Harry Relph (1867-1928) was an English music-hall comedian who performed under the name Little Tich. ("Tich" being rural England's equivalent of the American word "smidgen".) Relph was a midget who was able to pass for a small boy, and sometimes did so offstage as part of a bizarre sexual prank he inflicted on unsuspecting young ladies. Onstage, Relph often performed with his hands in his pockets: he was self-conscious about the fact that he had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot.
Most of Little Tich's stage routines were comic monologues, which would have been inappropriate for filming in the days of silent movies. But his most famous routine was an eccentric dance he performed while wearing a grotesque pair of boots shaped like planks: the boots were of normal height and width but extremely long. In these boots, Tich was able to lean forward at an impossible angle, or to leap high into the air and then balance on the plank-ends like a stilt-walker. He would "accidentally" catch his hat on the tip of one boot, and other comic business.
Although this film is a recording of a stage act, Little Tich (or more likely his director) cleverly makes use of the screen frame at the end. Tich makes his exit stage right -- at the left edge of the image -- then turns and leans forward on his boots, bringing his grinning face back into the frame for an encore!
"Little Tich and His Big Boots", made by the great French director Alice Guy Blaché, was filmed during a live performance at the Paris Exhibition of 1900. It's a vital record of this important comedian's most distinctive act. This film is significant for another reason too, as it was a very early attempt to synchonise a moving image with a sound recording: in this case a Victrola disc. I viewed/heard this recording through the courtesy of the British Film Institute. It's obvious that the surviving audio portion was pre-recorded in some sort of early studio, with no audience present: it simply doesn't correspond to the visual portion of Tich's public performance.
Still, this is a fascinating glimpse of a performer who is undeservedly forgotten, as well as being an early example of the work of an important early film director.
Most of Little Tich's stage routines were comic monologues, which would have been inappropriate for filming in the days of silent movies. But his most famous routine was an eccentric dance he performed while wearing a grotesque pair of boots shaped like planks: the boots were of normal height and width but extremely long. In these boots, Tich was able to lean forward at an impossible angle, or to leap high into the air and then balance on the plank-ends like a stilt-walker. He would "accidentally" catch his hat on the tip of one boot, and other comic business.
Although this film is a recording of a stage act, Little Tich (or more likely his director) cleverly makes use of the screen frame at the end. Tich makes his exit stage right -- at the left edge of the image -- then turns and leans forward on his boots, bringing his grinning face back into the frame for an encore!
"Little Tich and His Big Boots", made by the great French director Alice Guy Blaché, was filmed during a live performance at the Paris Exhibition of 1900. It's a vital record of this important comedian's most distinctive act. This film is significant for another reason too, as it was a very early attempt to synchonise a moving image with a sound recording: in this case a Victrola disc. I viewed/heard this recording through the courtesy of the British Film Institute. It's obvious that the surviving audio portion was pre-recorded in some sort of early studio, with no audience present: it simply doesn't correspond to the visual portion of Tich's public performance.
Still, this is a fascinating glimpse of a performer who is undeservedly forgotten, as well as being an early example of the work of an important early film director.
