Moe Howard's wife Helen suggested the story line for Hoi Polloi, one of the three stooges best films. However when she was asked if she would rather have money or screen credit she took the money.
In Fredrico Fellini's The White Sheik, the director's excellent first solo directorial feature, a star of one of Fellini's great coming classics showed up in a small cameo. This was the character Cabiria (played by the director's wife Guilietta Masina) who would later become the main character of The Nights of Cabiria, one of Fellini's many master pieces. It is also with noting that some of Nino Rota's musical score for the film would later be used in Fellini's La Starda (La Starda is one of my favorite movies ever made which makes this connection all the cooler for me).
Buster Keaton's first feature Three Ages was made so that it could be cut up into three shorts if it did not do well, to help make back some money. However the film was a hit and Buster would make more ambitious features in the future.
Lost in Alaska with Abbott and Costello was the first film in which composer Henri Mancini worked. He would later go on to immortality for composing the Pink Panther theme.
Though Charlie Chaplin's The Circus was released in 1928, ideas for the film had been going around Charlie's head since 1920.
Edna Purviance one of Charlie Chaplin's earliest leading ladies stayed on Chaplin's payroll well after she retired. Charlie had great respect for Edna and even directed the drama film A Woman of Paris, her first staring role and produced her A Woman of the Sea, her only other staring role. Unfortunately A Woman of the Sea is now a lost film, and A Woman of Paris is an underrated classic.
A 1921 silent film called Humor Risk was the film debut of The Marx Brothers, unfortunately this is a lost film today.
It's time to take a look at one of the most successful studios of the silent era, The Keystone Studio, and it's films.
Our first film today is The Water Nymph. Released in 1912, this was the first film the studio released. Mack Sennett started his career at the Biograph Studio, a studio founded by D.W. Griffith himself. D.W. Griffith never understood comedy, and because of this Mack Sennett never fully got to be himself as a filmmaker. This is one of the main reasons Mack Sennett founded the Keystone Studio. Sennett directed this film himself, it was somewhat a remake of a film he had made at Biograph in 1911 called The Diving Girl. However The Water Nymph is much rowdier and more comedic than the previous short. This film stars Sennett, Mabel Normand (who was also in The Diving Girl), and Ford Sterling. The beautiful and talented Mabel Normand in her one piece bathing suit, would later give birth to Mack Sennett's bathing beauties, a later staple of Keystone films. It is hard to understand today, why this film was so revolutionary, but 1912 audiences had never seen such a mixture of slapstick and sex (tame compared to modern films) on the movie screen before. However this does not stop it from being quite entertaining still.
Many stars got their start in films at the Keystone studios, including W.C. Feilds, Fatty Arbuckle, Ben Trupin, Harry Langdon, Harold Lloyd, Marie Dressler and Charlie Chaplin. One of Chaplin's best films from his time at Keystone was our next short, Dough and Dynamite. Released in 1914, Chaplin's first year in films, it is obvious that his own style of comedy was already becoming evident. This film has no trouble taking it's time and slowing down the pace to make the slapstick even funnier, something that was not evident at all in his first few films at Keystone. This film was directed by Charlie Chaplin, and written by Mack Sennett. Chaplin did not start off directing his own films, but he became increasing unhappy with his directors to the point where he asked if he could direct his own films. After this he would very rarely star in any film that wasn't directed by himself.
Next we are going to look at an early film for a group that Keystone is highly associated with
Keystone, and this was the Keystone Cops. The Keystone Cops first appearance had been in a 1912 film called Hoffmeyer's Legacy, but this film is still often called their first film, and it was the one that popularized the team. Despite popular belief the cops were hardly ever the stars of their films. Like Mighty Mouse would later they usually didn't even appear until near the end of the films. This film's real star is Mabel Normand instead. The lineup for the Keystone Cops would often change from film to film, here they are played by Fred Mace, Charles Avery, Rube Miller, Edgar Kennedy, Jack Leonard, and Fred Happ. This film is directed by Henry Lehrman who was one of the most prolific Keystone directors. So from 1913, here is Bangville Police.
Our last film tonight is one of the classic Mack Sennett produced shorts staring Harry Langdon. It is Soldier Man from 1926. Langdon was in his prime at this time, and he already had his trusty crew behind him. This crew included director, Harry Edwards, and writers Arthur Ripley and Frank Capra (yes the Frank Capra who later directed It's a Wonderful Life and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington). Also playing a supporting role is someone who would be very familiar to my fellow Three Stooges watchers, actor Vernon Dent, who appeared in quite a few films with Langdon at this time. What is also very interesting about this film is that it's opening scenes are quite similar with those that opened the latter Laurel and Hardy feature Blockheads. What makes that interesting is that Harry Langdon would be a writer for that film. Anyway this is a very funny short that shows just how great the team of Langon, Edwards, Capra, and Ripley could be at their best. http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x23dghg_soldier-man-1926-harry-langdon-harry-edwards_shortfilms
The film Smiles of a Summer Night was entered into the Cannes Film Festival without it's director Ingmar Bergman knowing. He found out is was entered when he read read the news papers talking about it.
Despite Universal being well known for horror films, the only Jekyll and Hyde film to come out of the studio was Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
The Academy Awards state that to win an award a film has to play in Los Angles. Because of controversy surrounding director/star/writer/producer Charlie Chaplin during the Cold War Era, his 1952 film Limelight, was not released in L.A. until 1972. Because of this it is the only film to receive an academy award 20 years after it was completed. It received an award for it's musical score.
Animation legend Walter Lantz (Woody Woodpecker, Andy Panda, Chilly Willy) wanted to make a combination live action/animation feature film with the comedy team Abbott and Costello, since they were both working for Universal. Unfortunately this never came to be.
For the scene in Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush where the little Tramp seeming turns into a chicken before Big Jim McKay's (Mack Swain's) eyes, a stage hand was supposed to be in the chicken suit. However the stage hand just couldn't move the way Chaplin wanted. So Chaplin himself got into the chicken suit.
In another famous scene from Chaplin's The Gold Rush, Charlie Chaplin and Mack Swain seemingly ate a shoe for Thanksgiving dinner.Chaplin had a hard time figuring out how to make an edible shoe, until he saw kids coming out of a candy store with animal shaped licorice. Chaplin then came up with an idea, and asked someone working in the candy store if they could make a shoe out of licorice. They did. The scene was shot so many time that Mack Swain grew sick of licorice.
Because of their success in foreign countries during the silent era, Laurel and Hardy would film their early talkies multiple times in various langues to keep popular in countries that don't speak English. They would read the words spelled phonetically off of cue-cards.
One of the most famous images of classic film comedy is Charlie Chaplin doing the dance of the dinner rolls in his classic The Gold Rush. However this was performed earlier by Fatty Arbuckle in the 1917 short film, The Rough House. However Chaplin definitely brought his own unique charm to the bit.
The underrated comedy team of Wheeler and Woolsey were the first film comedy team to emerge out of the sound era, with the 1929 musical comedy Rio Rita, based off a stage play they themselves acted in. Interestingly Abbott and Costello would later star in another film version of Rio Rita, that film would be released in 1942.
For the film Blockheads, silent comedy legend Harry Langdon, drew the caricatures of Laurel and Hardy (the stars of the film) that appear in the opening credits. He also was a writer on the film.
Though the feature film His First Flame was completed in 1925, it was not released until 1927. The film was made at the Mack Sennet studio, before the film's star Harry Langdon left for First National. Though Mack Sennet originaly did not want to release the film (It would have been the first feature starring Harry Langdon), he changed his mind after seeing the success of the feature films Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, The Strong Man, and Long Pants, all of which also stared Harry Langdon. Therefore it was released after Harry Langdon had proven himself to be successful in features.
W. C. Fields (along with staring in) wrote The Bank Dick. The writing credit for the film is given to Mahatma Kane Jeeves. This is a fake name W. C. Fields made up. It is a play on words meaning "My Hat, My Cane Jeeves".
A film that Charlie Chaplin wanted to make but never did was a film about the life of Napoleon Bonaparte, with himself playing Napoleon himself.
Before he became a director, George Steven (The Diary of Anne Frank, Shane, The Greatest Story Ever Told) was a cinematographer on many Laurel and Hardy films.
In an effort to top the emotional impact of his own City Lights, Charlie Chaplin's originally scripted ending for Modern Times, involved the Gamin becoming a nun, and the tramp meeting her in the hospital after having another mental breakdown. He dropped this ending for the one that appears in the film today.
When legendary silent comedian Harry Langdon became less popular an actor, he would also write for various comedy films. These films would include 4 Laurel and Hardy films; Block Heads, Flying Deuces, A Chump at Oxford, and Saps at Sea.
Before doing the films he is known for now Frank Capra (It's A Wonderful Life, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington) worked as both a writer and director for films staring Harry Langdon.
Though Harold Lloyd's characters often times had the first name Harold, the only time he played a character named Harold Lloyd was in Safety Last. Though in much of the intertitles he is just referred to as the boy, on his paycheck you can clearly see the name Harold Lloyd.
Bill Strother who played Harold Lloyd's building climbing friend in Safety Last was actually a real building climber, and after Lloyd saw him performing this act, he came up with the idea for the film.
One of the first images that may come to ones mind when they hear Laurel and Hardy is the two carrying a piano up a flight of stairs. Before this film the duo appeared in another film in which they carried a washing machine up the same flight of stairs and had much of the same trouble. This 1927 film has unfortunately been lost, but some screen shots still exist such as the one I included here. The film was named Hats Off.
Universal did not want Lou Costello to do his own stunt work, so much of the stunt work was done by Lou's older brother Pat Costello. You can see Pat along side his brother in the film Mexican Hayride. He would also be a producer on the film Jack and the Beanstalk staring Abbott and Costello. He would also be a producer for The Abbott and Costello Show for TV.
Lou Costello was a great athlete and in the film Here Come the Co-eds, he had done nearly all of the complicated basketball shorts in the movie.
Charlie Chaplin did not get along with his City Lights costar Virginia Cherrill. After she showed up late one day Chaplin wanted to fire her from the movie. He was going to replace her with Georgia Hale who had costarred with Chaplin in The Gold Rush. However she still costars in the film because too much time and money was spent on scenes with her in them, he decided not to re-shoot.
Though Buster Keaton did nearly all of his stunts in his independently produced films. The only exception to this is his character's s amazing pole vault into his sweetheart's room in College.
Even though he never received director's credit on any Laurel and Hardy film, Stan Laurel often times worked very closely with the director, and basically co-directed many of these films.
Director Leo McCarey is the only person to take credit for teaming Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy.
During the making of The Time of Their Lives(1946), Lou Costello called director Charles Barton saying, he should play Bud Abbott's part. Barton said there was simply to much of the film already shot to do this. Costello didn't come to work for a little bit, but Barton called his bluff. When Lou Costello came back on set, he never mentioned this incident and continued the part originally written for him.
Buster Keaton was known for taking huge risks for the stunts of his films. In the scene of "Steamboat Bill Jr." in which the front of a building falls towards and he is safe because he stood where an open window was, he made a piratically big risk in fact many on the set feared for Keaton's life because if things went wrong he could have easily died.
After years of being an independent filmmaker Buster Keaton moved to MGM mainly for finical reasons. However he soon found himself treated as just an actor, and was no longer able to direct his own films. He became very unhappy with many of the films he acted in, and would call this the worst decision he ever made. Interestingly though even though he acted in many sub-par films for MGM, his first film at MGM, The Cameraman, is in fact a masterpiece.
In the film A Day at the Races, Groucho Marx's character was originally named Dr. Quackenbush. However MGM's legal department found out that there were real doctors with that name so to avoid offending anyone the name Dr. Hackenbush was used instead. Groucho often called this character the best one he ever played.
