Little Daddy

Little Daddy (1931)

*** (out of 4)

Farina is taking care of his younger brother Stymie when it's learned that he must go to an orphanage. This doesn't sit well with the gang who plan on fighting off the man when he comes to take their friend. Reading up on this short I learned that it was originally banned from television due to some people, including the NAACP, protesting how blacks were shown and I must admit that I'm downright shocked that they'd take that stance as I've never seen a film from this era that showed as much respect to blacks. I know this series was rather mean to Farina in earlier films but this one here is so sweet and caring that it's just shocking anyone would take offense to it but then again I doubt those protesters even bothered watching it. The first fifteen-minutes actually play out as a drama even though there's a hilarious scene about Noah, which Stymie can't understand. Chubby and Jackie get some funny lines but the entire film belongs to Farina and Stymie, which is pretty rare for two black actors to get all the screen time in a white comedy. June Marlowe appears at the very end.