Film & Shorts Discussions > Random Comedy Reviews

Billie Gets Her Man (1948) - Billie Burke

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metaldams:
Yes, just watched this one and it’s almost proof Columbia had a house style of making shorts that applied to about everybody they made shorts with.  It will be interesting to see how the Langdon series goes, but that was earlier.  By 1948, when BILLIE GETS HER MAN was released, the Columbia style of pacing and slapstick was well established.

In this established environment, we get Billie Burke, a veteran comedienne in her sixties who obviously wasn’t going to be taking hard slapstick - so instead of tailoring a short to her, they build a typical Columbia short around her.  The results are entertaining, but this does play more like an ensemble piece than a Billie Burke short.  Still, Ms. Burke was wonderful with what she was given, having a way of delivering a skittish line.  If the short was centered around her completely, she would have worked wonderful in some type of boxed in domestic comedy, like early television.

What we get is a lot of slapstick by Dick Wessel and especially Emil Sitka.  This is definitely a prototype for Sitka’s Uncle Phineas in GENTS IN A JAM, down to the train of people running him over in the end and being the long lost rich lover.

Another short that should be of interest to Stooge fans.

...and after reading Sitka’s diary entry, understandable why Burke was not at the receiving end.  Fascinating read about what he went through and not a flattering portrait of Patsy Moran.

Umbrella Sam:
Based off of the few non-WIZARD OF OZ films I’ve seen Billie Burke in (MERRILY WE LIVE, ZENOBIA, and at least one other film I can’t recall the name of at this moment), Burke seems to pretty much be doing the same kind of comedy she usually did, and that’s a good thing. She seems to usually play a somewhat eccentric person, yet she’s so sweet that it’s hard to not like her, and if Sitka’s diary entries are to be believed, it seems she was just as nice in real life. And to Columbia’s credit, she does actually have some pretty funny spoken word gags. I especially loved when she asked the nurse, “Am I a grandfather or a grandmother?” instead of “Is it a boy or a girl?”

As far as the rest of the cast goes, they’re more in line with Columbia’s usual style, but they’re still very good at it. Dick Wessel plays the dumb guy and Patsy Moran the mean maid (and again, reading Sitka’s diary entries, I can see why she tended to get those parts). Sitka himself is the real standout, though, and he does do a lot of slapstick. Like metaldams mentioned, it’s very reminiscent of what would later be his role in GENTS IN A JAM. Despite doing almost nothing to anyone, the whole world just seems out to get him, and Sitka is great with delivering reactions.

Overall, I really enjoyed this short.

9 out of 10

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