The most beautiful legs in Berlin

Movie
Original title	The most beautiful legs in Berlin
Country of production	Germany
original language	German
Publishing year	1927
length	6 acts, 2,327 yards, 90 minutes
Rod
Director	Willi Wolff
script	Willi Wolff, Robert Liebmann
production	Ellen Richter -Film GmbH.
music	Otto Stenzel
camera	Axel Graatkjaer
occupation
Ellen Richter, Henry Bender , Teddy Bill , Kurt Ehrlich , Kurt Fuß , Kurt Gerron , Dina Gralla , Bruno Kastner , Rudolf Lettinger , Kurt Lilien , Rudolf Meinhardt-Jünger , Frida Richard , Fritz Richard , Julius von Szöreghy , Alice Torning

The most beautiful legs of Berlin is the title of a silent revue film that director Willi Wolff made in Berlin in 1926/27 for his wife's production company, Ellen Richter-Film GmbH Berlin, based on a script that he wrote together with Robert Liebmann . Ellen Richter also took on the lead role of the dancer Dolores; her opponent in the competition, the dancer Poupette, played Dina Gralla . A sparkling revue atmosphere conjured up appearances by the dance troops Charell Boys, Dodge Sisters and Original Lawrence Tiller Girls , while well-known Berlin comedians such as Henry Bender , Kurt Gerron and Kurt Lilien provided down-to-earth comic relief .

action

A beauty competition against the background of a big revue in a capital city variety theater offers a welcome opportunity to put the 'most beautiful legs in Berlin' into the picture. The private entanglements of the women contending for the prize, the dancers Dolores and Poupette create tension. Stage comedians like Bender, Gerron and Lilien can be seen in funny scenes. The dance performances of the legendary Lawrence Tiller Girls, the Dodge Sisters and the Charell Boys offer additional show values.

background

The film was available on March 17, 1927 under the number B.15 274 of the test center in Berlin and was banned from young people. The first performance took place on July 28, 1927 in Berlin in the representative large cinema UT Kurfürstendamm .

The film was awarded by Universum Film UFA in Germany under the original title “The most beautiful legs of Berlin”. In Austria it ran under the distribution title “The woman with the most beautiful legs”, later also as “The big revue”.

The film structures were created by Ernst Stern , the illustration music in the cinema wrote and directed by Otto Stenzel .

The film also got a title hit, composed by Walter Kollo based on a text by Willi Wolff. It was also successful outside of the cinema and has been passed down several times in gramophone recordings by well-known bands:

• The most beautiful legs in Berlin: Fox and Charleston / Walter Kollo - text by Willi Wolff. Paul Godwin ms artist ensemble u. Singing. Record “Grammophon” 21 089 / B 41 845 (mx. 608 bd), put on. 1927

• The most beautiful legs in Berlin: Fox and Charleston from the film of the same name / Walter Kollo - text by Willi Wolff. Odeon dance orchestra with vocals. Odeon O-2194 (die number Be 5907), also Beka B.6192-I (mx. 34 146) as “Saxophone Orchestra Dobbri” . 1927

Note: Robert Gilbert (actually: Robert David Winterfeld) wrote a hit text to the melody by Fritz Loewe as early as 1924, "Kathrin, you have the most beautiful legs in Berlin" and had his first success with it.

reception

The title page of a Munich illustrated magazine from December 9, 1927 quoted the film title as the headline for a photo, to which a Ms. Meyn (standing on the table showing her legs), the film diva Fern Andra and her husband at the time, the middleweight boxer Kurt Prenzel , said are seen.

literature

• Herbert Birett: Silent film music. Material collection. Deutsche Kinemathek Berlin. Berlin 1970, DNB 456121080 .
• Hans-Michael Bock, Michael Töteberg, CineGraph, Hamburg Center for Film Research: The Ufa book. Art and crises, stars and directors, business and politics; the international history of Germany's largest film company. In cooperation with CineGraph - Hamburg Center for Film Research eV [Rolf Aurich, Manfred Behn, Marie-Luise Bolte ...]. Zweiausendeins , Frankfurt am Main 1992, p. 162, DNB 930775236 .
• Heinrich Fraenkel: Immortal Film. The great chronicle from the laterna magica to the sound film. Part of the picture by Wilhelm Winckel. Kindler , Munich 1956, pp. 144, 399, 425. DNB 451329279 .
• Horst O. Hermanni: The film ABC. From Jean Gabin to Walter Huston , Volume 3. BoD - Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2009, ISBN 3-8334-2377-3 , p. 76.
• Wolfgang Jansen: Splendid revues of the twenties Edition Hentrich , Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-926175-34-6 , pp. 117–118 (Photo Kurt Lilien), 121–126 (Tiller Girls) (= sites in the history of Berlin , volume 25) .
• Reinhard Kloss, Thomas Reuter: body images. Human ornaments in revue theater and revue film. Syndikat , Frankfurt am Main 1980, pp. 10, 73, 115. ISBN 3-8108-0140-2 .
• Hans Helmut Prinzler: Chronicle 1895-2004. In: Wolfgang Jacobsen, Anton Kaes, Hans Helmut Prinzler (Hrsg.): History of German film . 2nd, updated and expanded edition. Metzler , Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 978-3-476-01952-3 .
• Hans Helmut Prinzler: Light and Shadow. Films of the Weimar Republic 1918-1933. Schirmer Mosel , Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-8296-0588-5 .
• Ulrike Traub: Theater of Nudity - On the Change in Meaning of Bare Bodies on the Stage since 1900. Transcript , Bielefeld 2010, ISBN 3-8376-1610-X , pp. 102, 152–153, 157 (= theater , volume 24, also dissertation on the University of Bochum ).
• Kay Less : "In life, more is taken from you than given ...". Lexicon of filmmakers who emigrated from Germany and Austria between 1933 and 1945. A general overview. ACABUS Verlag, Hamburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-86282-049-8 .
• Friedrich von Zglinicki: The way of the film. The history of cinematography and its predecessors . Rembrandt-Verlag, Berlin 1956, DNB 455810680 .

Web links

• Most legs from Berlin in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• “The most beautiful legs of Berlin” at filmportal.de , there also seven still photos from the film.
• Ellen Richter at steffi-line
• Ellen Richter at the postcard archive
• The Dodge Sisters, the twins Betty and Beth at screen goddess [8]
• The Dodge Sisters, the "Birds Of Paradise", at jazzageclub [9]
• The sixteen Lawrence Tiller Girls, photo postcard [10]
• Photo of the Lawrence Tiller Girls, taken in Berlin around 1925 [11] from the Saturday edition of the Chicago Daily News
• Photo postcard from Kapellmeister Otto Stenzel with hsl. Dedication [12]

Individual evidence

1. ↑ actually Käthe Weiß (1891-1969), cf. Less pp. 423–424
2. ↑ cf. jazzageclub: " On 18 August 1926, they opened in Herman Haller's spectacular revue An Und Aus (In and Out) at the Admiral Palast, Berlin along with La Jana, Alice Hechy, Trude Hesterberg and Ruth Zackey. The show ran through until 22 March 1927 and was then transferred to the Apollo Theater, Vienna (25/3/27 - 28/4/26) and in a theater in Dresden for a short run from 1 May 1927 (in which the Sisters did not appear). During their stay in Berlin they were lured into German movies and appeared in Conrad Wiene's Unter Ausschlub Der Offentlichkeit (1927) and Willi Wolff's Dei Schonsten Bein von Berlin (1927). "
3. ↑ Union Theater (UT), over 1000 seats, opened on October 3, 1913 with the film "The Island of the Blessed" by theater director Max Reinhardt , cf. Zglinicki p. 439; Prinzler: Chronicle, 1895-2004, cit. according to film portal [1]
4. ↑ cf. Zglinicki p. 423
5. ↑ cf. Birett, sources on film history 1920 - 1931 [2]  : B15274 Woman with the Most Beautiful Legs, Die (additional title), B15274 Grosse Revue, Die (additional title)
6. ↑ Stenzel, who also wrote to Stenzeel , was the director of the cinema in the UT Kurfürstendamm from 1926 to 1930, later he directed the orchestra of the »Scala« Berlin until 1943 , cf. Birett p. 206
7. ↑ listen on youtube, here sings uncredited Franz Baumann [3]
8. ↑ Label shown at [4] , to be heard on youtube [5] here Alfred Strauss sings uncredited .
9. ↑ cf. Robert Gilbert at LexM [6] ; Robert Koppel sang a gramophone recording on the Beka label : B.5151-II (32 474), aufgen. August 13, 1924, music by Fritz Loewe, text “Robert H. Winter” [sic], cf. Zwarg Diskographie PARLOPHON Matrix Numbers - 30173 to 34999: German, p. 301
10. ↑ “The most beautiful legs of Berlin” (Ms. Meyn, film diva Fern Andra, husband boxer Kurt Prenzel): cover of DER BLITZ. 4th year, No. 49 / Munich, December 9, 1927 [7]