The Jazz Singer 80th Anniversary in October!!!

On Oct. 16, Warner Home Video will debut the DVD of the studio’s 1927 landmark movie The Jazz Singer, which was the first feature-length film to have synchronized dialog and musical sequences.

The Al Jolson-starring title will be issued in a three-disc 80th Anniversary Collector’s Edition that contains, among other things, a restored and remastered version of the film featuring a refurbished soundtrack, a collection of period cartoons, shorts and rare Vitaphone comedy and music pieces, a handful of early sound era shorts and the newly produced feature-length documentary The Dawn of Sound: How Movies Learned to Talk. The package will carry a list price of $39.98.

The Jazz Singer “is going to be one of the landmark releases for 2007,” said WHV’s senior VP of theatrical catalog marketing George Feltenstein, who’s particularly proud of the new documentary.

Here are the specs:

DVD Special Features:


Disc 1 – The Movie

· All new feature digital transfer and immaculately refurbished soundtrack from restored picture elements and original Vitaphone-Sound-on-Disc recordings

· Commentary by film historians Ron Hutchinson and Vince Giordano

· Collection of rare cartoons and shorts:

o I Love to Sing-a classic 1936 WB parody cartoon directed by Tex Avery

o Hollywood Handicap classic M-G-M short with Al Jolson appearance

o A Day at Santa Anita classic Technicolor Warner Bros. short with Al Jolson & Ruby Keeler cameo appearance

o “Al Jolson in ‘A Plantation Act’ “1926 Vitaphone short made a year prior to The Jazz Singer

o An Intimate Dinner in Celebration of Warner Bros. Silver Jubilee

· 1947 Lux Radio Theater Broadcast starring Al Jolson (audio only)

· Al Jolson Trailer Gallery



Disc 2 – The Early Sound Era

· All-new feature-length documentary The Dawn of Sound: How Movies Learned to Talk

· Two rarely-seen Technicolor excerpts from Gold Diggers of Broadway (1929 WB film, most of which is considered lost)

· Studio shorts celebrating the early sound era:

· Finding His Voice (1929 Western Electric animated promotional short, produced by Max Fleischer)

· The Voice That Thrilled The World - Warner Bros. short about sound

· Okay for Sound 1946 WB short celebrating the 20th anniversary of Vitaphone

· When Talkies Were Young 1955 WB short looking back at the early talkies

· The Voice from the Screen 1926 WB ‘demonstration’ film explores the Vitaphone technology and, looks at the making of a Vitaphone short.



Disc 3 – VITAPHONE SHORTS

In the 1920’s Warner Bros. began producing a series of short films which utilized the Vitaphone process. These films ran the gamut from musical theater legends and vaudeville acts, to dramatic vignettes and classical music performances from the most prestigious artists of the era.
Most of these were shorts considered lost for decades, until a consortium of archivists and historians joined forces with a goal to restore these magnificent time capsules of entertainment history. Up until now, contemporary audiences have only been able to see these shorts via rare retrospective showings in a few large cities, or through the limited release of a restored handful of the earliest subjects, which were part of a 1996 laserdisc set. This new collection will finally make these amazing rarities available to the thousands of film fans awaiting their DVD debut.


· Over 3 1/2 hours worth of rare, historic Vitaphone comedy and music shorts

Elsie Janis in a Vaudeville Act: “Behind the Lines”
Bernado Depace: “Wizard of the Mandolin”
Van and Schneck: “The Pennant Winning Battery of Songland”
Blossom Seeley and Benny Fields
Hazel Green and Company
The Night Court
The Police Quartette
Ray Mayer & Edith Evans: “When East Meets West”
Adele Rowland: “Stories in Song”
Stoll, Flynn and Company: “The Jazzmania Quintet”
The Ingenues in “The Band Beautiful”
The Foy Family in “Chips off the Old Block”
Dick Rich and His Melodious Monarchs
Gus Arnheim and His Ambassadors [
Shaw and Lee: “The Beau Brummels”
Larry Ceballos’ Roof Garden Revue
Trixie Friganza in “My Bag O’ Tricks”
Green’s Twentieth Century Faydetts
Sol Violinsky: “The Eccentric Entertainer”
Ethel Sinclair and Marge La Marr in “At the Seashore”
Paul Tremaine and His Aristocrats
Baby Rose Marie: “The Child Wonder”
Burns & Allen in “Lambchops “
Joe Frisco in “The Happy Hottentots”


Outstanding Collector’s Edition Bonuses:

· Rarely seen behind-the-scenes Photo cards

· Original release Lobby card reproductions

· Original release Souvenir Program book reproduction

· Booklet with vintage document reproductions and DVD features guide

· Reproduction of post-premiere telegram from Al Jolson to Jack L. Warner



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