Series: Charley Chase

Director: Leo McCarey
Producer: Hal Roach
Titles:
Photography:
Editor:

Stars: Charley Chase, Mildred Harris, Vivien Oakland
Company: Pathé Exchange
Released: 13 March 1926
Length: 2 reels
Production No.: B-5
Filming dates: October 27 - November 6, 1925
Rating: -/10


Mama Behave

Available on DVD:
 

Charley and his wife Lolita (MILDRED HARRIS) are attempting to dance to the Charleston in their living room, but Charley is unsuccessful and falls to the floor. She is clearly better than he is and tells him so with her body langauge. Charley retreats into a side room and having seen his pathetic performance, the helpful butler (SYD CROSSLEY) offers to show Charley how to do the dance. Charley confesses that he already knows how to do it but to let on to the wife would mean he would be pestered into going out with her every night, so he has faked it. As Charley demonstrates his skills to the butler, his wife walks into the room and catches him red-handed. She suspects that some other woman has been teaching him the moves, but Charley storms off in protest. In his gymnasium, he viciously assaults a dummy, but when his wife catches him, he continues his protest by smacking the pillow on his bed.
Across the hallway, Lolita's best friend (VIVIEN OAKLAND) pays her a visit, but when Lolita sees her dressed in a beautiful fur, she complains she has no good clothes because she never gets to go out. The nosey butler overhears this and quickly rushes to tell Charley, who walks out into the hallway minus his pants and encounters Vivien. Charley has decided that in order to fulfill his wife's desire for him to be more like his twin brother, he would order a new suit. He returns home wearing it, still with a reduced price tag attached to the back of it, much to the amusement of the butler.

REVIEW INCOMPLETE.

Trivia
Copyrighted January 23, 1926.
The musicians in the background of the nightclub sequence were a real band, Paul Howard's Quality Serenaders.
Partially reworked by Chase as Thin Twins (1929).
The opening scene shows a record: "The Original Charleston" by The Kickerbockers.
Charley has a twin brother - Jim. Of course, in real life that was the name of Charley's real brother, James Parrott.

Charley Chase
Charley Chase/Jim Chase
Mildred Harris
Lolita Chase
Vivien Oakland
Miss D'Arcy
Syd Crossley
The Chase butler
Rolfe Sedan
Friend of the family
Paul Howard's Quality Serenaders
Jazz musicians
Paul Howard
Jazz musician
Harvey Brooks
Jazz musician
George Orendorff
Jazz musician
Thomas Valentine
Jazz musician

CREDITS (click image to enlarge)

Acknowledgements:
Smile When The Raindrops Fall by Brian Anthony & Andy Edmonds (book)
Jesse Brisson (identification of Paul Howard, George Orendorff, Thomas Valentine, Harvey Brooks)

This page was last updated on: 13 March 2023