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Bubbles (film)

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Bubbles
Directed byRoy Mack
Starring
Cinematography
  • Howard Green
  • Willard Van Enger
Music by
  • M.K. Jerome
  • Harold Berg
Distributed byWarner Bros.
Release date
  • August 1930 (1930-08)
Running time
9 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Bubbles is a 1930 American Vitaphone Varieties short film released by Warner Bros. in Technicolor. It was filmed in December 1929 at the First National Pictures studio with Western Electric apparatus, an early sound-on-film system, Rel. No. 3898.[1][2] Bubbles is one of the earliest surviving recordings of Judy Garland on film, at 8 years old.[2][3][4]

Content

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A Vitaphone short film directed by Roy Mack, Bubbles features a land of make-believe where The Vitaphone Kiddies perform seven short singing, dancing and acrobatic acts. The opening act is Marjorie Kane singing "My Pretty Bubble". The second act is Judy Garland and her two older sisters, then known collectively as The Gumm Sisters, singing "In the Land of Let's Pretend", a song from Warner Bros' 1929 film On with the Show!, with Garland singing a short solo.[5][2][6] Five more brief acts follow, including a tap dancing number in ballet pointe shoes.[1]

Cast

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Preservation status

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This short film now exists in black and white through copies made for television syndication, and was included as an extra on the 2004 deluxe DVD edition of Meet Me in St. Louis (1944).[7]

Bubbles was one of the shorts included in the 1994 LaserDisc version of Judy Garland - The Golden Years at M-G-M.[8] The audio from the movie of Garland's song is included in the 2010 CD set Judy Garland – Lost Tracks 1929 - 1959.[9]

References

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  1. ^ a b Bubbles (Motion picture). Warner Bros. 1930. Rel. No. 3898.
  2. ^ a b c "Judy Garland Discography: The Gumm Sisters/Garland Sisters Short Films". thejudyroom.com.
  3. ^ "The Vitaphone Project! "A Night at the Palace" Hit at Film Forum (Spring/Summer-1996)". picking.com. "Bubbles" (1930) is a one-reel Vitaphone Variety, originally shot in Technicolor, but now only surviving in black and white. An all-kiddie musical, this short marks the earliest surviving screen appearance of Judy Garland, here seen with her sisters, billed as The Vitaphone Kiddies.
  4. ^ "The Vitaphone Project! Lost or Just Hiding? (Summer/Fall 2003)". picking.com. Judy Garland, as Frances Gumm, appeared with her sisters in three west coast-produced one reel Vitaphone Technicolor shorts. Two have no known film at all, and the third, BUBBLES ('30) survives only in a black and white print. Much of the color output was returned to the Technicolor Corporation in Hollywood, to the building now ironically occupied by the UCLA Film & Television Archive. Much of the stored footage was discarded in the 1950's as Technicolor itself moved away from the superior three-strip system in favor of the monopak approach of Eastman Color.
  5. ^ Bradley, Edwin M. (2005). The First Hollywood Sound Shorts, 1926-1931. McFarland & Company. p. 103. ISBN 9780786410309.
  6. ^ Liebman, Roy (2003). Vitaphone Films – A Catalogue of the Features and Shorts. McFarland & Company. p. 213. ISBN 9780786412792.
  7. ^ "Meet Me In St.Louis Blu-ray - Judy Garland". dvdbeaver.com.
  8. ^ "Judy Garland Discography: The Golden Years At MGM". thejudyroom.com.
  9. ^ "Judy Garland – Lost Tracks 1929 - 1959". thejudyroom.com.
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