Editing Burns and Allen (section)

==Motion pictures==
In the early days of talking pictures, the studios eagerly hired actors who knew how to deliver dialogue or songs. The most prolific of these studios was [[Warner Bros.]], whose [[Vitaphone Varieties]] shorts captured vaudeville headliners of the 1920s on film.

Burns and Allen earned a reputation as a reliable "disappointment act" (someone who could fill in for a sick or otherwise absent performer on a moment's notice). So it went with their film debut. They were last-minute replacements for another act ([[Fred Allen]]) and ran through their patter-and-song routine in ''Lambchops'' (1929). After a restoration, the film was released on [[DVD]] in October 2007, on disc three of a three-disc 80th anniversary edition of ''[[The Jazz Singer]]''.<ref name="New DVDs: The Jazz Singer">{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/movies/homevideo/16dvd.html?pagewanted=print&_r=0 |url-access=subscription |title=New DVDs: The Jazz Singer |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |date=October 16, 2007 |access-date=2014-11-17}}</ref><ref name="warnerbros.com">{{cite web |url=http://www.warnerbros.com/studio/news/%E2%80%9C-jazz-singer-80th-anniversary-collector%E2%80%99s-edition%E2%80%9D-dvd-warner-home-video |title='The Jazz Singer 80th Anniversary Collector's Edition' DVD From Warner Home Video |publisher=[[Warner Home Video]], July 9, 2007 |access-date=2014-11-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141129020650/http://www.warnerbros.com/studio/news/%E2%80%9C-jazz-singer-80th-anniversary-collector%E2%80%99s-edition%E2%80%9D-dvd-warner-home-video |archive-date=November 29, 2014 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

[[Paramount Pictures]] used its East Coast studio to film New York-based stage and vaudeville stars. [[Eddie Cantor]], [[Fred Allen]], [[Ethel Merman]] and [[Smith and Dale]] were among the top acts seen in Paramount shorts. Burns and Allen joined the Paramount roster in 1930 and made a string of one-reel comedies through 1933, usually written by Burns and featuring future Hollywood character actors such as [[Barton MacLane]] and Chester Clute.

In 1932, Paramount produced an all-star musical comedy, ''[[The Big Broadcast]]'', featuring the nation's hottest radio personalities. Burns and Allen were recruited, and made such an impression that they continued to make guest appearances in Paramount features through 1937. Most of these used the ''Big Broadcast'' formula of an all-star comedy cast. In 1935 the team also starred in a pair of low-budget features, ''Here Comes Cookie'' and ''Love in Bloom''.

At [[RKO Pictures|RKO]], [[Fred Astaire]] succeeded in his efforts to make a musical feature without [[Ginger Rogers]], and the studio borrowed Burns and Allen from Paramount for the 1937 film, ''[[A Damsel in Distress (1937 film)|A Damsel in Distress]]''. Their names appeared with Astaire's before the title. Under contract to RKO, the young [[Joan Fontaine]] was assigned as Astaire's romantic interest, but when she proved to be an inadequate dance partner Astaire did most of his dancing with Burns and Allen. The trio's comic dance in the film's "Fun House" sequence earned an Academy Award for choreographer [[Hermes Pan (choreographer)|Hermes Pan]].<ref>Jewell, Richard B. ''The RKO Story''. New Rochelle, New York: Arlington House, 1982. {{ISBN|0-517-54656-6}}</ref>{{Rp|112}}<ref>{{cite web |url=http://awardsdatabase.oscars.org/ampas_awards/BasicSearchInput.jsp |title=Academy Awards Database |publisher=[[Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences]] |access-date=2014-11-10 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090208011732/http://awardsdatabase.oscars.org/ampas_awards/BasicSearchInput.jsp |archive-date=2009-02-08 }}</ref> Burns suggested a dance number that employs whiskbrooms as props, used in vaudeville by a duo called Evans and Evans. He bought the idea and auditioned the routine for Astaire, with Allen and the surviving member of the vaudeville team.<ref name="AFI Damsel">{{cite web|url=http://www.afi.com/members/catalog/DetailView.aspx?s=&Movie=5915 |title=A Damsel in Distress |publisher=AFI Catalog of Feature Films |access-date=2014-11-10}}</ref>

This movie led [[Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer]] to cast Burns and Allen in its [[Eleanor Powell]] musical, ''[[Honolulu (1939 film)|Honolulu]]'' (1939). This was their last film as a team; Gracie made two subsequent film appearances on her own, but Burns and Allen did not return to the cameras until their [[The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show|television series]] in 1950.

When Burns was 79, he had a sudden career revival as an amiable, beloved and unusually active comedic elder statesman in the 1975 film ''[[The Sunshine Boys (1975 film)|The Sunshine Boys]]'', for which he won the [[Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor]]. In 1977, his starring role in ''[[Oh, God! (film)|Oh, God!]]'', along with the former film, permanently secured his career resurgence. At the age of 80, Burns was the oldest Oscar winner in the history of the [[Academy Awards]], a record that would remain until [[Jessica Tandy]] won an Oscar for ''[[Driving Miss Daisy]]'' in 1989.  Burns, who became a [[centenarian]] in 1996, continued to work until just weeks before his death of [[cardiac arrest]] on March 19, 1996, at his home in Beverly Hills.

===Filmography===
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Title
! Format
! class="unsortable" | Notes
|-
| 1929
| ''[[Lambchops (film)|Lambchops]]''
| rowspan=8 | Short
| Added to the [[National Film Registry]] in 1999.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.loc.gov/film/registry_titles.php |title=National Film Registry Titles |publisher=[[National Film Preservation Board]] |access-date=2014-11-10}}</ref> DVD release 2007<ref name="New DVDs: The Jazz Singer"/><ref name="warnerbros.com"/>
|-
|1930
|''Fit to Be Tied''
|
|-
|1931
|''Pulling a Bone''
| 
|-
|1931
|''The Antique Shop''
| Directed by Ray Cozine{{Citation needed|date=June 2024}}<ref name="KP">Parker, Kit (ed.), ''Kit Parker Films Catalog 1980–1981'', page 301.</ref>
|-
|1931
|''Once Over, Light''
| Directed by [[Howard Bretherton]]
|-
|1931
|''100% Service''
| Directed by Ray Cozine.<ref name="KP"/> DVD release 2006<ref name="Cavalcade Kino">{{cite web|url=http://www.kinolorber.com/video.php?film_id=796 |title=Cavalcade of Comedy: The Paramount Comedy Shorts 1929–1933  |publisher=[[Kino International (company)|Kino Video]], 2006 |access-date=2014-11-17}}</ref><ref name="Cavalcade WorldCat">{{cite book|title=Cavalcade of Comedy  |publisher=[[WorldCat]] |oclc = 63791558}}</ref>
|-
|1931
|''Oh, My Operation''
| Directed by Ray Cozine<ref name="KP"/>{{Citation needed|date=June 2024}}
|-
|1932
|''The Babbling Book''
|
|-
|1932
|''[[The Big Broadcast]]''
| Feature
| 
|-
|1932
|''Your Hat''
| rowspan=3 | Short
|-
|1932
|''Walking the Baby''
| Directed by [[Aubrey Scotto]]
|-
|1933
|''Let's Dance''
| Directed by [[Aubrey Scotto]]<ref name="KP"/>
|-
|1933
|''[[International House (1933 film)|International House]]''
| rowspan=13 | Feature
|-
|1933
|''[[College Humor (film)|College Humor]]''
| 
|-
|1934
|''[[Six of a Kind]]''
| 
|-
|1934
|''[[We're Not Dressing]]''
| 
|-
|1934
|''[[Many Happy Returns (1934 film)|Many Happy Returns]]''
| 
|-
|1935
|''[[Love in Bloom (film)|Love in Bloom]]''
| 
|-
|1935
|''[[Here Comes Cookie]]''
| 
|-
|1935
|''[[The Big Broadcast of 1936]]''
| 
|-
|1936
|''[[The Big Broadcast of 1937]]''
| 
|-
|1936
|''[[College Holiday]]''
| 
|-
|1937
|''[[A Damsel in Distress (1937 film)|A Damsel in Distress]]''
| 
|-
|1938
|''[[College Swing]]''
| 
|-
| 1939
| ''[[Honolulu (1939 film)|Honolulu]]''
| 
|}