Alexander Carr Movies
Silent-film actor Alexander Carr was born in Rumni, Russia. Prior to coming to Hollywood he worked in the circus, vaudeville, and in the theater. In films, he is best known for playing Perlmutter in the comedy Potash and Perlmutter (1923) and its two sequels. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide- 1940
This modest Preston Sturges comedy stars Dick Powell as an office clerk dreaming of better things and Ellen Drew as his more pragmatic girlfriend. Powell convinces himself that his fortune will be made if he can win a slogan contest sponsored by a coffee company. Powell's contribution: "If you can't sleep at night, it isn't the coffee, it's the bunk!" Three of Powell's fellow workers decide to have some fun with him; they fake a telegram which announces that he's won the contest. The deception snowballs to the point that even the head of the coffee firm (Raymond Walburn) labors under the misapprehension that Powell has won. When the painful truth is revealed, Powell finds himself broke (because of all the creature comforts he's bought) and jobless, but at least he's retained the love of his wife. A cute deus ex machina to the story appears in the person of William Demarest, the foreman of the "jury" that is judging the slogan contest. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dick Powell, Ellen Drew, (more)
- 1933
In this comedy, a young couple are forced to marry after they are accidentally locked in a store overnight. Unfortunately for the young groom, his overbearing mother is unhappy with the match and keeps trying to get them divorced. She even follows them on their honeymoon. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George "Slim" Summerville, ZaSu Pitts, (more)
While Tonart Studios is filming a gangster movie, one of the actors is killed in a shooting accident. After several other incidents occur, police begin to think of sabotage. Their list of suspects includes the studio chief (Alexander Carr), his manager (Bela Lugosi), the director of the film (Edward Van Sloan) and an actress (Adrienne Ames). ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bela Lugosi, David Manners, (more)
- 1933
Her Splendid Folly is an old-fashioned comedy/drama from the misleadingly named firm of Progressive Pictures. Lillian Bond plays a dual role, a famous film star and her look-alike, a humble stenographer. The plot requires the stenog to pose as the movie queen, and in so doing she falls in love with Theodor von Eltz, the star's boyfriend. Her 15 minutes of fame brings Bond together with her long-lost mother Beryl Mercer, who has taken a job as a studio scrubwoman to be nearer to her daughter. Jewish-dialect comedian Alexander Carr is featured as the obligatory English-fracturing studio boss. Her Splendid Folly seems to have been filmed through the facilities of General Service Studios, then the home of Educational Pictures. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lillian Bond, Beryl Mercer, (more)
- 1932
Alexander Carr, a Jewish-dialect comedian usually confined to small roles, is practically the whole show in the sentimental drama No Greater Love. Carr is cast as delicatessen owner Sidney Cohen, who unofficially adopts Irish-Catholic orphan girl Mildred (Betty Jane Graham). Hoping to finance an operation that will enable the crippled Mildred to walk, Cohen hocks all his possessions and sells his store. The insensitive adoption authorities intervene, snatching Mildred from Cohen's arms, but the girl eventually walks all the same, inspired by the love of her foster father. No Greater Love was partially remade in 1938 as City Streets, with the protagonist changed to an Italian (played by Leo Carrillo). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dickie Moore, Alexander Carr, (more)
- 1932
Roly-poly comedian Jack Oakie in a serious role? Yes, that is exactly what you get with Uptown New York, an otherwise humdrum melodrama from lower echelon company World Wide Pictures. Oakie plays Eddie Doyle, a gumball machine salesman who marries Pat Smith (Shirley Grey) knowing full well that the girl is on the rebound from a failed romance with aspiring Jewish doctor Max Silver (Leon Ames). But when Pat is nearly killed in an effort to protect her husband's gumball machines from hoodlums and is in need of a lifesaving operation, Eddie calls on Dr. Max and then nobly fades into the background. While recuperating, Pat learns from one of Eddie's pals that her husband is languishing in prison, convicted of selling the business without consulting her, the part owner. The girl finally realizes that she truly loves the self-sacrificing Eddie and they reconcile. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jack Oakie, Shirley Grey, (more)
- 1926
This sequel to the popular ethnic comedy Potash and Perlmutter finds Jewish entrepreneurs Abe Potash (George Sidney) and Mawruss Perlmutter (Alexander Carr) joining forces in a used-car business. After another of their famous squabbles, Abe and Mawruss break up the partnership, whereupon gullible Abe falls into the hands of a pair of slick con artists. On the verge of being thrown in jail, Abe is rescued by Mawruss, who spirits his pal off to Canada by air. Our heroes are both vindicated at the end, permitting them to live scrappily ever after. Like its predecessor, Partners Again was based on a stage comedy by Montagu Glass and Jules Eckert Goodman. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George Sidney, Alexander Carr, (more)
- 1926
The Beautiful Cheat was a cute parody of the motion-picture business. Most of the story takes place in a fly-by-night movie studio run by the enterprising Abe Meyer (Alexander Carr). To save his company from bankruptcy, Abe builds a huge publicity campaign around his latest discovery, celebrated Russian actress Maritza Callahansky. Only Abe and his partners know that the divine Mlle. Callahansky is actually Brooklyn-born Mary Calahan (Laura LaPlante). The rest of the film concerns Mary's efforts to pull off her deception, which she does with considerable comic aplomb. The film was adapted from a serialized story in The Saturday Evening Post. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Laura La Plante
- 1926
One of the era's many ethnic (read: Jewish) comedies, this film starred Alexander Carr, a Broadway actor-playwright who made a career out of playing Lower East Side types. This time around, Carr played Jacob Goodman, a former pants-presser turned umbrella tycoon, whose daughter, Irma (Duane Thompson), falls for the handsome nephew (Raymond Keane) of the Goodman's nouveau riche neighbor, Mr. Applebaum (Snitz Edwards). The boy, however, is soon accused of theft; the crime, as Goodman discovers, is actually committed by Applebaum's no-good son, Joseph (Eddie Phillips. Little Baby Peggy (aka Diana Serra Cary), who earlier starred in her own series of 2-reelers, appeared here as one of the Goodman children. Produced by small-time company Chadwick, April Fool was based on a 1915 play written by Carr and Edgar Allan Woolf. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- 1924
Most of the elements that made the first Potash and Perlmutter film so successful are brought back here: Frances Marion is the scenario's author, Alexander Carr plays Mawruss Perlmutter, and Vera Gordon is Rosie Potash. The original Abe Potash, Barney Bernard, had died, but George Sidney does a good job as his replacement. In this entry, the two men give up the tailoring business and go into motion picture production. Their first film, however, stars all of Potash's relatives and is a complete failure. Blanchard, a banker (Anders Randolf), offers Potash and Perlmutter a hundred thousand dollars to make a film, providing they star his mistress, Rita Sismondi (Betty Blythe). Rita's presence incites much marital discord, and both Mrs. Potash and Mrs. Perlmutter (Gordon and Belle Bennett) threaten to leave their spouses. But everything is straightened out in the end -- the picture is a success and Rita dumps Blanchard, who was merely using her, in favor of her director, Sam Pemberton (Charles Meredith). Silent star Norma Talmadge and her comedienne sister, Constance Talmadge, have amusing cameos as actresses auditioning as vamps. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- 1923
Producer Samuel Goldwyn had first become familiar with Montague Glass' "Potash and Perlmutter" series of stories when he was a glove salesman. In 1923, he decided to make a film of the play (also written by Glass with Charles Klein), which went against the preference of most moguls of the day -- they shunned anything Jewish, although most of them were Jewish themselves. This ethnic comedy was Goldwyn's first as an independent producer. Alexander Carr as Morris Perlmutter and Barney Bernard as Abe Potash reprise the roles they played on Broadway; Vera Gordon, who played a Jewish mother in Humoresque, does so again here as Abe's wife Rosie. Potash's tailoring business is a failure, so he latches onto the more prosperous Perlmutter as a partner. Their enterprise promises to be a success, but they have an enemy in Feldman (Edward Durand), the rich attorney Potash has picked out as a husband for his daughter Irma (Hope Sutherland). Irma, however, has fallen in love with Boris Andrieff (Ben Lyon), a starving musician that Potash has hired as a fitter. When a murder is committed at the partners' establishment and Andrieff is charged with the crime, Feldman shows his true colors by refusing to clear the young man's name. Andrieff is eventually found to be innocent and proves to be a suitable husband for Irma. The film was so successful that Goldwyn made several more Potash and Perlmutter comedies. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Barney Bernard, Alexander Carr, (more)
