbett was a great American opera singer and recording artist who also performed as a film actor and radio personality. A baritone, he sang with the New York Metropolitan Opera company more than 600 times from 1923 to 1950...
- Stan LaurelStan LaurelArthur Stanley "Stan" Jefferson , better known as Stan Laurel, was an English comic actor, writer and film director, famous as the first half of the comedy team Laurel and Hardy. His film acting career stretched between 1917 and 1951 and included a starring role in the Academy Award winning film...
- Oliver HardyOliver HardyOliver Hardy was an American comic actor famous as one half of Laurel and Hardy, the classic double act that began in the era of silent films and lasted nearly 30 years, from 1927 to 1955.-Early life:...
- Catherine Dale OwenCatherine Dale OwenCatherine Dale Owen was an American stage and film actress.-Stage career:Born to a prominent family in Louisville, Kentucky, Owen graduated from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City...
- Nance O'Neil
- Judith Vosselli
- Ullrich Haupt
- Elsa Alsen
- Florence LakeFlorence LakeFor the reservoir in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, see Florence Lake .Florence Lake was an American actress best known as the leading lady in most of the Edgar Kennedy comedy shorts.-Early life:In the early 1900s, her father and uncle toured with a circus in an aerial act known as...
Songs
- "The Rogue Song" (Sung by Lawrence Tibbett)
- "The Narrative" (Sung by Lawrence Tibbett)
- "Love Comes Like A Bird On The Wing" (Sung by Lawrence Tibbett)
- "The White Dove" (Sung by Lawrence Tibbett)
- "Swan Ballet" (Played by Studio Orchestra)
- "Once In The Georgian Hills" (Sung by Lawrence Tibbett)
- "When I'm Looking At You" (Sung by Lawrence Tibbett)
Laurel and Hardy
There were ten comic episodes throughout the film in which Laurel and Hardy appeared. One of these has survived on film. In this scene, there is a storm and a tent is blown away revealing Stan and Oliver. They try to sleep without any cover. A bear enters a cave. Stan and Oliver decide to seek shelter in the cave and, because it is so dark, they can't see the bear. Oliver thinks Stan is wearing a fur coat. The bear begins to growl. Stan and Oliver flee.Another segment, in which Laurel swallows a bee, has also survived on the trailer
Trailer (film)
A trailer or preview is an advertisement or a commercial for a feature film that will be exhibited in the future at a cinema. The term "trailer" comes from their having originally been shown at the end of a feature film screening. That practice did not last long, because patrons tended to leave the...
to the film, which has survived almost intact.
Production
The film is MGM's first All-Talking, All-Color (TechnicolorTechnicolor
Technicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...
) production. It was also the screen debut of Lawrence Tibbett, who was a world renowned star of the Metropolitan Opera. The film is notable today as Laurel and Hardy's first appearance in color, although at the time of release they were only minor players in the film.
The movie was adapted by John Colton
John Colton (screenwriter)
John Colton was a prolific American playwright and screenwriter. He spent the first 14 years of his life in Japan where his English father was a diplomat. After returning to the US he soon worked for a Minneapolis newspaper. He is best remembered for adapting Somerset Maughan's novel Rain into a ...
and Frances Marion
Frances Marion
Frances Marion was an American journalist, author, and screenwriter often cited as the most renowned female screenwriter of the twentieth century alongside June Mathis and Anita Loos.-Career:...
from the operetta
Operetta
Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...
Gypsy Love by Robert Bodansky and A. M. Willner
A. M. Willner
Alfred Maria Willner was an Austrian writer, philosopher, musicologist, composer and librettist. He began composing mostly music for the piano before making a career writing librettos for ballets, operas and operettas...
.
Lost film status
- Despite extensive searches, no complete print of the movie has been found. One reel features a ballet sequence by Albertina RaschAlbertina RaschAlbertina Rasch was a naturalized American dancer and choreographer.-Early life:Born in Vienna in 1891 to a family of Polish Jewish descent, Rasch studied at the Vienna State Opera Ballet school and became leading ballerina at the New York Hippodrome in...
and survives intact at the UCLA Film and Television ArchiveUCLA Film and Television ArchiveThe UCLA Film and Television Archive is an internationally renowned visual arts organization focused on the preservation, study, and appreciation of film and television, based at the University of California, Los Angeles. It holds more than 220,000 film and television titles and 27 million feet of...
. Another surviving reel features Lawrence Tibbett singing to Catherine Dale Owen survives at the Czech Film Archive in Prague. In addition, a short fragment exists which features Lawrence Tibbett and Catherine Dale Owen as they are caught in a storm. This fragment also features a short comic segment with Laurel & Hardy hide in a cave in which a bear has taken shelter. An almost complete print of the original trailer also survives at UCLA -- the first sixty seconds are lost, due to deterioration, but the sound survives complete as it was recorded on VitaphoneVitaphoneVitaphone was a sound film process used on feature films and nearly 1,000 short subjects produced by Warner Bros. and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1930. Vitaphone was the last, but most successful, of the sound-on-disc processes...
disks, rather than MGM's usual usage of MovietoneMovietone sound systemThe Movietone sound system is a sound-on-film method of recording sound for motion pictures that guarantees synchronization between sound and picture. It achieves this by recording the sound as a variable-density optical track on the same strip of film that records the pictures...
. In the trailer we see Lawrence Tibbett singing White Dove to Catherine Dale Owen. A short segment featuring the comics Laurel & Hardy is also seen in which Laurel has apparently swallowed a bee. In addition to these film fragments, the complete soundtrack survives because it was re-recorded on VitaphoneVitaphoneVitaphone was a sound film process used on feature films and nearly 1,000 short subjects produced by Warner Bros. and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1930. Vitaphone was the last, but most successful, of the sound-on-disc processes...
disks for theaters that did not have optical sound systems. Prints made in the early two-color TechnicolorTechnicolorTechnicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...
processes proved especially unstable due to the color dyes used, compounded by the instability of the nitrate filmNitrocelluloseNitrocellulose is a highly flammable compound formed by nitrating cellulose through exposure to nitric acid or another powerful nitrating agent. When used as a propellant or low-order explosive, it is also known as guncotton...
used for the negatives and prints. Digital restoration processes have been employed to transfer many early Technicolor films to more stable "safety" stock.
- The Lawrence Tibbett Estate held a color copy of the entire Rogue Song for many years after the Metropolitan baritone's death. Tibbett liked the film and showed it frequently to his friends. The late Allan Jones was a regular visitor and friend and reportedly gained possession of the print, which his son Jack JonesJack Jones (singer)John Allan "Jack" Jones is an American jazz and pop singer. He was one of the most popular vocalists of the 1960s.-Overview:...
unfortunately had to junk because of nitrate film decomposition.
- MGM held the negative of reel 4 until the early 1970s. It is believed that the entire film was stored in their Vault No. 71967 MGM Vault fireThe 1967 MGM Vault fire was a major fire that erupted on Saturday, May 13, 1967 at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's studio at Vault #7. An electrical fire burned the vault and destroyed hundreds of silent films, including A Blind Bargain, The Big City, The Divine Woman and, more famously, London After Midnight...
but was destroyed in the fire that occurred there.
- A recent discovery in the former East Germany has provided evidence that a German two-color print of the film was copied, dubbed into Russian, and sent to the Soviet Union.
- Lawrence Tibbett recorded some of the songs from the film in studio recordings released by RCA Victor on 78-rpm "Red Seal" discs.
See also
- List of United States comedy films
- Laurel and Hardy filmsLaurel and Hardy filmsThis is the complete list of films which either star or feature the comedy team of Laurel and Hardy. Together, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy appeared in 107 short films and features....
- List of lost films
- List of early color feature films