Three's a Crowd is Harry Langdon's costly masterpiece

Review by Doug Gibson

(This is our third original Plan9Crunch review this month of a Harry Langdon film. We are presenting these posts in recognition of the Harry Langdon Film Festival next weekend a the silent film history, Niles Film Museum in Fremont, Calif.)

There is a scene near the very end of "Three's A Crowd," 1927, that I find both heartbreaking and beautiful. Harry Langdon (No. 3) is about to lose No. 1, a beautiful young woman he has long pined for, and through a set of extraordinary events, managed to save the life of her and her newborn baby. For days she and the infant have recuperated at his meager tenement home up high above a long set of stairs. No. 3 (Harry) wishes for a fantasy. A charlatan has assured him that the young woman, who left an errant husband, will stay with Harry and both will raise the baby. But No. 2 (the prodigal husband) has returned, and No. 1 still loves him. They are leaving No. 3, and crushing a fantasy that deep down, he knows was impossible.

The minimalist comedian Harry Langdon, who ironically thrived in an era of slapstick, knockabout comedies, displays emotional chaos with his eyes, facial expressions, movements and other gestures. Once he looks down at the palm of his hand. The attentive viewer understands that is the palm the charlatan read before promising Harry romantic happiness with No. 2. Getting back to the crux of my point, just as the happy, reunited couple is leaving, with airy promises that No. 3 can visit them anytime, Harry clutches the sleeve of an overcoat draped over the woman. For just a moment, No. 3 caresses the wrist area of the sleeves. It's a fleeting moment, not noticed at all by the departing couple. But it's powerful, as it captures the deep reluctance and despair No. 3 has at losing what is literally his heart's desire.

Watch Three's a Crowd here.

I consider "Three's a Crowd" to be Harry Langdon's masterpiece silent film feature. He evolved his minimalist comic character -- who quietly through perhaps dumb luck and God's providence wins happiness and the girl in movies -- to a comic cipher who doesn't get the girl of his dreams, who doesn't find a place in the world, doesn't improve his financial means. In short, he is a survivor, who gets up every day and gets through it with a stoicism that only reveals emotion, and comedy appreciation, though gestures, both facial and body, and stubborn determination to both endure trials and create facsimiles of what he would like to have. (An example of this is found early in the film where Harry encounters a doll that looks a lot like him. Observing his boorish, bullying, and insecure, boss - Harry is an assistant to a trucker - playing with his young son, Harry imitates this by playing with his doll in the same manner.)

"Three's a Crowd" has a simple plot. No. 3, Harry, has a crush on a girl, No. 2, he has observed. Because she left her husband, No. 2, Harry is placed in a situation where he can both save her, get help for her when she gives birth, and provide her and baby space to recuperate. That leads to the climax previously discussed. There are greats bits of comedy in the film. Examples include Harry trying to get back through a trap door with a large curtain . Every time Harry tries to open the door to climb in, more curtain falls and he has to start over. More great comedy is Harry preparing a diaper for the infant. Daydreaming causes him to prepare it as a pie. There is a finale, epilogue scene that involves Harry returning to the false hypnotist's office. I won't give it away but it is laugh out loud comedy.

"Three's a Crowd" is a beautiful film to watch. The camera work of the surrounding area is perfect. As Gabriella Oldham notes in her biography, Harry Langdon: King of Silent Cinema, the star and director recreated a tenement neighborhood of three or four blocks on the studio, with 300 extras. Snow was realistically created in 90-degree California heat! The sights of tenement life, morning to evening, are captivating. I love the "snowstorm" scenes and individuals braving their way through the winds, bumping into poles, or the early-morning milk wagons, the busy late-morning afternoon streets, the lonely, steep staircase that leads to Harry's home.

I call "Three's a Crowd" a costly masterpiece. I acknowledge it has many detractors. It lost money and basically was the genesis of Harry Langdon's end as a leading features actor. Honestly, one can't blame First National Pictures for being angry with Langdon delivering a film so different from box office winners such as "Tramp, Tramp, Tramp," and "The Strong Man." And who can blame audiences, long accustomed to Langdon "Little Elfing-ing" his way to winning the girl and success, being nonplussed that the protagonist's lonely, dour life stays that way at the end?

But Langdon was evolving his character, and I think he succeeded. I urge readers to buy the KINO DVD release of "Three's a Crowd," paired with "The Chaser," and listen to David Kalat's commentary. He makes a strong case against the fabulist (when it came to Langdon) Frank Capra's criticisms that were, unfortunately, picked up by scholars like Leonard Maltin and others. "Three's a Crowd" was a financial bomb, but so was "The General," "Duck Soup" and many other films appropriately revered today. The late James Agee tabbed Langdon as one of the four comedy greats, along with Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd. He merits that. Unfortunately, Langdon's silent features are virtually ignored by Turner Classic Movies. I've never seen a silent feature aired. Occasionally the Sennett shorts are aired, and some of his Hal Roach early talkie shorts. That indifference is a sin of omission by TCM that needs to be repented of.

"Three's a Crowd" is often described as a cloying attempt to duplicate Chaplin's "The Kid." I disagree. Langdon is not Chaplin's Tramp. He is a silent, ignored working-class cipher, with a dream that falls into his lap. Unlike Chaplin's Tramp, who is perceptive enough to understand the kid needs his mom, Harry assumes a fantasy -- with a palm reader's urging -- that can't realistically occur. Chaplin's Tramp also ends "The Kid" with a clear guarantee that he can have a relationship in the future. Despite promises from the reunited couple in "Three's a Crowd," there is no sense that No. 3 has a rewarding future with the couple and their baby. How can he? He's No. 3.

Also, despite Harry's hopes, there's an entertaining dream sequence by Harry where he is fighting the husband to protect the woman and child. Despite encouragement from the woman, Harry loses the bout. In his own dream, No. 3 loses. It underscores that "Three's a Crowd" is a sad tale of unrequited desires with comedy. It's hard to please audiences expecting slapstick to dominate.

Please watch "Three's a Crowd" above. Watch it more than once. Enjoy Harry Langdon providing great comedy in an understated, minimalist manner. And then e-mail TCM and urge them to show "Three's a Crowd" or another Langdon silent feature on a Sunday night. It's about time. As much as I love "The Kid," "The General" or "The Freshman" on TCM, they've probably played 100 times the past generation. Audiences merit a chance to sample Langdon's genius.

Aging Harry Langdon still carries comedy short Piano Mooner

Review by Doug Gibson

Harry Langdon certainly did his best comedy shorts work in the first half of the 1920, silents such as "All Night Long" "Saturday Morning," "Fiddlesticks, "Boobs in the Woods,"and many more. He made some above-average early sound shorts with Hal Roach's studio and with Educational and Paramount studios, often paired with Vernon Dent.

The last decade or so of his life, though, a healthy percentage of Langdon's screen acting credits were with Columbia making two-reel comedy shorts. Into the 1940s, the actor began to show his age. He still acted as the "Little Elf," but the face was puffy, with age lines and a paunch. I have a fondness for some of his late shorts though. He gamely carries on with low budgets, quick schedules and by-the-numbers plot. He brings magic to these films.

Watch Piano Mooner here.

That brings us to "Piano Mooner," released by Columbia in December 1942. Although it has the chaos and ultra slapsticky dosage of the Columbia shorts, it's an enjoyable 16-plus minutes, with a surprisingly concise plot. Harry plays Harry, a Little Elf-type piano tuner who really wants to marry his fiance, Mildred, (Gwen Kenyon) but only if he can do it with a proper set of dress tails. In the opening scene, Mildred is explaining this to her menacing, pistol-toting brother (Stanley Blystone) who threatens to use his pistol on Harry if the marriage does not occur by 3 p.m.

Harry put an ad in the paper, he'll tune a piano for a suit of tails. In a funny scene where he waits for a call, Harry sits on a couch and pushes springs back in the seat that keep springing out. A Mrs. Gibson (Betty Blythe) calls and says he can tune the family piano and she'll give him a suit and tails.

At the Gibson home, a wedding is being prepared for the family's daughter. Harry gets to work on the piano, which offers another funny scene of him discovering it's infested with birds. Although scenes in the short are helmed haphazardly by the director (Harry Edwards) Langdon adds to their value by underplaying the role. In the manner he made famous as a silent star, he uses his face to express befuddlement and mild emotion.

At the Gibson home is a marriage-obsessed maid (Fifi D'Orsay) who gets it in her mind that Langdon, who announced that he's getting married, plans to marry her. Employing a lot of physical comedy (which in the Columbia sense means she falls down a lot and generally takes a lot of lumps) she tries very hard to keep Harry from keeping the suit and tails that Mrs. Gibson has given him.

Orsay was a big star in the early days of talkies and obviously her wattage had diminished by late 1942. But she is a unique co-star for Langdon and does a good job in an obviously stereotypical role. (She has the kind of role that generally would have been played to less effect by say, Columbia comedy shorts regular Elsie Ames).

Interludes at the Gibson home include Harry and the bride-to-be at the Gibson place walking down the aisle as a practice role, only to be discovered by Mildred's violent brother, who goes after Harry with pistols blazing. Other comedy interludes involve Harry setting off a sprinkler, and losing his suit and tails (temporarily) to a man from the mission collecting used clothes. Another has Harry learning from a guest at the Gibson house that he's late for his own wedding. Another involves Harry taking back his suit and tails from a scheming Fifi; and finally, Harry and Mildred escaping from a chaotic wedding scene at the Gibson home on a motorcycle with sidecar.

Betty Blythe was a silent movie screen siren around 1920. She and Langdon co-starred in a very entertaining Producers Releasing Corp. 1940 film, "Misbehaving Husbands," They had excellent chemistry as a married couple dealing with the wife's suspicions that Harry was unfaithful. The film, I have read, was a successful B movie. It would have been interesting to see if Harry and Betty could have made a series of domestic comedies for PRC, but it was not to be.

Director Edwards, who among other credits, directed "Tramp, Tramp, Tramp," Langdon's first feature, was at the end of his career. Some say that alcoholism had damaged him professionally. The Three Stooges, and Vera Vague, refused to work with him on Columbia comedy shorts. Perhaps because of their long association, Edwards' best late Columbia work seems to be with Harry Langdon. Harry's signature brand of restrained comedy tempered any haphazard, sloppy directing work by Edwards. Soon after Langdon's death in late 1944, Edwards was let go by Columbia.

It's easy to find a lot of Langdon's Columbia shorts on the Internet. However, until someone produces a DVD of his Columbia shorts, what's available are ragged, choppy, faded prints. Nevertheless, watch Piano Mooner (here) and get past the tattered print and already-old slapstick and watch Harry Langdon elevate a one-week two-reeler by working well with an old movie-making partner, Harry Edwards.

Buster Keaton's last starring role -- Boom in the Moon

By Doug Gibson

I am reading James L. Neibaur's book "The Fall of Buster Keaton: His Films for MGM, Educational Pictures, and Columbia," (The Scarecrow Press, 2010) and I plan to review it soon. On page 177, he mentions Keaton's  role in an obscure Mexican comedy -- from 1946 -- called "El Moderno Barba Azul," or "Boom in the Moon." Neibaur says the film is best forgotten, and he's correct that it makes his low-budget comedy shorts seem like "The General" in comparison. However, I think it's worth a review; after all, it was Keaton's final starring role. So, here we go:

There's really no big reason to see Boom In the Moon ... unless you are a cult film fanatic. (And that's why we at Plan 9 Crunch are reviewing it) It's an  feature from 1946, made when Keaton was at the low point of his career (he later rebounded via TV and small roles and cameos in big-budget films). But in the mid-1940s, Buster Keaton was not working much.

But, first some background: In the 1920s, Keaton was among the kings of cinema comedy. But he had a drinking problem that became more acute when talkies came and he signed a multi-picture deal that included comedies with Jimmy Durante. To put it charitably, Durante's manic, often-unfunny rantings grated on Keaton's physical, stone-face comedy. Without any creative input, Keaton was portrayed as a buffoon and clown rather than an industrious underdog. During the making of their last film, "What No Beer?" Keaton was so drunk he trashed his dressing room and disappeared from the set for several days. After the film wrapped, MGM, his employer, canned Keaton.

After that, Keaton existed for almost 20 years in a grab-work-when-available world. His chief income was making comedy shorts for Educational Pictures and Columbia, as well as doing gag-man work for the bigger studios at $100 a week. Keaton's comedy shorts efforts were overshadowed by The Three Stooges and Little Rascals shorts.Also, Keaton felt the shorts were demeaning, as well. He had not starred in a film for a long time when he accepted the lead role in Boom in the Moon, or as it was known in Mexico, The Modern Bluebird ("El Moderno Barba Azul)

It is a very low budget, often strange movie starring Keaton and a bunch of mediocre Mexican actors. Buster plays a sailor in a lifeboat who drifts for weeks. He doesn't know that World War 2 is over and thinks he is in Japan when he lands in Mexico. He is immediately arrested and accused of being a killer of young girls. He's paired with another clownish prisoner (Angel Garasa). The pair are offered the choice of flying to the moon in a very goofy professor's rocket instead of execution. After a bunch of clowning they accept. Somehow the professor's very pretty niece (Virginia Seret) is in the rocket when it blasts off.

After a few days the rocket lands. The trio thinks they are on the moon, but they are really just a few miles from where they took off. The two convicts are cleared ... No more synopsis in case some readers want to watch the film. (It's hard to find. The best bet is to check amazon and ebay for used copies)

The first half is a little better than the last half because Keaton has the opportunity to use a lot of physical comedy, including a funny bit in his cell. The last half unfortunately allows too many actors to babble, including one Mexican actor -- playing a silly psychiatrist -- who will cause viewers to grind their teeth in pain at his performance. The rocket is so low budget that it would not have qualified for a C-movies serial in the 1930s. Still, Keaton occasionally, with his physical deadpan humor, comes off well in a few scenes. Ironically, Garasa, as Keaton's sidekick, is as nasal and annoying as Durante was with Keaton 15 years earlier.

Keaton has very little dialogue, and it's dubbed anyway in today's prints, although the others prattle on too much. Boom in the Moon could have been a lot better if it had been shot silent, and relied on Keaton's emotion and physical comedy. But that idea likely occurred to nobody in 1946.

The film was released theatrically in Mexico and played only in Spanish for 37 years, including U.S. TV on Spanish-speaking stations. It was briefly released via VHS with English dubbing in 1983. The release wasn't very long and the film has become a little hard to find. I'm glad I watched it -- I have wanted to for at least a decade. It was good to see Keaton starring in any feature in 1946. Despite the poverty-row film, Keaton still retained flashes of the great talent in the The General, The Camera Man, and Steamboat Bill Jr., etc.

Review of "For Art's Sake: The Biography and Filmography of Ben Turpin"

Review by Doug Gibson

There's a passage in "For Art's Sake," Steve Rydzewski's biography and compilation of silent film comedy star Ben Turpin's life (BearManor Media), in which actor Wallace Beery roughs up his co-star Turpin while making a comedy short. The somewhat sadistic encounter takes place just before Turpin, a literal pioneer of slapstick silent cinema, becomes a major star for producer Mack Sennett, earning more than $3,000 a week in his heyday.

Now flash 20-plus a few years, the elderly Sennett, getting close to 70, provides a bittersweet rational as to why he is rarely in the "talkies" cinema --no one has asked. Turpin is still active, whether on the stage or for other publicity endeavors. But he's proud of what he has accomplished, and doesn't want to go hat in the hand, begging for screen work.

Rydzewski's book is a dash of biography (much of it in his subject's early years) and a whole lot of research that is shared with readers, mainly in the form of newspaper clipping and press releases. The format works. The subject's life and events flow well and the information, which must have taken thousands of hours to gather, is fascinating.This is a treasure trove of history. (Just the accounts of obscure stage performances are fascinating) It's unlikely that another book will ever improve on detailing Turpin's life. Given that most readers of this genre book will be searching for details of the subject's life, the format is successful

There's a lot of pathos in these life anecdotes, clipping and biography, but Turpin's life was not a tragedy. He was a very successful man, who saved and invested his earnings so he didn't have to work all his life. He enjoyed two successful marriages that were only ended by death. Rydzewski has done an impressive job of detailing the comic performer's life about as well as anyone has done and will be able to do. As for myself, prior to reading "For Art's Sake, " I knew little about Turpin's life, other than recognizing his iconic cross-eyed countenance. Several years ago, I read an enjoyable feature article on Turpin in Cult Movies Magazine, where I learned that Ben as a teen was given a small bounty by his dad and told to seek his fortune. After Ben, born in 1869, lost the bounty gambling, he hit the rails as a hobo. In the book, Rydzewski quotes Turpin as saying that "Mulligan stew was my bread" in those days.

"For Art's Sake" provides lots of information on Turpin's early life. His father managed candy shops in New Orleans and New York City, where Turpin learned the art of taffy pulling, a skill he was paid for as an adult performer. Living a nomadic life for several years after leaving home, Ben gravitated to carnivals and theater work, particularly physical comedy. A brief first marriage hardly slowed him down. Although he traveled widely, working for very low wages, Chicago eventually became an early hub of his career.

In the first decade of the 20th century, Turpin gained notoriety for his "Happy Hooligan" performance. These types of characters required intense physical skill, including throwing one's legs up high in the air and falling on the back and quickly rising. These moves, as well as comedy acts that required climbing and hard knocks, would frequently send Turpin over the years to hospitals. (Although there are many "explanations" as to why Turpin developed crossed-eyes, Rydzeswki's research points toward the cumulative effect of Ben having to intentionally cross his eyes for long stretches to play Happy Hooligan as a likely reason.

In 1907, Ben married Carrie Le Mieux, a fellow performer and they settled in Chicago. It was a happy union that would last until her death in 1925. About this time, Ben started making silent comedy films for Essanay, a Chicago-based company. As Rydzewski explains, film was not as respected as the stage in that period. Scripts were not a part of short comedy films. It was go to the scene, stay away from the cops, and improvise your movie. In fact, as Rydzewski's book notes, Ben was once arrested, and spent several hours in jail shivering, for entering public waters in Chicago while filming. (Here is a look at Ben, a legitimate pioneer of slapstick silent cinema -- he was literally the first -- in a portion of the Essanay 1909 short "Mr. Flip.")

Although he was only paid $20 to $30 a week for several years, Ben stayed with Essanay for a long time, even heading with his wife, Carrie, when Essanay made the move to Hollywood. Most of his early films are lost but enough survive remain to fully appreciate Ben's talent for physical comedy timing as well as his facial expressions and aggressive persistence that demands that viewers pay attention to him. Frankly, Essanay exploited his talent, making a fortune with the peanuts they paid him. As Rydzewski notes, once Ben tried to quit Essanay, but lost, and came back to the same miserable pay.

It was Charlie Chaplin, hired by Essanay, who finally started to move Ben's career into well-paid stardom. Instantly noting Turpin's star power, Chaplin worked with him and then refused to work with him again -- as a compliment -- correctly noting Turpin was a star. When Chaplin left Essanay, it likely helped provide Ben the resolve to find better earnings. He signed with Sennett, amazed that they accepted his demand of $100 a week. (An interesting anecdote in Rydzewski's book is Turpin recounting how his accountant urged him to live on far less and save a lot. That likely underscores his frugal lifestyle, which kept the Turpins financially secure after the top-earning years were over.)

As mentioned, Ben sailed to super-stardom with Sennett, earning $3K-plus a week. Many of his Sennett shorts survive and they are a pleasure to watch. As his wife Carrie's life neared its end, Ben, a very devout Catholic, took her to religious shrines hoping for a cure. He suspended his career to care for her in her final months. After her death, there are several news clipping that capture how big the story was in the mid-1920 entertainment media of star Ben Turpin shucking off his career to care for his loved spouse.

Although very witty in his public appearances, Turpin lived a quiet life with Carrie. There were no children, evidently a life disappointment. (Rydzewski includes an odd tale of Ben and Carrie asking a poor man if they could raise his daughter -- the man declined). In any event, it's not a surprise Ben eventually married Babette Dietz in the summer of 1926. Their union lasted until Ben's death in 1940 at age 70.

Ben went back to comedies but did not make the change to talky comedies. He was financially secure. At age 60 he could still do stage work and add to his secure living. He had invested well. I'm just guessing but he may have looked at the artistic difficulties some of his peers (Langdon, Lloyd, Keaton and even Chaplin) were having making the transition. In the early '30s, comedy cinema was moving toward dialogue comedy, either battle of the sexes or the fast repartee of the Marx Brothers. Slapstick was popular in shorts, but the budgets were tiny, and the films less recognized than in the Sennett era.

The best chance to see Ben in a film is the 1940 Laurel and Hardy film, "Saps at Sea," where he plays -- in a quick cameo -- a cross-eyed plumber. Ben Turpin died of a heart attack on July 1, 1940. Born in 1869, he was a literal first in his class of silent slapstick. Rydzewski has done a tremendous service, both to fans and film historians, with this comprehensive work. The book also includes scores and scores of pages of photos.

Teddy at the Throttle is classic early slapstick romance

By Doug Gibson

This month (September 2012) Turner Classic Movies is showing early silent Mack Sennett/Keystone Company comedy shorts. They are a treasure to view and my favorite so far is 1917’s “Teddy at the Throttle.” I don’t know if by that date a damsel in distress, a feckless boyfriend, a dastardly villain, the scheming vamp, a heroic dog – and a girl tied to the railroad tracks – had become clichés already.

Certainly, “Teddy at the Throttle” does not take itself seriously. It’s a great comedy, with lots of slapstick that includes slips in the mud and a very fat man taking up two seats on a train. But it’s a must-see film for fans of the silent era. Fortunately, TCM has the full 27-minute version. (YouTube has a couple of shorter versions, a 24-plus minute-version without music and a 22-minute version one that focuses more on the orchestra than the film (see above).

The plot is simple and well-suited for a one-reel comedy farce.  The young lovely is “Gloria Dawn,” played by Gloria Swanson, who is engaged to “Bobbie Knight,” a rather simple-minded by good-hearted man, played by Bobby Vernon. Gloria is an orphan, and her finances are being handled by “Henry Black,” “her rascally guardian,” played by Wallace Beery. Black, of course, is stealing Gloria’s money. He enlists his vampy sister, played by May Emory, who easily turns the head of simple-minded Bobby. At that point,

Black moves in on a repulsed Gloria, hoping to marry her for her cash, get rid of her, and split the loot with his sister. There’s an uncaring aunt who hangs around, lots and lots of extras and of course, there’s “Teddy,” a faithful dog who turns out to be a big hero.

The film, directed by Clarence G. Badger, is fast-paced, manic comedy at its best. The two stars, Swanson and Beery went on to much bigger status, and they are fantastic. Swanson is so vulnerable that you want to reach into the screen and take her away from the villainous Beery, who has no qualms about tying her to the railroad tracks and gleefully anticipating her horrendous death. Ah, but Teddy won’t let that happen.

Besides YouTube and TCM, you can buy Teddy at the Throttle as part of a Kino Collection DVD. It’s worth the cash.