NEWLY RICH aka FORBIDDEN ADVENTURE (1931)

Another odd little rarity. The print I saw was called FORBIDDEN ADVENTURE, and I couldn't find it listed in any of my reference books. However, there is an entry for it under NEWLY RICH on IMDB, although the information about it there is minimal. But I like running across old movies that I can't find in the reference books, and I figured with Edna May Oliver, it was probably worth watching once. While it's no buried treasure, it was surprisingly pleasant. It seems appropriate that it has two different titles, since it plays out like two different movies. In the first part, Edna May Oliver plays a widowed owner of a gas station somewhere out in the sticks who, jealous of the success of an old friend's child in Hollywood, takes her daughter out West to break into pictures. This part of the movie fits the NEWLY RICH title. Once the child (Mitzi Green) is established, the movie switches gears and becomes an adventure as the two child stars and the boy king of a small European country (they meet him while doing publicity in London) escape their guardians and tramp about London, joining a gang of urchins and getting kidnapped--sort of a PRINCE AND THE PAUPER meets OLIVER TWIST storyline. There is some mild parody of Hollywood (the child stars are named Tiny Tim Tiffany--formerly Mickey Monahan--and Declicia Tait), and Edna May is indeed at her strident best, but I've never seen her in a movie where she hasn't been wonderful. This was probably intended as a kid's movie in its day, although I still think the two halves don't fit together as tightly as they could. It's based on a Sinclair Lewis story called "Let's Play King."