''Oliver Twist'' is a 1933 American
pre-Code
Pre-Code Hollywood was the brief era in the Cinema of the United States, American film industry between the widespread adoption of sound in film in 1929LaSalle (2002), p. 1. and the enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code censorshi ...
drama film
In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super-g ...
directed by William J. Cowen. The earliest sound adaptation of
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian e ...
's 1838
novel of the same name, it stars
Dickie Moore as Oliver,
Irving Pichel
Irving Pichel (June 24, 1891 – July 13, 1954) was an American actor and film director, who won acclaim both as an actor and director in his Hollywood career.
Career
Pichel was born to a Jewish family in Pittsburgh. He attended Pittsburgh Cent ...
as Fagin,
Doris Lloyd
Hessy Doris Lloyd (3 July 1891 – 21 May 1968) was an English–American film and stage actress. She is perhaps best known for her roles in ''The Time Machine'' (1960) and ''The Sound of Music'' (1965). Lloyd appeared in two Academy Award w ...
as Nancy, and
William "Stage" Boyd as Bill Sikes.
Released by
Monogram Pictures
Monogram Pictures Corporation was an American film studio that produced mostly low-budget films between 1931 and 1953, when the firm completed a transition to the name Allied Artists Pictures Corporation. Monogram was among the smaller studios i ...
, the film was made on an extremely low budget. The film never really achieved much success and was out of circulation for many years, but resurfaced on television in the 1980s.
Plot
Interspersed with segments of Dickens' novel comes the story of an orphan boy in 1830s London, who is abused in a workhouse, then falls into the clutches of a gang of thieves.
Cast
*
Dickie Moore as
Oliver Twist
''Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's Progress'', Charles Dickens's second novel, was published as a serial from 1837 to 1839, and as a three-volume book in 1838. Born in a workhouse, the orphan Oliver Twist is bound into apprenticeship with ...
*
Irving Pichel
Irving Pichel (June 24, 1891 – July 13, 1954) was an American actor and film director, who won acclaim both as an actor and director in his Hollywood career.
Career
Pichel was born to a Jewish family in Pittsburgh. He attended Pittsburgh Cent ...
as
Fagin
Fagin is a fictional character and the secondary antagonist in Charles Dickens's 1838 novel ''Oliver Twist''. In the preface to the novel, he is described as a "receiver of stolen goods". He is the leader of a group of children (the Artful Dod ...
*
William "Stage" Boyd as
Bill Sikes
William "Bill" Sikes is a fictional character and the main antagonist in the 1838 novel '' Oliver Twist'' by Charles Dickens. Sikes is a malicious criminal in Fagin's gang, and a vicious robber and murderer. Throughout much of the novel Sikes i ...
*
Doris Lloyd
Hessy Doris Lloyd (3 July 1891 – 21 May 1968) was an English–American film and stage actress. She is perhaps best known for her roles in ''The Time Machine'' (1960) and ''The Sound of Music'' (1965). Lloyd appeared in two Academy Award w ...
as
Nancy Sikes
*
Alec B. Francis as
Mr. Brownlow
Mr Brownlow is a character from the 1838 novel '' Oliver Twist'' by Charles Dickens. Brownlow is a bookish and kindly middle-aged bachelor who helps Oliver escape the clutches of Fagin. He later adopts Oliver Twist by the end of the novel.
T ...
*
Barbara Kent
Barbara Kent ( Barbara Cloutman) December 16, 1907 – October 13, 2011) was a Canadian film actress, prominent from the silent film era to the early talkies of the 1920s and 1930s. In 1925, Barbara Kent won the Miss Hollywood Beauty Pageant.
...
as
Rose Maylie
Rose Fleming Maylie is a fictional character in Charles Dickens' 1838 novel '' Oliver Twist'' who is eventually discovered to be the title character's maternal aunt. Though she plays a significant role in the novel, she is often omitted from drama ...
* Sonny Ray as
The Artful Dodger
Jack Dawkins, better known as the Artful Dodger, is a character in Charles Dickens's 1838 novel '' Oliver Twist''. The Dodger is a pickpocket, so called for his skill and cunning in that occupation. He is the leader of the gang of child criminals ...
*
George K. Arthur
Arthur George Brest (27 January 1899 – 30 May 1985), known professionally as George K. Arthur, was an English actor and producer, born in Aberdeen, Scotland,. He appeared in more than 50 films between 1919 and 1935, and is best known as t ...
as Toby Crackit
* George Nash as
Charles Bates
*
Clyde Cook as Chitfing
*
Lionel Belmore
Lionel Belmore (12 May 1867 – 30 January 1953) was an English character actor and director on stage for more than a quarter of a century.
Life and career
Onstage, Belmore appeared with Wilson Barrett, Sir Henry Irving, William Faversham, Lil ...
as Mr. Bumble
*
Tempe Pigott
Tempe Pigott (2 February 1869 – 6 October 1962) was an Australian silent and sound screen character actress. She was a stage actress in England and Australia, Canada and the United States for a number of years before entering motion pictures.
...
as Mrs. Corney
*
Nelson McDowell
Nelson McDowell (August 14, 1870 – November 3, 1947) was an American actor. He appeared in more than 170 films between 1917 and 1945.
McDowell was born in Greenville, Missouri. His parents were N. B. McDowell and Anne Hampton. He attend ...
as
Sowerberry
*
Virginia Sale
Virginia Sale (May 20, 1899 – August 23, 1992) was an American character actress whose career spanned six decades, during most of which she played older women, even when she was in her twenties. Over the 46 years she was active as an actr ...
as Mrs. Sowerberry
*
Harry Holman
Harry James Holman (March 15, 1862 – May 3, 1947) was an American character actor. He appeared in approximately 130 films between 1923 and 1947.
Biography
Born in Conway, Missouri, Holman dropped out of school in the ninth grade an ...
as Grimwig
* Bobby Nelson as Noah Claypole
Release
Early releases of the film include scenes with Oliver at Sowerberry's; these were removed for unknown reasons and makes the lasting cut look like Oliver escaped from the workhouse.
References
External links
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1933 films
American black-and-white films
Films based on Oliver Twist
Films about orphans
1933 drama films
Monogram Pictures films
Films set in London
American drama films
1930s English-language films
Films directed by William J. Cowen
1930s American films
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