Trick Baby (1972)

Two Phildelphia con men try to evade gangsters they have conned and cops who are trying to put them in jail.

Director:

Larry Yust

Writers:

Robert Beck (novel), A. Neuberg (screenplay),

Stars:

Kiel Martin, Mel Stewart, Dallas Edward Hayes

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Kiel Martin	...	White Folks
Mel Stewart	...	Blue Howard
Dallas Edward Hayes	...	Dot Murray
Beverly Ballard	...	Susan
Vernee Watson-Johnson	...	Cleo Howard
Donald Symington	...	Morrison
Don Fellows	...	Phillips
Thomas Anderson	...	Felix the Fixer (as Tom Anderson)
Clebert Ford	...	Josephus
Fuddle Bagley	...	Percy
Ted Lange	...	Melvin the Pimp
Tony Mazzadra	...	Nino Parelli
David Thomas	...	Frascatti
Jim King	...	Duke
Anthony Charnota	...	Bobby

Storyline

Two Phildelphia con men try to evade gangsters they have conned and cops who are trying to put them in jail.

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Plot Keywords:

passing for white | mafia | con artist | blaxploitation | heart attack | 

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Taglines:

Sometimes even the players get played.

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Genres:

Action | Crime | Drama

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

16 November 1973 (Denmark)

Also Known As:

The Double Con

Filming Locations:

3rd Base - 52nd & Spruce Streets, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Cinema Entertainment, Universal Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

89 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Kiel Martin did all of his own running in the foot chase sequence.

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Goofs

When Blue looks out the window & sees the cop walking into the building, it's still daylight. When the camera moves to street level with the cop, it's suddenly nighttime.

User Reviews

The suggestion that not all black men on screen are as lily-white – or should it be black? – is excellently demonstrated in "Trick Baby."

The story is that of two con-men: White Folks (Kiel Martin), who had a black mother and a white father and whose skin is white; and Blue Howard ( Mel Stewart), a grizzled black veteran who has taught his young protégé everything he knows about the art of dishonest tricks…

Together they cheat the Mafia and the police; they make $10,000 and have to give some of it away to the local black protection retailer; they set up a confidence property deal to get by fraud some over-greedy white businessmen out of $150,000, but cannot quite shield the stolen loot…

The distinguished trait of the film is that not all the blacks are all good, and not all the whites are all bad… What is more, it makes a point of showing that black men can play on their color to win their own ends…