Murray Roth

The Swell Head is a 1928 silent comedy short

A poor cobbler's son enters a $25,000 cross-country hiking contest sponsored by the footwear company that has nearly bankrupted his father. He also...

A young reporter pines for his high-school sweetheart, but she's preoccupied with appearing in their small town's community musical show. This 1934...

The Norman Thomas Quintet performs "Sleep Baby Sleep," "Listen to the Mockingbird," and "Melody in F," with quite a flair for comedy mixed in.

A hotel clerk from Iowa believes he's destined to collect first prize in a contest: a movie contract at a Hollywood studio.

George and Gracie enter an elegant drawing room, looking everywhere for something. Turns out, they're looking for the audience, and when George spots...

A plumber wins big at the racetrack but then his luck runs out and almost ruins his business. His manicurist girlfriend stands by him and helps him...

This Vitaphone short features Red Nichols and His Five Pennies performing songs, including China Boy, Nobody's Sweetheart, Ida Sweet as Apple Cider,...

A young man follows a pretty girl into her office, which turns out to be a musical dentist office. Cute chorus girls attend to the many male...

Robert L. Ripley first shows the very first cartoon of his, published in newspapers 8 years earlier. He then proceeds with various oddities, first...

At a charity bazaar, Ripley settles a thousand dollar bet by producing man who has not slept in 75 years.

The second entry in the Believe It or Not series of shorts begins with Robert Ripley in his office sorting his mail. At the time he received about...

Horace Heidt and His Californians plays "Tiger Rag", "Painting the Clouds with Sunshine", "Carnival of Venice" and "I'll Never Ask for More".

In a wordless story with semi-surreal stage sets, a poor black man ventures from his ramshackle rural home to the big city, where a dancing girl in a...

Young Pepper Jolly enters the life of sour old millionaire John Wilkes. She convinces him to take her gang to Coney Island and prevents his daughter...

Police search for the killer of a man who misused $700,000 intended for the Chinese Communists.

Eddie is conned into fronting a speakeasy for a local gangster who intends to frame him for the murder of a cop.

To stop his mother from marrying a man he doesn't like, a young millionaire hires an ex-con in helping him fake his own kidnaping.

Joe Palooka is a naive young man whose father Pete was a champion boxer, but his lifestyle caused Joe's mother Mayme to leave him and to take young...

Eddie, a modern man, suddenly finds himself in the palace in an ancient, mythical kingdom. This does not change his attitude or habits and, while...

A beautiful woman suspected of being a jewel thief is actually a detective tracking down a ring of bond thieves.

Patient Charlie McCarthy, running a fever, is tended by Doctor Edgar Bergen. Will a tonsillectomy cure him?

This brash comedy team toured extensively in vaudeville, and even made a Victor 78 of much of the material contained in this short.

Two college boys have a flat tire. They proceed to play music on a tire, a bassoon, a balloon and an umbrella.

A young actress is interviewed and flashes back to her tenement days.

Bobby Jarvis and Eloise Taylor, a scrapping married couple, enter a newspaper essay contest on Happy Marriage, and win a trip to Paris.

Juvenile drummer, Buddy Traps [sic], later known as Buddy Rich, taps out harmony out of a wide assortment of objects, from drums to bottles, can,...

Ripley shows unusual athletic feats, a boy born with "clock" eyes, and a blind French monk who invented navigation laws.

Reporters interview Ripley about his world travels.

An energetic "heavyweight" song and dance troupe of six performs with gusto.

Gags and patter from an armed man at a musicale.

Henlere plays piano in the style of various “masters” and other instruments as a one-man band.

A plumber wins big at the racetrack but then his luck runs out and almost ruins his business. His manicurist girlfriend stands by him and helps him...

A comedic team. The Ann seems to try and come across as a Mae West type. Jay plays the role of the straight partner.

Ben Bernie and his orchestra play a few songs for a vitaphone recording.

Harry Fox performs his vaudeville act.

Two bums manage to get into a restaurant. They admit that they are a couple of self made men. A couple of comics they are.

Pressed into service, an inept comedian offers a burlesque on Helen Morgan.

The Mound City Blue Blowers and Doris Walker perform popular songs of the day.

The film starts off with Edith Murray joining the band for "Some of These Days" and right from this moment you know this thing isn't going to work....

This Vitaphone short features the Kjerulf Mayfair Quintette in their only film performance. Their act is basically five women, three on a harp, one...

The comedy team of Jack Born and Elmer Lawrence perform their vaudeville act.

Vitaphone short in which Charles C. Peterson performs a number of challenging billiard trick shots.

Billie 'Swede' Hall & Company in the comedy short 'Hilda'.

Vitaphone short in which Oklahoma Bob and his two "daughters" perform a series of musical numbers, including an exciting new dance craze.

The Gotham Rhythm Boys perform a few of their songs.

Fred Ardath does his drunken vaudeville act in 'These Dry Days'.

Harry Fox & Beatrice Curtis perform parts of their vaudeville act.

Mel Klee performs his black-face vaudeville act in 'The Prince of Wails'.

Douglas Stanbury & The Lyric Quartet sing a few songs.

Dooley and Sales vaudeville act 'Dooley's the Name'.

Mr. Young introduces the sketch in an appropriately melodramatic fashion, wearing an opera cape and a glowering expression. He recites a bit of...

Anderson and Graves vaudeville act 'Fishing Around'.

Carlena Diamond plays her harp for this Vitaphone production reel #864.

Irked by the success of a brassy nightclub owner. her rivals set out to drive her out of business, and frame her for a murder in the bargain.

Says how much he likes ballet. He wonders why the girls are always running with no one chasing them. And the male dancers are always running to the...

Grace starts the film by singing 'That's My Baby.' The five band members do an instrumental, then Grace sings 'Glad Rag Doll.'

Mr. Fiasco, a producer of plays gets three plays explained to him. In one of the plays, a man chooses scotch for a drink and dies. In the second play...

The Whispering Coronetist, Roy Fox and His Orchestra are broadcasting from Warner Bros. Studios and perform these three musical numbers: 1. 'Sally Of...

Felix Rudolff is a dressmaker tailor and later dresses like a policeman after seeing a parade He becomes a rookie policeman who handcuffs Dynamite...

Sings a song he and five others wrote, 'You Want Lovin', and I Want Love.' Does a comedy skit. Then he sings another song he says he wrote, 'Can't...

Man from small town comes to New York to be best man at an old friend's wedding. He mistakenly supposes that the girl and her family are after his...

Short musical comedy.

A musical short starring, Zelda Santley and Victor Pelle.

Opera singer Carolina Segrera belts out a couple tunes in this early Vitaphone short that has her being backed by don Alberto and His Argentines.

Clara Barry & Orval Whitledge dry comedy routine.

Bobbe Arnst accompanied by Peggy Ellis on piano plays us a few songs.

Two strip Technicolor short film. While the film is considered lost, the Library of Congress has acquired a musical sequence from the film.

The story of the training and adventures of several airline stewardesses.

A vaudeville act. Trixie Friganza performs first a story and then a song. For the story, she wears a wide-brimmed had and a matching diaphanous...

Comedian Chaz Chase performs his vaudeville act.