Circus Fever

Production Notes[]

Length: Two Reel
Producer: Hal Roach
Director: Robert F. McGowan
Photography: Art Lloyd
Editor: Thomas J. Crizer
Titles: H. M. Walker
Writer: Hal Roach
Released: February 8, 1925
Studio: Pathe Exchange

Main Cast[]

Supporting Cast[]

The Short[]

Plot: The circus is in town for one day only. Meanwhile, at the Hoskins Family home, a sign says Fever Quarantined. Farina and Gene have been confined to home with "speckled fever." (A fictitious disease of them having white spots being covered on their entire body.) Mickey, Jackie and Joe are likewise stuck with going to school. When they learn Gene and Farina will be out for six weeks, they dot their faces with paint and head home moaning in pain. Incredibly, their mothers are fooled, but the doctor is not, calling what they have "circus symptoms." Innocent Mary busts their deception even further by revealing the teacher has granted them all free tickets to the circus for the day. The angry mothers now must have their due, dosing the little con artists with castor oil and ordering them to bed and in the words of Mickey and Jackie's mother, "An' stay there till you grow up!"
Quotes:

"Dr. Royal Fitzhugh Sorghum, a practicing physician - He's practicing on Farina and Gene --" - Title Card
"Ah got speckle fever - We kaint go to school fo' six weeks--" - Gene
"It's nothing - I've seen these circus symptons before." - Dr. Pipp

Notes/Trivia:

Dr. Sorghum is played by Joseph Morrison, the father of former Rascal Ernie Morrison.
Elements of this short were later remade into Fish Hooky, Bored Of Education, Spooky Hooky, and Three Smart Boys.
This short reveals the promise that Mary promised to marry Mickey. He recalls it in Fish Hooky.
Crizer's Colossal Circus is an homage to T.J. Crizer, a comedy writer for Harold Lloyd and the Our Gang series.
In this short, Mickey and Jackie are brothers. David Durand and an unknown toddler play the duo's younger siblings. Joe Cobb is their next door neighbor, and Pal is owned by Joe.
The last known short in which Allen Hoskins's character is identified as being female.
Gene and Farina have white spots instead of dark ones, these shorts can have gags about their skin color because they're African - American ,however in reality, black people are given red spots on their skin like chickenpox for example.
this somehow predicted white looking smallpox because of the white spots of the boys given, it happen similarly to an Bangladesh girl.

Sequence[]

Previous Short: The Big Town
Next Short: Dog Days