One of the key things, in addition to our pets, that got this household through many months of lockdown in 2020-2021 was watching The Silent Comedy Watch Party, presented with wit and panache by intrepid film historians, authors and curators Ben Model and Steve Massa on Sundays.
On this Sunday, St. Patrick's Day, the series will return to YouTube for its 4th anniversary extravaganza and episode #100 - HOORAY!
One of the many things I love about the series is that, unlike 99% of silent era comedy programs, The Silent Comedy Watch Party does not limit the focus strictly to The Big 3, Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd.
While we at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog love those guys, unquestionably the other silent movie laughmakers, lesser known but often hilarious, richly deserve kudos, bravos and huzzahs for their contributions to film humor.
It's noteworthy that acrobatic Al St. John, the ever-persnickety Johnny Arthur and wacky redhead of silents Alice Howell - all very funny performers - are featured in Silent Comedy Watch Party episode #100.
The following graphic for Silent Comedy Watch Party episode 50 shows just a few of the amazing comics featured in the series.
The dyed-in-the-wool silent comedy aficionados at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog extend big time thanks to The Silent Comedy Watch Party for repeatedly delivering big laughs during 2020, a difficult time (even for those fortunate enough to not lose family members and friends to coronavirus) and continuing to do so with good-natured enthusiasm in only slightly less bat guano crazy 2024.
Last year, posted a Happy Easter entry that spotlighted a few all-time favorites of Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog. Why not? Nobody was going anywhere!
If one is going traditional on Easter, and pondering the multiple Biblical epics of Cecil B. DeMille, the 1927 silent King Of Kings would get the nod.
It's an epic, as many silent features produced in 1923-1928 are, so you might need a gargantuan television - or a 35mm projector and a genuine film print - to view the big big big (and, no kidding, we do mean BIG) production.
If the Easter viewing is definitely NOT going traditional, there's always DeMille's early talkie Madam Satan, the director's headlong plunge into pre-Code delirium.
Indeed, DeMille's epic spectacle of dirigibles, dancers, showgirls, wild parties, massive masquerade parties, all in fever dream hallucinogenic-ness anticipating Busby Berkeley, serves as an excellent palate cleanser.
Arguably, Cecil B. DeMille is most frequently associated with the 1956 epic production of The Ten Commandments, which TCM will be screening in various venues today.
All the gang at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog can think of seeing The Ten Commandments is not Yul Brynner's hairdo, but Edward G. Robinson. As described by Billy Crystal: "where's your Moses NOWWWWW?"
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We're big fans of Eddie Robinson AND Billy and would love to see Mr. Crystal perform his excellent stand-up comedy live sometime.
Here are a few more snippets of Easter entertainment options, beginning with a Name That Film proposition. Don't know the name of this cartoon or where MyFootage001 found it. Looks Eastern European and gets me thinking of the Tom & Jerry cartoons the great Gene Deitch produced in Prague. Whatever the country of the cartoon's origin may be, that is one badass rabbit!
Along similar lines to the MyFootage001 clip. . . Australia's Eric Porter made violent albeit cheerful short subjects, resembling classic American toons filtered through a broken funhouse mirror. While the budget is low and the animation is anything but Disney-esque, the two Color Classics by Porter strike this animation buff as oddly original and rather entertaining, with some very funny and enjoyably extreme sight gags throughout.
Had Eric Porter produced cartoons 40 years later, the voice of this series' ersatz star, rabbit trap purveyor and unsympathetic lout Bimbo the Wombat would have no doubt been provided by Chris Farley (or at least the SNL and comedy feature film star's Down Under equivalent).
Wrote a post about Eric Porter's studio in 2013 and was unquestionably unduly harsh in calling its cartoons "The Blunder From Down Under." Never mind this blogger's natural inclination towards sarcasm - we're actually very fond of these cartoons and would especially love to see more of the Porter studio's animated commercials, WW2 era training and advertising films.
After producing Rabbit Stew in 1952 and Bimbo's Auto in 1954, Porter pitched the Color Classics as a series to Columbia Pictures. At that time, Columbia was distributing UPA's popular Mister Magoo cartoons and critically acclaimed Jolly Frolics.
Jolly Frolics won Oscars and Mister Magoo got laughs, so Cohn and Co. at Columbia did not regard Eric Porter's pitch as an offer they could not refuse.
This is quite ironic, considering that the pre-UPA producers of animation for Columbia Pictures, the much-maligned and misbegotten Screen Gems Studio, produced actual American toons filtered through two SHATTERED funhouse mirrors.
Of course, we at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog, along with three or four other individuals upon this earth, LOVE both Screen Gems and Eric Porter Studio cartoons!
As all of us here miss the annual Easter shindigs of yore and especially the family and friends who have passed, is there anything else we will watch today? This, episode 52 of The Silent Comedy Watch Party, featuring Charlie Chaplin and Harry Langdon. The Silent Comedy Watch Party is on YouTube every Sunday, at 3:00 p.m. EST /high noon PST!
Silent Comedy Watch Party logo by Marlene Weisman
The 50th episode of The Silent Comedy Watch Party was two weeks ago on March 21.
This Sunday series has been helpful in weathering many rough spots in the past year.
Cool vintage silent comedies fill the bill, Easter Sunday and every day.
Movies starring the likes of Chaplin, Langdon, Keaton and Chase, preceded by some documentaries about music, followed by Bugs Bunny in Easter Yeggs and a Billy Crystal stand-up comedy set or two, that will do just fine as Easter entertainment.
Getting back to Mr. Crystal, the eloquent eulogy Billy gave at Muhammad Ali's memorial is something that will lift one's spirits on Easter and the other 364 days of the year. Underlying Billy's reminiscences of his friendship with the heavyweight champion is a message about the brotherhood of man.
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!
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.
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!
During extended sheltering-in-place thanks to That Darn Pandemic, we at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog are pleased as pomegranates to see fellow archivists, friends, historians, classic movie and animation buffs stepping up to the plate with much needed entertainment.
On Facebook Friday nights at 8:00 p.m. Sci Fi Bob Ekman, my friend and guru of the Kodak Pageant 250S, presents a weekly slice of the Psychotronix Film Festival. Do I miss my cohorts, Sci Fi Bob, Robert Emmett, Scott Moon, Gary "The Poster King" Hascall and the gang from KFJC??? F¶*^#¡£¢¡¶$£%&~≠ YEAH!! Is it fun to see hand-picked psychotronic flicks from the Sci Fi Bob Archives, projected in glorious 16mm straight from the booth at Derek Zemrak's movie palace in Orinda, California? Again, F¶*^$#¡£¢¶¡$%&~≠ YEAH!!!
We've mentioned the monthly Cartoon Carnival programs presented by Tommy Stathes quite a few times on this blog. These fun programs had been simulcast on Facebook, which was fantastic for us who could not make it down to Brooklyn to be there in person.
Now none of us are going anywhere, so Tommy will be presenting an all-new Cartoon Carnival online from home on Facebook tomorrow afternoon at 3:00 p.m. EST.
And, speaking of cohorts from past movie events, horror host Mr. Lobo presents Cinema Insomnia on Facebook weekly, late nights on Saturday, starting at 10:00 p.m. EST.
The last streaming Cinema Insomnia episode featured one of the most misunderstood movies of all misunderstood movies, a Filipino horror flick that struck this viewer as a gorier (and only marginally more competent) version of Manos: The Hands Of Fate, but with even worse hairdos and tacky early 1970's fashions. Mr. Lobo and Miss Mittens co-host!
Sunday afternoons at 3:00 p.m. EST, silent movie experts Ben Model and Steve Massa present The Silent Comedy Watch Party on YouTube. To watch this Sunday's show, go to the YouTube channel. The past five episodes have, as all of the aforementioned watch parties, provided and continue to provide sorely needed LAUGHS!
Silent Comedy Watch Party logo by Marlene Weisman
Thanks to a very generous OK from Serge Bromberg of Lobster Films (Paris) to include short subjects he has produced for DVD/Blu-ray release, this Sunday's show includes a Lobster release from the Blackhawk Films Collection.
That would be His Wooden Wedding, one of the funniest comedy short subjects ever made, directed by Leo McCarey and starring the one, the only Charley Chase.
There are terrific comedies every week, representing the gamut of silent movie funmakers.
Opening for Charley is It's Me (1927), a comedy rarity starring Monty Collins and directed by Harry Sweet. This is from a transfer of the only known print, a very rare 16mm from the collection of cartoonist Kim Deitch, and unavailable on DVD. Also on the program, thanks to the EYE Filmmuseum, is She Cried, a 1912 Vitagraph short subject starring and written by Florence Turner, prolific star of movies in Great Britain and America. This was preserved by the EYE Filmmuseum (Netherlands), from a 35mm original print in the Jean Desmet Collection.
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