Ringing in August with The Silent Comedy Watch Party, Felix, Ozzie and Cartoon Roots!

Ringing out July 2020, not at all happily, with the passings of guitar genius Peter Green, actress, author and scat singer supreme Annie Ross, silver screen legend Olivia DeHavilland and Danish film music composer/pianist Bent Fabricius-Bjerre A.K.A. Bent Fabric - all favorites at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog - leaves one pondering how the heck to ring in August 2020.



Good news? The blogmeister has, with the exception of grocery shopping, stayed home, washed his hands according to Alton Brown's helpful instructions, wore a stylish jet-black face mask whenever leaving the house and, as the new month begins, happily can attest that he's not dead - and here to write the August 1, 2020 blog post!



JUST kicked off August with today's edition of The Silent Comedy Watch Party, which delivered sorely needed LAUGHS!

Silent Comedy Watch Party logo by Marlene Weisman



Today's lineup begins with Pep Up (1929 - Educational Pictures) starring Cliff Bowes.



Then it's on to Love's Young Scream (1928) a very funny 1-reeler produced by Christie Comedies featuring Anne Cornwall and Jack Duffy and episode 20 of The Silent Comedy Watch Party's piece-de-resistance, Fluttering Hearts (1927 - Hal Roach Studio), starring Charley Chase, Oliver Hardy and Martha Sleeper. Thanks a million, Ben Model, Steve Massa and Mana Allen!


We're delighted to hear that Ben is spearheading a Kickstarter for The Everett Edward Horton DVD Project. The fundraiser runs through August 17.

The gang at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog are enthusiastic fans of Mr. Horton, from his late 1920's silent comedies produced by Harold Lloyd to his brilliant comedy relief work in Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers pictures, inspired narration of Jay Ward Productions' Fractured Fairy Tales and memorable work in a host of enjoyably silly 1960's sitcoms, including F-Troop. The gang here is happy to contribute to this Kickstarter!




Last Sunday's episode included, as half of a 1913 Keystone split reel, A Little Hero (starting at 50:41 in The Silent Comedy Watch Party ep. 19 program), featuring a cast of intrepid fur-bearing stars, led by Pepper the Cat. LOVED IT!



There are numerous heroic canines, led by Pete the Pup of Our Gang and Luke of the Sennett and Arbuckle Comique short subjects, in silent movies. One of our favorites is Cameo the Dog. Here's a crude video copy of a Mack Sennett comedy featuring canine comedienne Cameo, who clearly gets the best of his human co-stars Billy Bevan and Harry Gribbon.



Pepper the Cat and the blogmeister's intrepid felines at home DEMAND equal time - so here's Otto Messmer's Felix the Cat.





We at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog, which devoted Memorial Day Weekend 2020 to silent era cartoons, enthusiastically support animation produced from Winsor McCay's heydey through the pre-Code era, but has never devoted any posts to the silent Disneys. . . until now. . McCay, Cohl, Fleischer and Otto Messmer, yes, many times. Walt Disney's pre-Mickey Mouse cartoons from the 1920's, covered in depth in Russell Merritt and J.B. Kaufman's Walt in Wonderland: The Silent Films of Walt Disney book, no.



Am partial to the Oswald the Lucky Rabbit series over Disney's Alice in Cartoonland, partly due to the more advanced animation in the 1927-1928 series. There was even a terrific book by David A. Bossert, J.B. Kaufman (Foreword) and David Gerstein (Archival Support) devoted to the Disney Oswalds.



The Walt Disney Treasures - The Adventures of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit DVD came out a few years ago, in 2007. It's still available and a tad pricey, but well worth it for those who love animation history, silent cartoons and the evolution of Disney.



For cartoon fans, it's of interest to see the distinctive animation, particularly in the Oswald the Lucky Rabbits made by Disney by 1920's Disney collaborators - those who left when Charles Mintz bought the rights to the character - such as Hugh Harman, Rudy Ising, Rollin Hamilton and Friz Freleng.

Many of our favorite DVDs and Blu-rays of early animation have been from Tommy Jose Stathes' Cartoon Roots series. We were delighted to be involved in the Kickstarter that got the ball rolling on the Cartoon Roots compilation The Bray Studios: Animation Pioneers back in 2015 and devote a blog post to said fundraiser.



After all, the Fleischer Brothers Studio, Earl Hurd, Paul Terry and Walter Lantz all cranked out cartoons for J.R. Bray during the silent era.



The subsequent Cartoon Roots: Bobby Bumps & Fido Blu-Ray from Tommy and Cartoons on Film ranks high on the Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog list of favorite silent cartoon compilations.







The animation of Earl Hurd broke new ground and the Bobby Bumps series no doubt influenced everything from the Reg'lar Fellers comic strip by Gene Byrnes to the Hal Roach Studio's Our Gang to the sound era cartoons of Walt Disney and Chuck Jones' crew at Warner Brothers Animation.



Alas, COVID-19 is still beating the you-know-what out of the U S of A on 8-1-2020, so it appears we will be staying at home, social distancing and attempting to stay safe for the foreseeable future - who knows, it may be many months into next year - so bring on the classic comedies and cartoons!