August 3, 1929 –
Four famous vaudevillian performers took a chance on the new medium of ‘talking pictures‘ with the general release of the film, The Cocoanuts, starring the Four Marx Brothers —
Chico, Groucho, Harpo and Zeppo, on this date.
The film has the first use of the overhead camera shot (from the roof of the sound stage looking down at the dancers forming kaleidoscopic patterns.) The technique is usually credited to Busby Berkeley, the Broadway dance director whom Samuel Goldwyn brought to Hollywood to stage numbers for Eddie Cantor comedies. But a year before Busby’s appearance on the scene in Whoopee!, the overhead shot is seen in The Cocoanuts.
The Haus of Dcaligari 