'Forgotten Sweeties' should be visted

Forgotten Sweeties (1927)
Starring: Charley Chase, Anita Garvin, Shirley Palmer, Mitchell Lewis, and James Finlayson
Director: James Parrott
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

When an absent-minded office worker (Chase) and former lover (Palmer) end up living across the hall from each other, neither his wife (Garvin) nor the ex-lover's husband (Lewis) are happy about it.

"Forgotten Sweeties" is a comedy of errors where coincidences morph into misunderstandings that are piled onto mistakes until our hapless hero is about to lose his marriage if he's not murdered first. Like many Chase films, it's structured in such a way that the gags and situations feed naturally into each other, with their being a sort-of realism to the film that is not found in many silent comedies. Even better, the main character of the film is another one of Chase's Nice Guy heroes who is very literally just trying to get through the day and not looking for any trouble. You can actually feel sympathy for this guy, especially since there is almost nothing he could have done differently that would have not put him in the situations he ends up in.

This is one of those short films that will be ruined if I talk too much about what happens in it. However, I can assure you if you enjoy sit-coms and like silent comedies, you'll find plenty to entertain yourself here. Anita Garvin also gets to play a more sympathetic character than usual, so that's a nice change of pace.

Not every bit in "Forgotten Sweeties" works--and I suspect that part of that may be due to a social context that has been muted by the passage of time, but others are just a little too silly and drag on just a little too long--but the good outweighs that bad. The running gag with James Finlayson and a cat during the second half of the film is one of the highlights here.

"Forgotten Sweeties" is one of a handful of Charley Chase shorts included in the "Silent Comedy Classics" collection, all of which were digitized from the collection of film preservationist John Carpenter. It's a great DVD... at a price that's a steal. It's more than worth the price, I think.

'Asleep in the Feet' is the Todd/Pitts Team at its Best

Asleep in the Feet (1933)
Starring: ZaSu Pitts, Thelma Todd, Anita Garvin, Eddie Dunn, Billy Gilbert, and Nelson McDowell
Director: Gus Meins
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

Thelma and ZaSu (Todd and Pitts) moonlight as taxi dancers to raise money for a neighbor's back rent.

"Asleep in the Feet" ranks among the films that Thelma Todd and ZaSu Pitts made together. It's a tightly plotted, smoothly directed film where the humor grows organically out of the story and its characters, and each joke and gag is carefully set up and each and every set-up has a satisfying payoff. The supporting actors are also perfectly cast, with Eddie Dunn as an obnoxious sailor and Nelson McDowell as a moral crusader being particularly good in their parts.

More recently, I've been watching the films that paired Todd with Patsy Kelly, and I reminded of the on-screen chemistry that Todd and Pitts shared. It's something that is lacking between Todd and Kelly, and it's led me to wonder why their characters are even friends. That is never something that one wonders about with the Todd and Pitts characters; they seem like they are good, kindhearted people, and utterly loyal to each other. There's a warmth and affection here that's mostly lacking in the ones that team Todd with Kelly. From what I've seen of those so far, I also find it hard to believe that those characters would take on extra work to prevent a neighbor from being evicted, where it seems completely in keeping with the main characters in the Todd/Pitts films. The laugh and the hug the characters share at the end of the film is also one of the most heartwarming moments I think I've ever seen in a Hal Roach-produced comedy.

Another interesting aspect of this film is the window it gives us into the past. We get to see what life was like for independent, working-class, single women during the Depression Era, and it's interesting how much things have (and haven't) changed since then.

"Asleep in the Feet" is included on a two-disc set that contains all of the short films that Thelma Todd and ZaSu Pitts made together

'Show Business' is full of funny business

Show Business (1932)
Starring: ZaSu Pitts, Thelma Todd, Anita Garvin, Monte Collins, and Otto Fries
Director: Jules White
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

A pair of vaudevillians and their singing monkey (Pitts and Todd) get a last minute gig as a replacement act in a touring show. Things start to go wrong even before they set foot on stage, as they end up at odds with the show's ego-maniacal star (Garvin).

At the center of "Show Business" is a professional lifestyle that was coming to an end by the 1930s--that of a member of a traveling variety show that criss-crossed the nation on any number of theatrical circuits. Muscians, chorus girls, actors, and comedians... all would travel together from engagement to engagement, essentially spending their lives on the road (or, more specifically, on the train tracks). Headliners would often be fixed, but smaller acts would drop in and drop out, which is where our heroines enter the picture

After a weak beginning that should have just been used to set up the monkey and the excuse for later showing viewers Thelma Todd walking around in a hat and her underwear, but which is crippled by Pitts doing some unfunny prop comedy involving a telephone and a half-eaten apple, followed by a just-as-unfunny bit involving a dresser drawer, the film really takes off. From the moment the action changes to the train station, and we're introduced to the film's antagonists, Anita Garvin and her manager Monte Collins, through to the final fade-out, we are treated to hilarious chaos and some fine comedic acting.

In "Show Business", Thelma Todd gets to show off what made her such a fantastic screen actress (and I'm taking about the skimpy outfit she's almost not wearing in the pseudo-catfight at the train station). There are multiple in this picture where her face says everything that's going through the character's mind, and just watching Todd's facial expressions change (as she goes from confused to angry, or self-righteously indignant to embarrassed) provide some of the film's funniest moments.

Anita Garvin also shines in this picture, playing a variant of the shrewish wife she'd portray in several Laurel & Hardy pictures, but here the main target of her ire is her manager played by Monte Collins while Todd and Pitts and their mon inadvertently make both their lives very difficult. It's a common in these kinds of shorts to see self-important characters be humiliated by the bumbling clowns with whom the audience's sympathies rests, and Garvin is so good at playing an obnoxious, self-entitled primadonna that her unraveling is extra satisfying. Meanwhile, Collins occupies an interesting place in the configuration of characters, swinging from threat to our heroines to an almost ally, as he tries to get them settled in the train so he can be spared any more abuse from Garvin.

The only disappointing member of the main cast here is ZaSu Pitts, but I don't think it's her fault. For the most part, she was stuck doing unfunny prop comedy, and her fidgety character seemed out of place surrounded by all the loud, overly theatrical types that occupy the rest of the film. That said, she had a couple shining moments in the part of the film at the train station, as she is trying to convince a police officer (Otto Fries) why it's a bad idea for him to make Thelma take off her coat; and later after she and Thelma wake everybody up on a sleeping car while trying to get into their bunk themselves.

Despite its weak opening, and a couple minor hiccups along the way (there is a point where some time must pass between scenes, but there's no indication of it, so the film feels a bit disorganized for few moments) "Show Business" is a fun entry in the Todd/Pitts series of comedies that benefits both for a strong script and the fact that most of its cast is in parts that let them play to their strengths as performers. (Although it's a shame that we never get to hear the monkey sing.

"Show Business" is one of 17 shorts contained in a two DVD set that features all of the films Thelma Todd and ZaSu Pitts made together.

'Whispering Whoopee' is lots of fun

Whispering Whoopee (1930)
Starring: Charlie Chase, Dolores Brinkman, Anita Garvin, Thelma Todd, Eddie Dunn, Carl Stockdale, Dale Henderson, and Tennen Holz
Director: James Horne
Rating: Nine of Ten Stars

Charley (Chase) hires three escorts (Brinkman, Garvin, and Todd) to service three members of the Rockaway Chamber of Commerce (Henderson, Holz, and Stockdale) to help him close a land sale. After it initially seems his plan is doomed to failure, the party gets wilder than Charley anticipated.

"Whispering Whoopee" is a straight-forward comedy with a simple plot and mostly straight-forward, simple jokes, but every one of those jokes lands perfectly, and every cast member is great in their parts. The picture was written and filmed on a very tight schedule, as it was conceived in order to keep cast and crew working, and the Hal Roach Studio's release schedule on track, when bad weather delayed filming of the many outdoor scenes in the golfing-based comedy "All Teed Up". Given the circumstances under which it was created and filmed, it's really impressive how perfect everything seems. The pinnacle of the film is a scene where all the characters are spraying each other with seltzer water, and there's a bit in there that makes fun of synchronized swimming/ice dancing that underscores the simplicity of the movie's humor but also that the exactness in its delivery makes it exceptional. 

While Charley Chase is the lead in the film, it is also very much an ensemble comedy. Each actor gets to do their own bits, or a bit with a partner. Among Chase's co-stars, Dolores Brinkman gets some of the best lines, and she shows herself to have plenty of screen presence and comedic timing. It's a shame that she never managed to propel her acting career above the level of bit parts, because, based on what I see her, she had plenty of talent. She also plays the role in this film that I would assume would have been filled by Todd if this film had not been inserted into the production schedule the way it was; Todd is seen in fewer shots than other cast members, and of the ladies in the film she has has the fewest lines; I assume she may have been going to other sets even while working on "Making Whoopee".

Getting back to Brinkman for a moment: As things would turn out, her role in "Making Whoopee" would be her final screen appearance. Interestingly, Chase's co-star in "One of the Smiths", Peggy Howard, was also a pretty actress who never "made it", and who's last credit was in a Charley Chase film. I wonder if I will find this to be pattern as I watch more of Chase's films from the early 1930s. Together with Hal Roach, Chase was in the process of turning Thelma Todd into a hugely popular comedienne... perhaps they were trying to capture that same magic with another actress? This seems like a reasonable idea to me, since, mere months after this film was made, Todd would be headlining her own series of comedic shorts. Perhaps Chase and Roach were perhaps looking ahead to fill Todd's role in the line-up of performers working with Chase? Perhaps they were looking for someone to team with Todd in the series of films that Roach was already considering--films starring the "Female Laurel & Hardy"?

I confess that I have neither the historical knowledge, nor the drive to do the research, to elevate anything in the previous paragraph past the level of speculation. Over the next few months, however, as I watch more Charley Chase and Thelma Todd films, as well as a smattering of Laurel & Hardy and other Hal Roach productions, and do my usual superficial research into the actors appearing in them, maybe I'll find something to either prove or disprove the speculation above.

All that is tangential to "Whispering Whoopee", which is a hilarious comedy that makes it easy to see why Charley Chase was second only in popularity to Laurel & Hardy when it came to Hal Roach's galaxy of stars. It's a shame that he and his work is mostly forgotten, but it's also easy to see why: His films are more rooted in the culture of the time within which they were made than the Laurel & Hardy pictures were. Comedies driven by Chase were focused more around social situations, while those with Stan Laurel's brain behind them were more about the human condition, so the latter have stood the test of time better. Nonetheless, a 90-year-old Charley Chase film is more finely crafted and funnier than many modern comedies, and I'll take a quickie production like "Whispering Whoopee" over almost any modern sit-com I've sampled in recent years.

"Whispering Whoopee" is one of 17 short films starring Charlie Chase that are included in the two DVD set Charley Chase at Hal Roach: The Talkies 1930 - 1931. Many of them also feature or co-star Thelma Todd, James Finlayson, and other popular Roach regulars.

Picture Perfect Wednesday: Anita Garvin

Anita Garvin is a nearly forgotten comedienne who was a frequent co-star of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy in silent movies during the late 1920s before they were a formal comedy team. She made a successful transition from the silent era to the talkies, but but by the late 1930s, she was ready to quit acting to raise a family.

Stan Laurel convinced her to delay her retirement long enough to join him in remaking one of their last silent films together, "From Soup to Nuts", as a segment in the 1940 film "A Chump at Oxford", with Oliver Hardy joining them in reprising the roles they had originally performed in 1928.

In her day, Garvin as a queen of slapstick comedy who could give any of her more famous male co-stars a run for their money in just about any area. Hers is a face and body that any fan of classic comedies is sure to admire if they keep an eye out for her.

Garvin passed away in July of 1994 at the age of 88.

'A Chump at Oxford' is funny but infuriating

A Chump at Oxford (1940)
Starring: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, James Finlayson, Anita Garvin, Forrest Harvey, Eddie Borden, Wilfred Lucas, and Peter Cushing
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

A pair of down-on-their-luck laborers (Laurel and Hardy) receive a scholarship to Oxford as a reward for foiling a bank robbery. They are greeted with cruelty by the snobbish student body until one of them is revealed to be the long-lost Lord Paddington.

"A Chump at Oxford" is the first Laurel and Hardy film I've seen where I remember being irritated. I wanted the collection of entitled, self-important jerks who decide to make their lives Hell when the arrive at Oxford to get what they dished out ten-fold, yet they never seem to be adequately punished to my mind. While Stanley beating them up after he regains his memories as Lord Paddington is a good start, but nowhere near enough--I wanted to see them tossed out of the school, not just out a window.

The rest of the film more than makes up for it though. From the pair's attempt to work as domestics at a fancy mansion through the various bits at Oxford--even if they were mostly brought on by mean tricks--are all very funny. An added bonus for Peter Cushing fans is that you can see him in an early role as one of the cruel students... it's not a big part, but he's there. And he's the only one who doesn't get to wear a silly mustache when the gang is passing themselves of as professors to Stan and Ollie.

An interesting note about this film is that it was originally intended to be released in two versions--a 40-some minute version for the American market an a 60-some minute version for Europe. The first part of the film--where Laurel and Hardy work as servants at a fancy party--was to have been omitted in the American release.