Simple Sis

{{short description|1927 film by Herman C. Raymaker}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=October 2020}}

{{Infobox film

| name = Simple Sis

| image =

| caption =

| director = Herman C. Raymaker

| producer =

| screenplay = Albert Kenyon

| story = Melville Crossman{{efn|One of three pseudonyms used by Darryl F. Zanuck while he was writing for Warner Bros.}}

| starring = {{plainlist|*Louise Fazenda

| music =

| cinematography = Frank Kesson

| editing =

|budget=$57,000Warner Bros financial information in The William Schaefer Ledger. See Appendix 1, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, (1995) 15:sup1, 1-31 p 5 DOI: 10.1080/01439689508604551

|gross=$185,000

| studio = Warner Bros.

| distributor = Warner Bros.

| released = {{Film date|1927|6|11|ref1=}}

| runtime = 70 minutes

| country = United States

| language = Silent (English intertitles)

}}

Simple Sis is a 1927 American silent comedy-melodrama directed by Herman C. Raymaker and starring Louise Fazenda as a poor, plain laundress hoping for romance, supported by Clyde Cook as a shy suitor and Myrna Loy as a cruel beauty.

No copies of Simple Sis are known to exist; it is presumed lost.

Plot

Sis, a laundress, is neither beautiful nor clever, but she still wishes to attract a boyfriend. When attractive Edith Van inadvertently hides her love-letter in the wrong pocket, Sis finds it and, thinking it is for her, goes to meet the lover. The mistake is soon exposed and Edith ridicules Sis. Sis meets truck driver Jerry when he rescues her from a purse-snatcher. Because of his extreme shyness, she thinks he has no interest in her. After taking in the orphaned Buddy, Sis loses her job. Although she saves Buddy from a fire, welfare workers remove him from her care. In the end, Sis, Jerry, and Buddy are united as a family.

Cast

Release

Simple Sis was released June 11, 1927, the second of four Warner Bros. feature films released that month.

Variety summed up the production as "colorless" and "of negligible entertainment or box office value". The reviewer for Motion Picture News called it "hokum" and thought it came across as depressing rather than comedic. In the brief Photoplay review, audiences were warned of boredom and Fazenda was deemed "worthy of better stories".

=Box office=

According to Warner Bros records, the film earned $136,000 domestically and $49,000 foreign.

References

;Notes

{{notelist}}

;Citations

{{reflist|refs=

{{cite web |title=Simple Sis |work=Catalog of Feature Films |publisher=American Film Institute |url=http://www.afi.com/members/catalog/DetailView.aspx?s=1&Movie=12134}}

{{cite web |url=http://www.silentsaregolden.com/arnewarner.html |title=Lost Film Files – The Lost Films of Warner Brothers Pictures |last=Andersen |first=Arne |via=Silents Are Golden}}

{{cite web |url=http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/ihas/loc.mbrs.sfdb.9206/default.html |publisher=The Library of Congress |work=American Silent Feature Film Survival Catalog |title=Simple Sis/Herman C Raymaker |date=March 7, 2016 |last=Pierce |first=David}}

{{cite book |last=Room |first=Adrian |title=Dictionary of Pseudonyms: 13,000 Assumed Names and Their Origins |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eSIhzKnNUf4C&pg=PA125 |edition=5th |year=2010 |publisher=McFarland |isbn=978-0-7864-5763-2 |page=125}}

{{cite journal |title=Warner Bros. Releasing Four Films in June |journal=Motion Picture News |date=June 10, 1927 |volume=XXXV |issue=23 |page=2270 |url=https://archive.org/stream/motion35moti#page/n1187/mode/1up |via=Internet Archive}}

{{cite journal |title=Simple Sis |journal=Variety |date=June 8, 1927 |volume=LXXXVII |issue=8 |page=17 |url=https://archive.org/stream/variety87-1927-06#page/n80/mode/1up |via=Internet Archive}}

{{cite journal |last=Flavin |first=Harold |title=Simple Sis: Hokum Story; Okay for the Small Houses |journal=Motion Picture News |date=June 17, 1927 |volume=XXXV |issue=24 |page=2369 |url=https://archive.org/stream/motion35moti#page/n1286/mode/1up |via=Internet Archive}}

{{cite magazine |title=Simple Sis—Warner Bros. |department=The Shadow Stage |magazine=Photoplay |date=August 1927 |page=104 |url=https://archive.org/stream/photo33chic#page/n249/mode/1up |via=Internet Archive}}

}}