Watching a film like The MIghty McGurk and seeing those scenes between former
pug Wallace Beery and young English orphan Dean Stockwell you can hardly believe you are seeing one of the great misanthropes of the last century. I can't
find anyone who enjoyed working with Wallace Beery..
Still seeing The Mighty McGurk might convince you Beery was the greatest actor who ever lived knowing what we know about him. This film has Beery working for saloonkeeper Edward Arnold as a bragging bouncer on retainer. Beery gets an assignment to pick up Arnold's daughter Dorothy Patrick over from the boat from Great Britain. But he muffs it and winds up with young English orphan Dean Stockwell who has come over to be with his uncle who has taken a powder with company funds.
So the two are kind of stuck with each other. If you've seen Treasure Island or The Champ with Beery and young Jackie Cooper you know what you'll get with this film.
As for Arnold he wants the corner location of the Salvation Army has on The Bowery where former fighter and Beery protege Cameron Mitchell is running the place. He wants Beery's help to get him out one way or another. Gives Beery some critical choices to make. Aline McMahon gets the roles that usually went to Marie Dressler or Marjorie Main as the pawnbroker who Beery parks his championship belt with when he needs a few bucks.
The Mighty McGurk is a pleasant piece of turn of the last century nostalgia.
Still seeing The Mighty McGurk might convince you Beery was the greatest actor who ever lived knowing what we know about him. This film has Beery working for saloonkeeper Edward Arnold as a bragging bouncer on retainer. Beery gets an assignment to pick up Arnold's daughter Dorothy Patrick over from the boat from Great Britain. But he muffs it and winds up with young English orphan Dean Stockwell who has come over to be with his uncle who has taken a powder with company funds.
So the two are kind of stuck with each other. If you've seen Treasure Island or The Champ with Beery and young Jackie Cooper you know what you'll get with this film.
As for Arnold he wants the corner location of the Salvation Army has on The Bowery where former fighter and Beery protege Cameron Mitchell is running the place. He wants Beery's help to get him out one way or another. Gives Beery some critical choices to make. Aline McMahon gets the roles that usually went to Marie Dressler or Marjorie Main as the pawnbroker who Beery parks his championship belt with when he needs a few bucks.
The Mighty McGurk is a pleasant piece of turn of the last century nostalgia.