After weeks of waiting, yesterday brought an advance copy of the glorious new Busby Berkeley DVD box set to my desk. I’ll be writing more about the films in the set—including the miraculous Gold Diggers of 1933—in next week’s DVD column.

Today I’m concerned with a relatively minor component of Gold Diggers… and other films of the era: the use of adult little people to portray babies and children.

The prime example comes from the aforementioned Gold Diggers film: During the vast, glorious “Petting in the Park” musical number, a cute little baby sits up in his stroller, gives an adorable baby smile, then leaps to the ground and begins roller skating. It’s an amazing moment, followed by a string of equally delightful/far creepier moments, such as when the “baby” starts giving horny winks to the camera. (RIP, Billy Barty.)

Granted, casting little people as babies is a little crude, but so is casting Elisabeth Shue as an anal-rape victim. Hollywood’s not in the business of bestowing dignity, and considering what we’ve learned about the eternal mind-fuck of child stardom, casting little adults as little kids makes plenty of sense.

Not only is it amazingly entertaining to watch a “baby” roller skate, smoke a cigar, and gaze lasciviously up a lady’s skirt, Home Alone would’ve been at least 10,000 times funnier with a face-slapping dwarf in the lead.