Stuff and Nonsense

A few goodies discovered on Ebay over the past few months.

Gallagher and Shean made a feature for Fox in 1923? This crucial piece of Broadway and vaudeville history undoubtedly sizzled along with everything else in the 1937 Fox vault fire. So many questions, so few answers.

1922 trade ad for The Reporter, the American film debut of Lupino Lane (trademark spit curl notably absent). Again, a (probable) vanished victim, along with the rest of the series, of the Fox vault fire.

Images from The Reporter (1922) starring Lupino Lane. Actually looks pretty funny. I can't find a cast list for it, but I'd swear that's Tom Kennedy as the heavy.

Beautiful, iconic ad for Ben Turpin's series for Mack Sennett. Note the emphasis on Ben's appeal to the "youngsters". Explains a lot, actually. From Pathe's 1926 exhibitor's yearbook.

In 1921, after Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle was promoted to features and Buster Keaton became star of the Comique shorts, Roscoe's nephew Al St. John departed for Fox and his own starring series. Do any of these shorts still exist? Former New York Hippodrome clown Clyde Cook had made his film debut for Fox the year before and apparently didn't have St. John's audience appeal. Cook would later have marginally better luck at the Hal Roach Studios.

This 1926 ad for Charley Chase's series nicely plays up his image as a comic sophisticate. This graphic could have just as easily served Max Linder or Raymond Griffith. It still boggles my mind that Pathe was distributing Roach's and Sennett's shorts simultaneously.

Harry Langdon's first feature, His First Flame, was ultimately held back until 1927, making way for the vastly superior Tramp, Tramp, Tramp (1926) and The Strong Man (1927). It was a wise move.

The Wrong Miss Wright

In honor of Greg Hilbrich having slashed prices over at The Columbia Shorts Department, I'm posting The Wrong Miss Wright, Columbia's 1937 remake of Charley Chase's 1926 Hal Roach short Crazy Like a Fox. Chase's Columbias have something of a bad reputation which seems mostly based upon the erroneous assumptions that Charley, nearing the end of his life, was losing steam and that Columbia was handling him, as Harry Langdon would later put it, as "an animated suit of clothes". Nothing could be farther from the truth. Chase was not only in incredible form after his departure from Roach, the transition even seems to have energized him. His performance in The Wrong Miss Wright is arguably better than most of his final performances for Roach, which seem, frankly, tired. Columbia's comedy shorts department was also still in its pre-war prime and Chase, considered one of their greatest assets as a seasoned performer/director, was given Grade A treatment.. something he hadn't been receiving at Roach for a very long time. Most of Charley's Columbias show the care and attention given at the time to most of the department's top-flight talents in both their handsome production values and their character-appropriate scripts. But a few sadly indicate the future direction of the department with scripts that mistake frenetic action for comedy and grossly neglect the talents of the featured performer. As the department continued its gradual slide, The Wrong Miss Wright, itself a remake, would become budget-cutting fodder as it was remade twice into vehicles for Vera Vague. But in 1937 that was all yet to come, and in this short both Chase and Columbia were at the top of their forms. The gags for Crazy Like a Fox, in which Charley attempts to squirm his way out of an arranged marriage by feigning insanity, were thoughtfully reworked for sound. I can't think of another comedy that gets so much mileage out of a Punch and Judy swazzle, which I tend to believe was Charley's own inspiration.

Part One

Part Two

We will BURY you.... in hilarity!

I sure don't, but do you remember the days when you could publish a trashy trade paperback about a silent comedian... and people would buy it? Believe it or not, Leo Guild's The Fatty Arbuckle Case is far more objective than the lurid jacket would indicate. I mean, look at it!

Poor Roscoe! Stanley Borack has painted him as the love-child of Curly Howard and Nikita Kruschev (and who ever imagined that Virginia Rappe had such a long torso!). Fortunately for Roscoe, better books have been written about his career and tragic downfall, including Stuart Oderman's latest, probably definitive, biography. But what about the others, I ask you? It has been too long since a classic comedy fan could plunk down a quarter for a cheap, poorly-researched paperback with a misleading cover about his or her favorite silent comedians. Let us relive those dear, dead days of yesteryear with this sampling of phoney paperback covers I just made up.