Best Ever 1930s Film Clip Starring Dogs in Clothes

Queenie in Trouble – an excerpt from The Dogway Melody (1930)

The Dogway Melody

The Dogway Melody is a 1930 comedy short film that recreates scenes from early musical films, particularly The Broadway Melody. The entire cast are trained dogs with human voiceovers. The finale is a chorus line of dogs performing “Singing in the Rain” spoofing Cliff Edwards’s original version of the song in The Hollywood Revue of 1929. Also spoofed is Al Jolson’s performance of “Mammy” in The Jazz Singer. This was a part of MGM’s popular series of Dogville Comedies.

Dogville Comedies

From 1929 to 1931, the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer motion picture studio produced a series of short comedy films called All Barkie Dogville Comedies, sometimes known as the “barkies” (in a parody of “talkies”). The actors in these films were trained dogs, dressed up to parody the performers in contemporary films. The dogs’ dialogue in these early sound films was dubbed by actors and voice artists including Pete Smith.

The films were directed by Zion Myers and conceived and co-directed by Jules White. Both Myers and White later worked on The Three Stooges comedies.

Series titles

1929

• Hot Dog
• College Hounds

1930

• So Quiet on the Canine Front
• Who Killed Rover? AKA The Dogville Murder Case
• The Big Dog House
• The Dogway Melody

1931

• Love Tails Of Morocco
• Two Barks Brothers
• Trader Hound

– wikipedia

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