ST Pre-Code—li'l tramp

[Robin Landseadel]

Shadow Ticket Pre-Code pg. 6: li’l tramp
 
Charlie Chaplin is mentioned on pg. 29, but the name of his best-known
character hides in this context:
 
Stuffy Keegan’s hooch-wagon gets blown up by forces unknown. Skeet
Wheeler (apparently Zoyd’s dad) rushes into the Unamalgamated
Ops office.

“That rig,” Skeet looking forlorn, “got him out of so many bad
situations . . . Called it his li’l tramp freighter of the streets and
in the end a blown-up wreck with zero resale value.”
 
The fate of both Stuffy and Skeet figures into the book’s resolution.

“Surprise Casserole”: Hicks at the dinner table of his far-right relative,
the ironically named Uncle Lefty has prepared his specialty.
 
Dinner-table talk, 1931:

“ . . . Der Führer,” gently, “is der future, Hicks. Just the other day
the Journal calls him ‘that intelligent young German Fascist.’”

“The called me Boy Inspiration of the Year once, look where it got me,”
 
“You can’t trust the newsreels, you only think you’ve seen him,
the Jews who control the movie business only allow footage that
will make him look crazy or comical, funny little guy, funny walk,
funny mustache, German Charlie Chaplin, how serious could he
be? But there also exist other Hitler movies, yes, some even filmed
in color, home movies, a warmer, gayer Hitler, impulsive, unorthodox,
says whatever comes into his head, what’s wrong with that?”
 
https://youtu.be/j0PmAK0jBxY?si=MxvaQd52pLdTRBHk

https://youtu.be/D6llaZefJDc?si=nZmwjBWylUGNROKQ

Well . . .

https://youtu.be/RxlopbcfXpQ?si=S_HgRoRRd4fZeSKF

Getting back to 1931: that was the year Chaplin released
“City Lights”. Chaplin wasn’t ready to place dialog in his films,
but ‘City Lights” was the first Chaplin film with a synchronized
soundtrack, in this case of a musical score. Many critics consider
it not only the highest accomplishment of Chaplin's career, but
one of the greatest films of all time. James Agee called the film's
final scene "the greatest single piece of acting ever committed to
celluloid:
 
https://youtu.be/ZJKfmsuvGHg?si=QU3bQT-Qu4xvgUbF
 
Lefty and Hicks couldn’t possibly know about “The Great
Dictator” from 1940—Chaplin’s first true sound film—but
the author knows we do.
 
https://youtu.be/-jj-PaqFrBc?si=a58LOvPWWNnsOLzL

And I suppose you all know how Chaplin was run out of town on a rail
by a posse of "anti-communist" (more like anti-union) witch-hunters
soon after the war.