Lady Killer

Dan Quigley is sacked from his job as an usher at a cinema. He falls in with a group of con men he meets on the street and is soon running the gang. When the police come after him he flees to Los Angeles. Working there as an extra, he is noticed by accident and within a few months is a film star. But his old gang comes to the same city and wants something from him. This seventy-six-minute film was made just before Hollywood's censorship rules were tightened, and it shows everywhere: the violence, the gambling and the sex go through unsoftened. James Cagney carries the part at his own pace; the scene in which he drags Mae Clarke by the hair is a deliberate callback to the famous grapefruit scene the two of them had in The Public Enemy. Roy Del Ruth directed. The film also mocks Hollywood itself: becoming a star looks easier than putting a gang together.