Dixiana (1930)

Dixiana (1930) is a lavish American musical film directed by Luther Reed and produced and distributed by RKO Radio Pictures. The final third of the picture was photographed in Technicolor. The film stars Bebe Daniels, Everett Marshall, Bert Wheeler, Robert Woolsey, Joseph Cawthorn, Jobyna Howland, Ralf Harolde, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson (in his film debut) and Dorothy Lee. The script was adapted by Luther Reed from a story by Anne Caldwell.
The Technicolor sequences were considered lost for years but were re-discovered in 1988 and subsequently included in the restored DVD.
At the end of 1958, the film entered the public domain (in the USA) due to RKO's failure to renew their copyright registration in the 28th year after publication.

This is the film in which composer Max Steiner received his first screen credit. Additionally, it was Wheeler & Woolsey's third film; however, as they were not yet an official "team", they were still billed separately.

Synopsis

Dixiana Caldwell and her friends, Peewee and Ginger, are circus performers in the antebellum South. When Dixiana falls in love with a young Southern aristocrat, Carl Van Horn, she leaves the circus where she is employed and, with Peewee and Ginger, accompanies Carl to his family's plantation in order to meet Van Horn's family. At first thrilled with the news of their impending nuptials, Carl's father and stepmother, Cornelius and Birdie Van Horn, throw a lavish party for the couple. However, Peewee and Ginger inadvertently disclose Dixiana's background as a circus performer, creating a scandal for the elder Van Horns.

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