Post by Jim ReidPost by Ray FaiolaPost by Jim ReidWas the Eastman print part of the nitrate collection that MGM donated?
That I don't know. They never had ownership.
I just thought MGM might have a nitrate from the original 34 release
when they were the distributor. They sent a bunch of nitrate to the
Eastman house at some point from what I've heard. Didn't MGM own all
the Roach films they released until Roach bought them back in the
early 40s?
I think it was the reverse - Roach owed MGM money and transferred
ownership of BONNIE SCOTLAND, THE DEVIL'S BROTHER, PICK A STAR, and
MISTER CINDERELLA to Loews Inc.
BABES IN TOYLAND was sold to Boris Morros and William LeBaron in 1948
as they intended to remake the film. However, the Breen Office
condemned the new script (I've seen the memos) for containing elements
of incest and beastiality. So Morros and LeBaron (Federal Films)
decided to reissue the old picture and leased it to Robert Lippert.
You're probably right that the 1934 TOYLAND print was something in
MGM's vault and sent it to Eastman House. In fact, when I was
searching for the uncut version in 1991 (for a CBS/Fox project) it was
Dick May who finally pointed me to Eastman House. The closest I had
come up til then was the Auerbach print at the BFI. After confirming
that the Eastman House TOYLAND was the uncut version (since they
wouldn't ship nitrate and we didn't want to schlep up to Rochester,
they made us a 16mm pix & track neg of the first reel), CBS went about
licensing the picture from the owners - WPIX/Tribune. They were going
to release it along with all the Fox features. However, at the last
minute WPIX insisted we pay for colorization. CBS said "no", and WPIX
went to Goldwyn. But WPIX/Tribune had no idea that a complete print
even existed. They had 24 35mm prints of the Lippert reissue - some
foreign dubbed, but all edited. So you can thank CBS and (at the
time) the Grand Sheik of the NY Founding Tent of the Sons of the
Desert (which is the only reason I got involved with the home video
group since I'm at the Network) for unearthing the original magilla.