Prof. S. Lubin's "'Fake Fight Films" and Re-enactments (1897-1908)

[Caractacus]

Here is one that has survived over the ages (or at least 2 abbreviated rounds from the 11 that were filmed surfaced).
" Reproduction of the Fitzsimmons-Jeffries Fight in Eleven Rounds Showing the Knockout " (Lubin,1899)
There were plans originally to film the actual fight at Coney Island(by Vitagraph) but it was not filmed due to very poor lighting,
so filmmaker S. Lubin had it re-enacted and filmed it with the cineograph a few days later on the rooftop (the Sky Parlor)at his studio across the street from
C.A Brandenburgh's Museum and Amusement Center located on Ninth and Arch Street in Philadelphia.
( although according to people who had attended the real fight and saw the re-enactment on screen had said it wasn't anything like the actual fight )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZh--rmNfxk

[Caractacus]

By the way, Here is some trivia.
Those were not the actual fighters (Jeffries and Fitzsimmons)seen there in the re-enactment as claimed elsewhere,
but the two in the S. Lubin film were actual professional fighters at the time that were based in Philadelphia.
Can you name them ?

[APerno]

No clue who they are . . .besides the Lubin film there is, according to Dan Streible (Fight Pictures, A History of Boxing and Early Cinema), a second reproduction of the fight, advertised in the newspapers as being "faithfully reproduced." (A cheap shot at Lubin's effort.)

This second reproduction was either filmed by Edison or American Vitagraph; there is even a possibility that Jefferies and Fitzsimmons may have participated in the reproduction, but the author was unable to confirm this.

Based on newspaper adds Streible seems confident that the second reproduction was in fact made and distributed, but he doesn't trust his own source regarding the Jefferies/Fitzsimmons participation, referring to his own source as a 'tale spinner.'

According to the newspaper adds the second reproduction came in a six round and an eleven round version. Considering it was an 8th round stoppage I wonder what they did for three more rounds.

[APerno]

Newspaper critiques of these early fight reproductions use to refer to the knockdown blows (sarcastically) as "push-downs." - That first knockdown was a perfect example

[APerno]

Oh! sorry, one last thing, the Lubin reproduction you posted was big box office; it forced Edison, American Vitagraph, and Biograph (the big three) to contend with his fakes (which of course he always advertised as 'reproductions')

[klompton]

Actually Lubin typically tried to pass his fights off as the real thing until legal wranglings forced him to start advertising with the caveat. That was the wild west of film days so after a fight Lubin would race yo get his film made to cyt into the profits of the real thing. Several of his and other fakes still exist: Jeffries-Fitz, Jeffries-Corbett, Corbett-McGovern, Gans-Nelson 1, 2, and 3, Dixon-McGovern

[Caractacus]

In Dan Streibles book there is also a 35 mm frame enlargement of Prof. Lubin's first Fake fight film
"Corbett-Fitzsimmons"Films in Counterpart of the Great Fight" (S. Lubin 1897)
of which 33 seconds still exist of (at 18 feet per second)

Prof. Lubin had made that film and released it before while the Verascope version of the actual Corbett and Fitzsimmons film was still being processed.

The film was part of the collection of the Los Angles Museum of Natural History
( and had been unidentified shelves as only " early Boxing Film"(-LACMNH #9)
and later deposited in the Libray of Congress

The two individuals seen as portraying Fitzsimmons and Corbett in that version are unidentified
but one is obviously wearing a bald cap and the other a pompador wig.

(I can not seem to locate the clip anywhere on youtube however)

[Caractacus]

check out this really interesting somewhat recent article by Dan Streible about another Corbett-Fitzsimmons re-enactment from 1897.
( as well as the screenshot from Lubin's Great Fac simile of the Big Fight.

http://orphanfilmsymposium.blogspot.com ... fight.html

[APerno]

check out this really interesting somewhat recent article by Dan Streible about another Corbett-Fitzsimmons re-enactment from 1897.
( as well as the screenshot from Lubin's Great Fac simile of the Big Fight.

http://orphanfilmsymposium.blogspot.com ... fight.html

- the guy is a great historian - thanks

[Caractacus]

Check out the fight reproduction of Jeffries vrs Corbett (1903) at 52:00 of this clip.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTQm6X30VqU

[Caractacus]

BTW hey Al Perno
I'm not sure if you noticed but that particular clip there is illustrated and identified by a frame enlargement in Dan Strible's book FIGHT PICTURES
as being from
Biographs
Young Corbett II vrs Terry Mc Govern (which had the original fighters re-eneact in it).
so was it wrongly misidentified in his book or in this documentery ?
It looks to me however like that is suppose to be Jeffries and Corbett to me in the clip
based on the resembelence of the re-enactors in it.
(obviously the film was reversed in printing)

[APerno]

BTW hey Al Perno
I'm not sure if you noticed but that particular clip there is illustrated and identified by a frame enlargement in Dan Strible's book FIGHT PICTURES
as being from
Biographs
Young Corbett II vrs Terry Mc Govern (which had the original fighters re-eneact in it).
so was it wrongly misidentified in his book or in this documentery ?
It looks to me however like that is suppose to be Jeffries and Corbett to me in the clip
based on the resembelence of the re-enactors in it.
(obviously the film was reversed in printing)

Ok - if what Lubin did is a 'fake' fight film (Corbett-Fitzsimmons) - and what Veriscope did is a 'real' fight film (Corbett-Fitzsimmons) - then how do we classify Corbett and Courtney? - It is not a reenactment but it certainly isn't a fight, is it?

[Caractacus]

I would call it an 'exhiibition'
Because Corbett appears to be laughing in it.

[APerno]

I would call it an 'exhiibition'
Because Corbett appears to be laughing in it.

I agree it was an exhibition, but they sold it as a fight (one round at a time oddly enough) so doesn't that make it a 'fake fight' ?- I don't expect an answer; where I am going with this is back to Lubin - Is Corbett-Courtney any less deceptive than what Lubin was up to? - I feel, that maybe he (Lubin) is much maligned; yes his recreations are fakes, but I am still not sure what he attempted to do was actual fraud; According to Streible the day Lubin's Fitzsimmons-Jefferies fake was released the Police Gazette had already "informed sports fans about the fate of the authentic version," (page 102), so just how much fraud could Lubin have gotten away with? It wasn't as if the public was unaware of the truth; they knew the truth from day one.

What the public could do of course, was choose to ignore the truth, which is what I believe Lubin played on - I feel Lubin is more in league with a PT Barnum than say a Konrad Kujau.

I don't know why I am picking up Lubin's argument, but the more I read by Streible the more I feel he was being 'scape-goated' by other film companies who weren't that much more legit than he. - Maybe as I read more I'll change my mind . . . we'll see.

[Caractacus]

By the way, Here is some trivia.
Those were not the actual fighters (Jeffries and Fitzsimmons)seen there in the re-enactment as claimed elsewhere,
but the two in the S. Lubin film were actual professional fighters at the time that were based in Philadelphia.
Can you name them ?

Answer: Bob Fitzsimmons was played by Billy Leedom "One of Philadelphia's cleverest Fighters"

http://www.cyberboxingzone.com/boxing/leedom-billy.htm


and Jim J. Jeffries was played by Jack McCormick ( who was a sparring partner to Jim Jeffries)

http://boxrec.com/boxer/11607

(source FIGHT PICTURES by Dan Streible)

[Senya13]

http://library.la84.org/SportsLibrary/S ... 325010.pdf
About Corbett-Courtney kinetoscope bout.

[Caractacus]

(Here is what is apparently all that is left of the original 6 (1 minute) rounds of it.
check out the rapid-fire combo that Corbett throws at at 1:30 of this clip. Man he looked good maybe even ahead of his time !)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnWzYxekFXo

[Caractacus]

Here is one that has survived over the ages (or at least 2 abbreviated rounds from the 11 that were filmed surfaced).
" Reproduction of the Fitzsimmons-Jeffries Fight in Eleven Rounds Showing the Knockout " (Lubin,1899)
There were plans originally to film the actual fight at Coney Island(by Vitagraph) but it was not filmed due to very poor lighting,
so filmmaker S. Lubin had it re-enacted and filmed it with the cineograph a few days later on the rooftop (the Sky Parlor)at his studio across the street from
C.A Brandenburgh's Museum and Amusement Center located on Ninth and Arch Street in Philadelphia.
( although according to people who had attended the real fight and saw the re-enactment on screen had said it wasn't anything like the actual fight )

[Caractacus]

By the way, Here is some trivia.
Those were not the actual fighters (Jeffries and Fitzsimmons)seen there in the re-enactment as claimed elsewhere,
but the two in the S. Lubin film were actual professional fighters at the time that were based in Philadelphia.
Can you name them ?

Answer: Bob Fitzsimmons was played by Billy Leedom "One of Philadelphia's cleverest Fighters"

http://www.cyberboxingzone.com/boxing/leedom-billy.htm


and Jim J. Jeffries was played by Jack McCormick ( who was a sparring partner to Jim Jeffries)

http://boxrec.com/boxer/11607

(source FIGHT PICTURES by Dan Streible)

Those are the two playes in the film there.
I had aslo read in Dan Strebles book that Lubin filmed a re-enactment of the
second Jeffries vrs Fitzsimmons bouts.

[keithmoonhangover]

By the way, Here is some trivia.
Those were not the actual fighters (Jeffries and Fitzsimmons)seen there in the re-enactment as claimed elsewhere,
but the two in the S. Lubin film were actual professional fighters at the time that were based in Philadelphia.
Can you name them ?

I don't know, but Kalan was there and Cus told him Wilt would beat them both ...... at once.

[Caractacus]

Looked like Jack McCormick may have really landed one there on the chin of Billy Leedom at 2:08.
it kind of re-minded me of the right hand that Ingemar Johansson landed out-of-the blue on Floyd Patterson in their first fight.
Because Billy Leedom looked unusually good acting like he was stunned while there on the canvas.

[SenorPipino]

That's what bothered me about the film.
"Jeffries" didn't look like Jeffries. He seemed too small in stature.

Although as I posted, Jeffries was actually only 6' 206 for the Fitz bout. Maybe large by 19th century standards but small for today.

But he always looked much larger and intimidating in the 1910 Johnson film.

YouTube apparently doesn't identify these Lubin films as reenactments.

Interesting to note that today, March 3, is the 65th anniversary of Jim Jeffries passing.

[Caractacus]

I think even the Library of Congress had originally misidenified those clips
as Jeffries and Fitzsimmons themselves doing the re-enactment in them too.
( according to Dan Streibles book)

[BitPlayer]

I think the Jeffries Ruhlin one is also a reenactment, but with the real Jeffries and Ruhlin.