from MGM
Directed by
Tod
Browning
Starring
Wallace Ford (Phroso)
Leila Hyams (Venus)
Olga Baclanova (Cleopatra)
Roscoe Ates (Roscoe)
Henry Victor (Hercules)
Harry Earles (Hans)
Daisy Earles (Frieda)
Rose Dione (Madame Tetrallini)
Daisy Hilton (Siamese Twin)
Violet Hilton (Siamese Twin)
Schlitze (Herself)
Josephine Joseph (Half-Woman, Half Man)
Johnny Eck (Half Boy)
Frances O'Connor (Armless Girl)
Peter Robinson (Human Skeleton)
Olga Roderick (Bearded Lady)
Koo Koo (Herself)
Randion (The Living Torso)
Martha Morris (Armless Girl)
Zip (Pinhead)
Pip (Pinhead)
Elizabeth Green (Bird Girl)
Angelo Rossitto (Angeleno)
Edward Brophy (Rollo Brother)
Matt McHugh (Rollo Brother)
Louise Beavers (Maid)
Albert Conti (Landowner)
Ernie Adams (Sideshow patron)
Tom London
Elvira Snow (Elvira, a pinhead twin)
Jenny Lee Snow (Jenny, a pinhead twin)
Written by
Al Boasberg
Willis Goldbeck
Leon Gordon
Clarence Aaron 'Tod' Robbins (novel Spurs)
Edgar Allan Woolf |
 Tod Browning, who directed Bela
Lugosi in the original Dracula,
stepped into even eerier territory with this 1932 story of betrayal and
retribution in the circus. Evil trapeze artist Olga Baclanova seduces and
marries a midget in the circus sideshow, hoping to inherit his wealth. But
in doing so, she has crossed the wrong folks: the tightly knit group of
nature's aberrations, who stick together like family--and who set out to
avenge their little pal. Browning brought in some of the most famous sideshow
attractions of the era, include Siamese twins Daisy and Violet Hilton and
Johnny Eck the Legless Boy, as well as Zip and Pip, microcephalics whose
appearance in this film inspired cartoonist Bill Griffith to create his
comic strip, "Zippy the Pinhead." So disturbing that it was banned
for 30 years in Great Britain.
|