Hidden Hollywood - Treasures from the 20th Century Fox Vaults
The proper title isn't so muchHidden HollywoodasCool Stuff We Found in the Vault at Twentieth Century Fox. This grab bag consists of segments snipped from Fox pictures for reasons of length or content, and the results are uneven but fascinating. Musical numbers abound and provide some fun, but Fox wasn't exactly MGM (and remember, this is the material deemed expendable). The jewels in the first volume include two routines fromCafé Metropole, starring the graceful dancer Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, and a bizarre patter song by Bert Lahr that qualifies as authentic American surrealism (as host Joan Collins admits, the studio cut the song because they were completely bewildered by it). There's also an entire, self-contained sequence from the omnibus filmWe're Not Married, featuring an irascible Walter Brennan in an amusingTobacco Road-style vignette. Plus, Edward Everett Horton does a pantomime of Gypsy Rose Lee: a golden 10 seconds.--Robert Horton