Film and Television
Cantor also bounced back between movies and on radio. He had previously appeared in a number of short films, performing his Follies songs and comedy routines, and two silent features (Special Delivery and Kid Boots) in the 1920s. He was offered the lead in The Jazz Singer after it was turned down by George Jessel. Cantor also turned the role down (so it went to Al Jolson), but he became a leading Hollywood star in 1930 with the film version of Whoopee!, shot in two-color Technicolor. He continued making films over the next two decades until his last starring role in If You Knew Susie (1948).
Read more about this topic: Eddie Cantor
Famous quotes containing the words film and/or television:
“You should look straight at a film; that’s the only way to see one. Film is not the art of scholars but of illiterates.”
—Werner Herzog (b. 1942)
“In full view of his television audience, he preached a new religion—or a new form of Christianity—based on faith in financial miracles and in a Heaven here on earth with a water slide and luxury hotels. It was a religion of celebrity and showmanship and fun, which made a mockery of all puritanical standards and all canons of good taste. Its standard was excess, and its doctrines were tolerance and freedom from accountability.”
—New Yorker (April 23, 1990)