MovieChat Forums > Imitation of Life (1934) Discussion > Time Frame Error?

Time Frame Error?

posted 16 years ago by andrewwjohnson
17 replies | jump to latest

.....According to the cast list Dorothy Black played Peola at age thirty five. The movie starts in 1919 when Peola, played by Sebie Hendricks, is four years old. This would mean the scene near the end of the movie where Peola turned up at her mothers funeral would have taken place in 1950 (?); sixteen years after the movie was released.....I'm aware that in the Novel Peola marries a white man and they move to South America, never to return, and the now iconic ending was added to get around the motion picture code ban on the depiction of miscegenation. I'm not sure how having Peola out in white society for sixteen years passing for white would have satisfied the Hays office. She could have found a white husband and had children in their early teens by then. Still if the scene had been added as a last minute concession it might not only explain the timeline dicrepency, but also why Dorothy Black, a British actress, played the role of Peola. Fredi Washington was not available to play the added scene or didn't want to do it....What ever the reason for the time frame error it was sadly prophetic. Racism was still a fact of life in 1950 and in different way even today.
People are just getting dumber, but more opinionated-Ernestine (Silks) in "The Human Stain"

[–] 16 years ago

[deleted]

[–] andrewwjohnson 15 years ago

.......My Guess is a lot of websites have errors on this subject. At least there doesn't seem to be any consensus on the subject...........Adding to the confusion the movie studios, during the thirties, only credited important adult actors. While the child actor, who played Peola in the scenes where she runs out of the classroom when her mother inadvertently exposes her background and blames her mother for being black, is important to the story she wasn't credited. IMdB and other references list her Serbie Hendrix. TCM lists her as a (one shot?) child actor named Dorothy Black which would explain the name confusion. After seventy five years and given the lack of official attribution I'm not sure anyone really knows. Maybe there were two child actors playing the role (as a toddler and a seven year old)early in the movie, before Fredi Washington played the character in her late teens..........There may be many cases of long gone actors like Dorothy Black having role attributed to them they never played. It's just nobody has noticed...........As for the time frame you guess is as good as mine. Maybe it reflects the original Fannie Hurst novel which involves Peola marrying a white man and moving to South America with him; the ending the Hayes Censorship office wouldn't permit.
TAG LINE: True genius is a beautiful thing, but ignorance is ugly to the bone.

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] andrewwjohnson 15 years ago

IMdB lists Serbie Hendrix. There isn't even a birth date on her IMdB page or any credits other then "Imitation of Life (1934). For a child actor who did such a good job playing the role of Peola in the classroom scene and rejecting her background, in the scene with her mother, she certainly didn't get any recognition. Either she never acted again or changed her name for professional (racial ?) reasons.

TAG LINE: True genius is a beautiful thing, but ignorance is ugly to the bone.

[–] digitaldiva 15 years ago

Hello andrewwjohnson,

I check the New York Times archives and found Andre Sennwald's review from November 24, 1934. Mr. Sennwald didn't care for the Hurst's novel but gave the film a passing grade and lists the credits at the end of his review. The credits clarify a question I believe you raised quite a while ago. They list Serbie Hendricks as Peola age 4 and Dorothy Black as Peola age 9.

[–] andrewwjohnson 15 years ago

That would make sense. Serbie Hendrick, who was apparently four at the time, played Peola at that age, in the opening of the movie and a nine year old child actress, named Dorothy Black, played the role later in the movie. Apparently TCM got it right although IMdB and Wikipedia still attribute the role to the much older British actress of the same name.

This sort of makes one wonder what happened to Dorothy Black, the child actress who's scenes, early in the movie, defined the Peola character, which Fredi Washington played as an adult. I doubt if she has an IMdB page (at least under her own name) and her best known name is credited to someone else.

There is no such confusion with the the 1959 version of "Imitation of Life". Karin Dicker is clearly credited as Sarah Jane ( the Peola character in the later version) and Susan Kohner plays her as an adult.

TAG LINE: True genius is a beautiful thing, but ignorance is ugly to the bone.

[–] digitaldiva 15 years ago

Dorothy Black is a common name and I doubt anyone knows what happened to the child actress who played in Imitation of Life. I've tried to correct things on the IMDB in the past and haven't had much luck. The British Dorothy Black worked in English films and on stage but unfortunately, there were no roles for children of mixed race at that time except in smaller, indie black films. Too bad, she was a talented little actress.

[–] andrewwjohnson 15 years ago

Dorothy Black, the British actress, would probably be very surprised to know she was listed as playing Peola in the 1934 version of "Imitation of Life" if she were still alive of course. As you pointed out she appeared in English movies and on stage. She also was in her thirties and couldn't possibly play a nine year old.

There is a rule in Hollywood, existing, even back in the twenties and thirties, no two actors can have the same name to avoid name confusion. Many actors had to change their names, before getting their first role, for that reason. I'm not sure having the same name as a character actor in another country would be considered a problem at the time.

Again, I'm not sure if the child actress, Dorothy Black, never acted again or changed her name. Whatever happened there isn't anything about her on IMdB or anywhere else.

If she had gone into independent black films she wouldn't have had any problems getting parts since very light skinned actors were the norm. Look at Oscar Micheaux's "With in Our Gates" or "Gods Step Children". Perhaps black audience of the time bought into the European idea of light skin and delicate features. All Hollywood gave them were dark skinned buffoons and mammy stereotypes. Even beautiful black actresses like Nina Mae Mckinney, Fredi Washington and Lena Horne were forced to, by the studios, to darken their skin with makeup.

TAG LINE: True genius is a beautiful thing, but ignorance is ugly to the bone.

[–] digitaldiva 15 years ago

The Screen Actors Guild which determined whether two actors could use the same name started in 1933 and was a fledgling union at the time Imitation of Life was filmed. Certainly a child actress named Dorothy Black could have filmed in Los Angeles while an adult actress with the same named could have worked in Great Britain at the same time. though as noted before Joseph Breen tried to derail the production. Perhaps the child actress Dorothy Black worked in black independent films or perhaps she never acted again. Regarding your comment about black actresses, Production Code stiffled the career of a number of actorsof color including the Asian actress Anna Mae Wong, sad but true.

[–] andrewwjohnson 15 years ago

........True, two actors in different countries could have the same name. Also rember one of them is a child actor who didn't even get credited or apparently worked under the name Dorothy Black anywhere else.........I think this is one of those mysteries that will never be solved. A google search of the name, Dorothy Black, comes up with a large number of entries for a modern day adult film star and a few for the British actress; still listing her as playing Peola at 35 in "Imitation of Life". The folks on the IMdB Need To Know board can't even figure this one out. ........Asians were discriminated against in Hollywood at least as much as much as blacks. Not only were to put in stereotypical roles and were prohibited by the code from appearing in romantic situations with Europeans, but they were in the odd position have having to compete with white actors for roles. One of the best known "Asian" actors was Warner Oland who was of course Swedish and played characters ranging from Fu Manchu to Charlie Chan. Even Pearl S. Buck's "The Good Earth" fell victim to "yellow face" casting........Anna Mae Wong did get to play some strong roles, but, much like many black actors from the same era, she often did better working in Europe.
TAG LINE: True genius is a beautiful thing, but ignorance is ugly to the bone.

[–] digitaldiva 15 years ago

Posters often note how racist Hollywood was but the real culprits were audiences and Joe Breen, Hollywood's Censor. The recent book about him doesn't go into detail about how racist he was and that he was the probable author of the anti-miscegnation clause in the Production Code, not Father Lord the priest who wrote the rest of the code. Father Lord was furious about it but Breen was intent on making sure that people of color didn't kiss on screen. Strangely it didn't seem to apply to Mexican actors and Polynesian women. I don't remember an Asian actor ever being cast as Charlie Chan in the past though there is a new movie being planned for 2011.

[–] andrewwjohnson 15 years ago

There were some long lost Charlie Chan movies filmed in China during the early thirties with all Asian casts. The American versions had a succession of actors from European backgrounds. The last actor, cast in the role was Peter Ustinov who had some well publicized Ethiopian ancestry, but he certainly wasn't Asian. Hopefuly if they really remake it they'll do it with a Chinese American actor, the character won't speak pidgin English and if he quotes Confucius he really is quoting Confucius.

As I noted weird casting wasn't unusual. Myrna Loy, who was of Welsh and Scotch decent, played so many Asian women the studio was actually worried about audience reaction when the cast her opposite William Powell in the "Thin Man" movies.

Austrian born Hedy Lamar was often cast as exotic native parts. Interesting when she played Tondelayo, an African (mulatto?) native, in "White Cargo" the Breen censorship office saw it as violation of the code prohibition against the depiction miscegenation. The background of the character was changed to Arab and Egyptian which was considered acceptable.

The very white Helen Morgan was cast as Julie, the tragic mulatto, in "Show Boat" (1938). Somehow they got the story past the Breen office. The earlier silent version was prohibited from going into the character's background even though it was a major part of the plot in the novel and stage version.

TAG LINE: True genius is a beautiful thing, but ignorance is ugly to the bone.

[–] digitaldiva 15 years ago

I think the new Charlie Chan involves an Asian American woman. There are two fairly young Asian American actors on the rise so who knows what will happen in the future?

I had an interesting conversation with a gentleman who is hosting a Pre-Code festival in Chicago. He's rather conservative and believes the code was a good thing; however, when one looks at the world of theaters in the late 20's, early 30's, you realize what could have been. Mae West certainly tried to help Lorenzo Tucker. I think there were eary attempts to film Lulabelle too. Breen almost derailed the original Imitation of Life and who knows what other projects were still born because of him?

[–] andrewwjohnson 15 years ago

..........I suppose "Charlie Chan" could work with a female character. It would be a clean brake with past stereotypes........It would be a bit hard to defend the old code system. There were movies, "Convention City" among others, that disappeared altogether........Also the code system was used to defend the indefensible. When Warner Brothers announced plans to produce a movie about Nazi concentration camps, during the late thirties, not only did the censorship office refuse to permit the release of the film but threatened to report the studio to the State Department. "Three Comrades", a movie set Germany during the thirties, any mention of the Nazis was prohibited, even though the organization that could not be identified was responsible for the death of one of the characters and forcing the other two to escape to South America. "The Mortal Storm" (1940) wasn't allowed to say anything about anti Semitism. The fact the family in the movie was named Roth and they were being persecuted for being non Aryan so I think most of the audience figured it out......As for for Mae West it is amazing she got away with as much as she did.
TAG LINE: True genius is a beautiful thing, but ignorance is ugly to the bone.

[–] digitaldiva 15 years ago

Hi andrewwjohnson,

I so agree about the code. I know that defenders think it made Hollywood more creative but I couldn't disagree more. It cemented Breen's very pedestrian attitudes toward sex, race and gender, toned down a number of films and stopped several from every being made.

I read Thomas Doherty's book, Hollywood Censor. Not a bad book but it soft pedals Joe Breen's racism and anti-Semitism and doesn't mention Imitation of Life at all. Breen hated Jews much like the notorious Father Charles Coughlin and did everything he could to curtail their power in an industry they built from the ground up. He was also a bigot which affected the careers of a number of artists of color. Truly a piece of work.

[–] bradford-1 9 years ago

Regarding credit confusion: Often done with Billy Daniels, the black crooner and William Daniels, a white cinematographer. I think the funniest credit confusion I've seen was between Louis Jourdan, the French 50s heartthrob and Louis Jordan, the black singer/Alto saxophonist. Several times I've seen it mentioned that "Jordan" appeared in films like GIGI and CAN-CAN! There a great photo that I think ran in Down Beat Magazine showing Jordan/Jourdan handing each other piles of the other guy's mail.
May I bone your kipper, Mademoiselle?

[–] digitaldiva 9 years ago

Hi Bradford-1,

So very true. It blows me away that people of the same name are often confused for each other though their work might be decades and continents apart. Love the Jourdan/Jordan story!