Mixed Nuts

Series: All Stars

Director: James Parrott

Producer: Hal Roach

Dialogue: H.M. Walker

Photography: Francis Corby

Editor: William H. Terhune

Sound: Warren B. Delaplain

Stars: Douglas Wakefield, Billy Nelson, Jack Barty, Don Barclay

Company: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Released: 17 February 1934

Length: 2 reels

Production No.: B-4

Filming dates:

Rating: 6/10

Mixed Nuts

Available on DVD:

A training experiment is set up in an all-female finishing school to educate a group of chorus girls, much to the disgust of its owner, Mrs. Twitchett (NORA CECIL). Professor Billy (NELSON) wastes no time in getting the girls into shape. He demonstrates to a large group of girls how to pack a punch and is promptly whacked by one of them (DOROTHY GRANGER), who turns out to be far stronger than he is. A second demonstration sees him picked up and thrown through the air and crashing down to the floor off the wall.
Professor DON BARCLAY hosts the art class and is immediately appalled by two ladies who tease him over a supposed painting of a man drinking a beer they had made. He hears their explanations of the blank portrait and tells them, "you'll pardon me if I ignore you". Across the hall, Professor Wakefield is conducting an experiment and is interrupted by one of the girls (THELMA HILL) when he pulls her into the room using a large net whilst trying to capture a butterfly. After the embarrassing apology he offers her, he accidentally tips a pot of fleas down her dress. She itches, wriggles and squeals herself out into the hall, where a bemused and suspicious Mrs. Twitchett observes her strange behaviour.

That night, some of the girls decide to pull a prank on Professor Barclay by putting a life-size female dummy in his room. He gets into bed in the darkened room and quickly sees the 'woman' lying next to him. A few screams and gropes later, he realises what it is before launching it from his upstairs window in a very undignified manner! Moments later, after Professor Wakefield comforts Barclay, Wakefield returns to his own room to find a woman in his bed. He thinks it is another prank but gets quite a shock to discover she is in fact a sleepwalker who wandered into his room. The girls ring a bell to attract her attention and bring her out of the professor's room in her deep state of sleep. Soon afterwards, Mrs. Twitchett is also seen sleepwalking along the corridors but nobody gives her a second thought!
Lastly, the government officials pay the school a visit and witness for themselves how things are progressing. The girls are on stage, singing and dancing whilst their professor tutors sing in top hats in accompaniment. Mrs. Twitchett comes dancing down the corridor with a silly expression on her face!

Douglas Wakefield, Don Barclay, Billy Nelson and Jack Barty in Mixed Nuts (1934)

Trivia
• Copyrighted February 6, 1934.
• Mixed Nuts appears on the "Lost Films of Laurel & Hardy" DVD only because it was an error on Michael Agee's part. He believed he was transferring the Stan Laurel solo film of the same name, but just left it in as the master disc had already been processed and would have cost a great deal of time and money to rectify. It had to be shipped out to Image by a certain promised date.
• The man who bids farewell to his sobbing daughter when they arrive at the school is Our Gang producer Robert McGowan.
• The building which is used as the all-girl's school is the same one later used for the sanitarium in Public Ghost #1 (1935).
• The government had released the sum of $50,000 for unemployed bummers.
• The government's announcement to allocate $2million to the chorus girls is published in the New York Evening Press.
• The first shot of Mrs. Twitchett reveals quite an obvious rear-projection of the cars and girls coming down the driveway.
• The girl playing the piano in the art class is clearly not hitting the correct keys in time with the music.
• The girl in Professor Barclay's class who paints the picture of a cow is an uncredited Carol Tevis - the squeaky-voiced 'Mrs. Hardy' in Laurel and Hardy's Twice Two.
• When the weights fall on Professor Nelson's head (the funniest scene in the film in my opinion), the last one echoes the famous bell sound from when Oliver Hardy whacks Stan over the head in Perfect Day.
• As the three girls take the dummy into Barclay's bed, the blonde woman very briefly exposes her right breast through her slipping black neglegee (you need to be quick on the freeze-frame to see it, but it is there!)
• The legs we see walking down the hallway towards the end of the film are clearly not those belonging to Nora Cecil.
• The calendar we see for February shows that it has 28 days, indicating that it was not a leap year. This film was made at the end of 1933, which was not a leap year (1932, and 1936 were). The calendar shows that February 1st fell on a Wednesday. This proves that the calendar belonged to the year 1933, as this would have been correct.
• When the government officials walk in on the dance rehearsals at the end, look at the woman on the far left of the screen. When she flicks up her skirt, she clearly is not wearing any underwear!!

My opinion
• A decent little film, in which it has to be said Don Barclay completely steals every scene!

	Douglas Wakefield Professor Wakefield
	Billy Nelson Professor Fabian Nelson
	Jack Barty Mr. Twitchett
	Don Barclay Professor Julius Barclay
	Thelma Hill Chorine
	Nora Cecil Mrs. Twitchett
	Dorothy Granger Chorine who packs a punch
	Betty Danko Miss Danko
	Robert A. McGowan Father of crying girl
	Ellinor Vandeveer Spectator at meeting
	Carol Tevis Girl in art class
	Howard Truesdale Meeting official
	UNIDENTIFIED Protester at meeting