I've been enjoying meandering through the TCM section of HBO Max. This shot appeared near the beginning of TAXI and I made a screen grab of it figuring it would be fun to share it.
Prince Albert billboard in 1931 James Cagney feature entitled TAXI
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That's remarkable, crazy to think there was once time when some brands in the pipe industry could afford advertising campaigns like that.
I’ve read during the Great Depression Prince Albert was RJ Reynold’s second greatest money maker after Camels.
Reynold spent over a million dollars a year promoting Prince Albert.
It was the largest sponsor of The Grand Ole Opry for many years.
Reynold spent over a million dollars a year promoting Prince Albert.
It was the largest sponsor of The Grand Ole Opry for many years.
Caller to the drug store: "Do you have Prince Albert in a can?"
Druggist: "Why, yes, we do."
Caller to the drug store: "Well, you better let him out!"
Druggist: "Why, yes, we do."
Caller to the drug store: "Well, you better let him out!"
Are you sure the signage refers to the pipe tobacco and not the body piercing so prevalent when our fathers or grandfathers were young?
Right? Or that it was allowed to be advertised in public or shown on TV.
Funny how a generation that made prank calls is now plagued with robocalls.Caller to the drug store: "Do you have Prince Albert in a can?"
Druggist: "Why, yes, we do."
Caller to the drug store: "Well, you better let him out!"
There’s a joke that could be made, but it might hit the nail on the head.
By the time I got hatched in 1958 and then learned to sing later on in the early to middle sixties the Grand Ole Opry still advertised Prince Albert and all my favorite Opry stars were featured in advertisements. The stars on KWTO like Red Foley told me how tasty Prince Albert cigarettes were.
There are three basic ranges for a man who likes to twang and my mother taught me to sing bass, baritone, and tenor.
I’m sort of like Gentleman Jim Reeves, in that I like to squall out in tenor but the audience prefers my baritone.
We Live in Two Different Worlds
Red Foley version 1961
There is a reason the do gooders outlawed tobacco advertisers on family shows, you know?
I love watching old and foreign movies. Even if the movie isn't great or good (which some truly are) you can see things like this. It's a weird window into other places and times. Or as I like to say I get to see what their phones looked like,
Half and Half also marketed cigarettes and used to advertise them on TV, chanting the slogan,“ pipe tobacco in a filtered cigarette.” Besides Prince Albert, I recall Carter Hall and Sir Walter Raleigh (“in the pouch pack”) ran frequent pipe tobacco commercials on TV back in the day.
The 30s movies are fun. Everyone smoked something and every abode sports a cocktail set.
For my money one of the definite peaks of the decade for cigarettes & booze was The Thin Man. Who knew ceaseless drinking + intermittent detection = superlative light entertainment? A formula so successful they beat it to death over the course of six movies, a radio show, and a tv series.
That sign is certainly swell but the real piperoo of this film , in my view, is Jimmy' Cagney's exchange in Yiddish with Joe Barton concerning a cab ride to Ellis Island. Evidently, Jim could converse in Yiddish due to a childhood spent on the lower east side of Manhattan. There are several old WB films in which the characters speak a lttle Yiddish as well as other immigrant languages, but I can't recall a film's star doing so. At any rate, I think this production strategy helped put immigrant and first generation asses in seats.
Cagney was fluent in Yiddish. Not bad for an Irishman!
My Yiddish is mostly confined to swearing.
The Warner Brothers films of the 20’s and early 30’s often featured immigrant characters, no doubt reflecting the experience of the founders, which provided a richer portrayal of America at that time.
Yup, Jim certainly knew his way around the "mameh loshen". I can just see Jack Warner sitting with Jimmy during a negotiation, both of them moving in and out between English and Yiddish for strategic emphasis. What a scene that congers up!
BTW, for another Yiddish treat treat from Joe Barton catch the Mayor of Hell starring Cagney. A kind of touching scene in a courtroom between Barton, playing Mr, Horowitz and his wayward son Isidore (Izzy) played by the then teenaged Sidney Miller.