Fauntleroy, Kodona, Ouji, boystyle, & paige boy gallery

[Robyn Jodie]

Regarding the use of women for Peter Pan and Little Lord Fauntleroy, I had always understood that the reason was that directors preferred older children or small adults in such roles due to their greater consistency, not to mention child labor laws (which, however, were much more lax back then).  And of course once a boy's voice changes he has a much harder time playing a child no matter how "undersized" he may be.

So someone who was "small for his/her age" stood a much better chance of being cast as a younger child than a child who was "big for his/her age" had of being cast as an older child or an adult.

Of course in an interesting turnabout, back in Shakespeare's time, most female roles were played by boys -- the theater was considered no place for a female.

[Angela M...]

I remember seeing "The Champ" but I can't ever remember seeing the "Lord Fauntleroy" movie and I didn't even watch much of Silver Spoons until the youtube videos. I don't really watch much TV just prefering movies when I have the time. I do love the wardrobe in the movie and his choice of dress in Silver Spoons too.

[Lindsey]

Angela, Ricky's version of Lord Fauntleroy was a ''made for TV'' movie that aired in the U.S. back in 1980.  Ricky would have been 9 or 10 at the time of the filming.  Unfortunately, I don't believe it was ever released on DVD, only on tape, which makes it quite difficult to find.

According to IMDB ''Reportedly, the film was the first time that the title role of "Little Lord Fauntleroy", a character who is an American boy, had been played by an experienced boy actor with an authentic American background.''  He also had shoulder-length hair at the time which gave him the appropriate ''look'' for the role... which may be another reason girls have been so often cast in the role.   

[Betty]

Actually it was a UK produced film by the Hallmark cable channel, for release in European theaters, & USA release on cable TV's Hallmark channel. It showed in UK theaters first, then a few months later in the USA on the cable Hallmark channel. So it was filmed in a full theater 16:9 aspect ratio in full film quality of the day. A German dubbed version of it was released for theaters in Germany in 1982. It's traditionally played on German TV every Christmas time since its release.

They didn't think it would do well in the American box office market, so only released it for the cable TV channel in the USA. It was very successful in European theaters. Within a year they sold rights to the major TV networks to re-run it too.

The DVD has (480p NTSC & 525p PAL) been around since 2002, which is about the time I got my DVD copy. The old vid caps I posted of it here in the mid 1990s was from a VHS version I taped off of cable TV in the early 1980s. The ones I just posted here were from the DVD running at 525p PAL on my computer.

I noticed the price of the DVD has gone up to about the price of the blu-ray version of it. That's because once they produced the blu-ray of it, they stopped producing the DVD. So it will be a rare item soon. So if you don't want to pay $20-$60 per movie for a blu-ray copy, or for your favorite videos, I suggest you get the DVD of it whenever you can find it cheap or they'll be gone except at collector prices once they are released on blu-ray.

Currently DVD & blu-ray versions of that film are going for about $23-$25 in stores.

The blu-ray version of it will play in standard resolutions, 480p, & 525p, & in HDTV at 720p & 1180i.

In a cheat, torrents of the DVD, & blu-ray of it exist in mp4 & MKV formats through your favorite torrent sources. On a slow DSL connection both the 480-525p & 720p versions can be downloaded in under a couple hours. Of course 1180i will take much longer on a slow connection.

I suggest the 720p mp4 torrent of the blu-ray at about 1.8gb in file size. I checked it out, it looks very good. But my DVD PAL version at 525p looks slightly better, probably because less compression was used on a 3.9gb DVD than in the 1.8gb torrent. All versions are in widescreen 16:9 format as long as your player & screen can handle it. I use the VLC player software to play video & audio files... the best video player for a computer in the world.

To play hi-def video files on undersized & or under-powered laptops, & tablets, leave all video enhancements, scaling, & sharpening turned off so you don't have frame dropping, skipping, or player crashes. Under powered computers can't play hi-def videos smoothly... the CPU just can't keep up. So you have to click off those enhancements on small computers.

However, on a good fast computer, those enhancements can make most ordinary DVDs or 480p files look as good as blu-ray, & make 720-1180p look as good as in the theater.

I was lucky that during the fire where I lost everything, most of my DVDs survived. The shelves they were on collapsed onto the floor & were under water from the fireman's hose. After washing & drying them up, almost all of them still play. The CDs did not survive getting wet... the silver backing peeled away on all brands. So the most reliable way to store data for long periods of time & under harsh environments is the DVD.

[Angela M...]

Thanks Lindsey and Betty for all the info. I do have a habit of wandering video shops looking for odd movies that I have learned about. I like foreign films from film fests that we don't often get to see at the local theater. I remember seeing Cathy Rigby playing the part of Peter Pan on Broadway and thinking that was not fair. I sure would have loved to play the part but then I have loved tights very much since I was a young boy. I joined the theater group in high school so I could wear tights in some productions even though I was terrified of going on stage most times. I also volunteered with the Toronto National Ballet in the late 60's and early 70's so I could be around the costumes, rehersals and even an extra onstage sometimes. Still hooked after all these years.

[Robyn Jodie]

This looks relatively contemporary...Here's a pageboy costume I'd love to wear, and the boy wearing it looks pretty happy about it too.