# infamous movies, never to be seen again **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 26, 2006, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264 "2006-04-26T06:39:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2006, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/61 "2006-04-28T20:29:33Z")
[QUOTE=Mr. Blue Sky] I doubt we’ll ever see _The Gong Show Movie_ on DVD (legitimately, that is). [/QUOTE] Maybe not, but it’s been on cable a lot recently. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2006, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/62 "2006-04-30T07:52:40Z")
[QUOTE=Krokodil] And this is the extent of my knowledge on the subject. If you ever find out more, please let me know! [/QUOTE] I think whoever posted that was pulling your leg. I can find no evidence of any short subject titled _The Radio-Pizza Show_, or any similar title starting with “Radio”. Not in the U.S. Copyright Catalog 1912-1939, or 1940-1949. Not in the _Variety_ movie reviews (yes, they reviewed short subjects, too). Not in the Internet Movie Database. The tip-off might be the idea of casting Jon Hall and Marjorie Main as a vaudeville team — she was twenty-five years older than he. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2006, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/63 "2006-04-30T08:22:51Z")
What’s more, when I do a search here, I find that there’s no poster ever named “lalbert” and no thread other than this one that contains all the words “radio”, pizza", “show”, “Main”, and “Hall”, although that may be just because it’s not possible to search certain time periods. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2006, 8:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/64 "2006-04-30T08:31:22Z")
[QUOTE=Wendell Wagner] What’s more, when I do a search here [/QUOTE] Here? **Krokodil** said it was posted to the alt.fan.cecil-adams Usenet newsgroup. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2006, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/65 "2006-04-30T08:42:13Z")
Sorry, I missed that when I read the post. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2006, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/66 "2006-04-30T14:06:05Z")
[QUOTE=Wendell Wagner] Sorry, I missed that when I read the post. [/QUOTE] And even if it were here, the search engine misses a lot, too. ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2006, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/67 "2006-04-30T14:25:23Z")
I found one other reference to _The Radio-Pizza Show_ on alt.fan.cecil-adams, posted by the same **lalbert** person. He’d mentioned a prior mention by somebody else in rec.arts.movies, but I couldn’t find anything archived on Google. Am I being whooshed? It wouldn’t be the first time. I don’t see any ironic kick that would make such a whoosh worthwhile on **lalbert** ’s part, though. And Jon/John Hall is a common enough name that maybe it was a different one from the one you cite. For every movie you’ve ever heard of, three are dozens more that you–and the IMDB–haven’t. More old movies slipped through the cracks than not. And Marjorie Main wasn’t the type of actress that film scholars are moved to write definitive biographies about. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2006, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/68 "2006-04-30T18:44:38Z")
[QUOTE=Krokodil] For every movie you’ve ever heard of, three are dozens more that you–and the IMDB–haven’t. [/QUOTE] As one of the most prolific contributors to the IMDb, I can say that the IMDb has its strong points and its weak points, but this would not be one of them. That all record of a short subject made by a Hollywood studio in the late 1930s would have disappeared is impossible, especially one in which several stars make cameo appearances. The nitrate materials may have disappeared, but there would still be studio records, Screen Actors Guild records, distributor records, copyright records, and industry reviews. The IMDb is better than you are give it credit. It is virtually complete for the first ten years of American commercial motion picture production, 1893-1903 (5,900 titles). And it is also virtually complete for the first eight years of American feature production, 1912-1920 (8,300 titles). And that is so even with only about ten percent of those movies physically existing today in complete form. As for the “John” Hall theory: The part you describe would be a principal role, and after [May 1937](http://www.sag.org/history/chronos_pages/30s.html) all principal roles, whether in features or in shorts, had to be cast from Screen Actors Guild members. There was no SAG member named John Hall, and Leo Gorcey did not start working in Hollywood until May 1937, having been brought there from the Broadway cast of _Dead End_ to do the movie version. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2006, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/69 "2006-05-04T02:14:31Z")
[QUOTE=Krokodil] And Marjorie Main wasn’t the type of actress that film scholars are moved to write definitive biographies about. [/QUOTE] Michelle Vogel, _Marjorie Main: The Life and Films of Hollywood’s “Ma Kettle”_ ([McFarland & Company](http://www.mcfarlandpub.com/book-2.php?isbn=0-7864-2322-6), 2006). ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2006, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/70 "2006-05-04T16:43:10Z")
[QUOTE=Walloon] Michelle Vogel, _Marjorie Main: The Life and Films of Hollywood’s “Ma Kettle”_ ([McFarland & Company](http://www.mcfarlandpub.com/book-2.php?isbn=0-7864-2322-6), 2006). [/QUOTE] Wow, I stand corrected! Your resources outstrip mine, Walloon, so let me ask you the question I posed to the alt.fan.cecil-adams NG: What is the earliest depiction of pizza in an American film that you can find? ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2006, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/71 "2006-05-04T17:02:42Z")
_The Crime of Dr. Forbes_ (1936), starring Gloria Stuart (of _Titanic_ fame), Robert Kent in the title role, and Hollywood’s favorite stock Italian Henry Armetta as Luigi. Produced and released by Twentieth Century-Fox. The first third of the plot summary in The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures: > [@](#): > > After his graduation from medical school, Michael Forbes accepts a position as the assistant to the renowned Dr. Eric Godfrey at the Jefferson Institute of Medical and Allied Sciences in New York. Michael works day and night for six months researching spondylitis-deformans, a disease which causes rigidity of the spinal column. After Michael meets Dr. Godfrey’s young and attractive wife Ellen, Dr. Godfrey encourages Michael and Ellen to use his opera tickets because he won’t be in town for the performance. On the way to the opera house, Ellen’s chauffeur has an accident outside a small Italian restaurant run by friendly Italian immigrants Luigi and his wife, who offer Michael and Ellen pizza. After hearing Luigi sing opera as he prepares the pizza, Michael and Ellen give Luigi and his wife their tickets and remain at the restaurant talking. Over the next few weeks, Luigi and his wife go to many operas, as Michael and Ellen spend evenings together at the restaurant, while Dr. Godfrey is away at an excavation site in Arizona investigating a cave where a fossil showing evidence of spondylitis-deformans has been found. The script was written in 1935, and filmed in April-May 1936. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2006, 10:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/72 "2006-06-03T10:18:04Z")
[QUOTE=Ranchoth] [_Greed_.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greed_%28film%29) [/QUOTE] Why would Greed be infamous? I know that there is only a quite shortened print available, but it is an excellent movie. The sad part is that so much of it was lost. I _love_ Zasu Pitts. ---
**Author:** ![BluePitbull](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e9bcb4/32.png) [@BluePitbull](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BluePitbull)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2006, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/73 "2006-06-03T13:34:03Z")
[QUOTE=Cicero] Why would Greed be infamous? I know that there is only a quite shortened print available, but it is an excellent movie. The sad part is that so much of it was lost. I _love_ Zasu Pitts. [/QUOTE] I was wondering the same. Some of the movies listed don’t seem “so infamous, that it will never be shown again”, they are just lost for some other reason ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2006, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/74 "2006-06-03T23:35:50Z")
[QUOTE=Cicero] Why would Greed be infamous? I know that there is only a quite shortened print available, but it is an excellent movie. The sad part is that so much of it was lost. I _love_ Zasu Pitts. [/QUOTE] My thinking is that it could be considered infamous _because_ so much of it was destroyed, and in the manner that is was. Kinda like Pearl Harbor. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2006, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/75 "2006-06-03T23:49:35Z")
…seems to be shown every once in a while. It is a pretty bad movie…you almost laugh at the stupid lines that John Wayne mouths. Hughes kept it under wraps for years, because the critics panned it. I could swear that AMC was running last year. ---
**Author:** ![Number](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/number/32/242_2.png) [@Number](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Number)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2006, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/76 "2006-06-04T03:21:43Z")
[QUOTE=Ranchoth] My thinking is that it could be considered infamous _because_ so much of it was destroyed, and in the manner that is was. Kinda like Pearl Harbor. [/QUOTE] Unfortunately that movie is still around. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2006, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/infamous-movies-never-to-be-seen-again/354264/77 "2006-06-04T14:03:57Z")
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