Date and Time
- Friday, Nov 7, 2025 12:30am
Details
Special Features: Introduction by film historian Danny Reid
Warren William, the undisputed King of Pre-Code, stars as a slick-talking sideshow barker who finds opportunity in the mind-reading racket. As the fraudulent psychic “Chandra the Great” — a name borrowed from a box of cookies — he rises to carnival fame before briefly trying to go straight to impress his new wife (Constance Cummings). But the lure of easy money proves too strong. Reinvented as the upscale “Dr. Munro,” he begins preying on high-society clients, using tips from wealthy families’ chauffeurs to expose adulterous husbands to their unsuspecting wives. Aiding William’s con man are loyal sidekicks played by character actor Allen Jenkins and Baltimore-born actor Clarence Muse, who four years earlier had become the first African American actor to star in a major studio film with 1929’s HEARTS IN DIXIE. William, one of the era’s great antiheroes, delivers a charismatic performance that is equal parts charm and menace. The film explores themes of fraud, ambition and the human need to believe in something — no matter how false — especially during the Great Depression, a time when desperation and deception often went hand in hand. The film was declared “unsuitable for children, adolescents or for Sundays” by Harrison’s Reports in 1933.
