A Lively Affair
About A Lively Affair
Women at a suffragette club meeting put on trousers, order their husbands about, neglect the children, play poker, and fight. The husbands stay home, mind the children, and run the house. Silent Era’s viewing notes for a print of this title list Mabel Van Buren and Lucy K. Villa, and the keywords suffrage, role reversal, gambling, and fights.
Cast & crew
More about A Lively Affair
Silent Era leaves the director blank and records a surviving print, public domain in the United States. A different AFI entry titled A Lively Affair, released 16 July 1912, is a Vitagraph split-reel directed by James Young, written by Alice M. Moore, and played by Clara Kimball Young, Leo Delaney, and Kate Price. That synopsis is a proposal sent by letter, not the suffrage meeting. Wikidata attaches Young and Vitagraph to this title. The two outlines do not describe the same reel.
Themes
Making
Whatever company made the suffrage reel, the joke is a straight reversal: the club meets, and the husbands are left with the house. The Vitagraph letter comedy is a separate plot under the same title.
Preservation
Silent Era records a surviving print and public-domain status in the United States.
Notes
- The suffrage print’s keywords on Silent Era also include fights and gambling.
- Van Buren and Villa are the names on that Silent Era cast line.
- The Young split-reel shared its reel with A Persistent Lover, according to the AFI history note.
- An Internet Archive identifier, silent-a-lively-affair, matches the title used for the suffrage short.
- Moving Picture World of 27 July 1912 reviewed the Young comedy and mentioned a letter delivered twice.
Scenes
- The women meet in trousers, play poker, and fight.
- The husbands stay home with the children.
Also available
- Internet Archive (silent-a-lively-affair)