La folie du Docteur Tube [The Madness of Dr. Tube] (Abel Gance, 1915)
Apr
23
World Laboratory Day
The professor's assistant is a young Black kid, maybe 10 years old. He's wearing a white lab apron over his dark outfit and glances at something off camera (I assume he's waiting for his cue from the director; this is the scene where the hallucinogenic powder is about to reach him and he has to act the part). In the background is Dr. Tube, cracking up under the influence of his own invention. DP: Léonce-Henri Burel.
Dr. Tube (Séverin-Mars) invents a powder that distorts reality and promptly tests it out on some oblivious test subjects, who quickly can no longer recognise the world around them. The brilliance of La folie du Docteur Tube is its use of practical in-camera effects that makes us, the viewer, experience the hallucinogen.
This little folly by the great Abel Gance features Albert Dieudonné in a small part, who later would again work with Gance in his Napoleon (1927), as Napoléon Bonaparte.
This is one of the few (French) comedies from the time that I'm aware of with a Black character who is not a horrible racist stereotype or a white person in blackface. If you have any idea of who the professor's assistant is, please reach out on Mastodon.