Classic movie site with rare images, original ads, and behind-the-scenes photos, with informative and insightful commentary. We like to have fun with movies!
Archive and Links
grbrpix@aol.com
Search Index Here




Thursday, March 04, 2010







Lon Chaney --- Part Two






His public knew that Chaney would never exploit the afflicted. They sensed a compassionate heart beneath his make-up. Sordid narratives got a pass when Lon enacted them. Writers have complained that Metro’s formula for him was too rigid. Well, certainly it was, but aren’t formulas called that because they work? Here was Lon’s in a nutshell: Lucky at crime and/or mayhem, unlucky at love. If we had a Chaney today, I’m betting the gambit would still play, for here’s the thing … none of us fail so often as in relationships. And that goes for the pretty people as much as the Lon Chaney outcasts. His characters longed for and lost every woman they encountered, and just that made him blood brother with everyone watching. The thing that rescued Lon and his audience was triumphs his loners achieved otherwise. This was one formidable persona. Nobody stopped Chaney once his blood was up. Shrunken violets could project themselves upon vengeful missions he embarked, often on behalf of women who’d scorned him, but always followed through to the loss of his enemies. While The City Sleeps answered the call of those isolated, but ruthlessly good at a one thing they’ve mastered, pretty much my summation of all Chaney characters. Here he’s a police detective, underestimated and with nary a chance that Anita Page will want him, but a tower of ferocity when time comes to shoot things out with a criminal gang twice his force’s number. That kind of proficiency was the Chaney image’s compensation for being shut out of tender emotions. Most endings found him dead or going it alone, but the world was always scrubbed a little cleaner for his having settled accounts otherwise.

A real treasure turned up some months ago on You Tube. Someone posted a 1951 episode of You Asked For It in which host Art Baker interviewed Lon Chaney, Jr. about his father. The request was from a viewer too young to remember the senior Lon, but had heard he was the greatest of all character actors. Junior is on hand to confirm that and pass along some family background. This is a priceless eight minutes. Baker is as respectful as Creighton is eloquent. I nearly inserted unexpected there for being lulled into acceptance of LC Jr. as slurring three sheets against winds for most of his performing life. Maybe too I’d bought the notion of his resenting Dad for past hostilities referenced by writers since. Junior’s tribute happily dispelled much of that. There’s warmth and sincerity here I never saw before in Creighton. He’s introduced in ascot and robe at a dressing mirror as though caught between acts on Broadway. Gracious and forthcoming on the topic of Senior’s pantomimic command as taught by deaf mute parents, Junior demonstrates his own sign language vocabulary. Host Baker illustrates with highlights of 1923’s The Hunchback Of Notre Dame "for the first time on television," which made me wonder … was it? Initial copyright protection of 28 years would by 1951 be at point of expiring, and we know Universal didn’t renew. Did You Asked For It license the use of these clips? If so, it was probably the last time anyone did. Creighton demonstrates how silent actor Lon expressed love, hate, and fear as Quasimodo, using visual shorthand deaf mutes knew well. This distinct minority of a mass audience likely appreciated Chaney even more for his playing so directly to them. For deaf mute patrons, LC acted through a long established medium of sign language in addition to further embellished pantomime. Was any other silent era performer reaching his public on so many levels?








































A fan magazine called Chaney The Man Who Made Homeliness Pay … but hold on … aren’t we talking about subjective standards here? Whoever tabbed Lon homely wasn’t necessarily thinking in pejorative terms. What he did with that face attracted millions to theatres. Craggy is characterized by rugged, sharp, or coarse features, according to definition. But what Chaney did with craggy was beautiful. To be the biggest money star at MGM (he was) required massive feminine support. That we know he had, even if women spoke more freely to worship of John Gilbert or Ramon Novarro, paths to them being more conventional and ones of less resistance. Top sergeant Chaney in Tell It To The Marines compares his embattled features to those of a bulldog mascot. But wouldn’t a lot of us prefer looking at a bulldog over most actors? Except Lon, of course. He’s majestic masked or no, be it so-called "straight" as in Tell It To The Marines, or as Phantom, Hunchback, or London After Midnight’s shark-toothed vampire. I don’t know of three figures that have been artist-rendered more than these. He Runs The Gamut Of Every Human Emotion, says the above ad for Mockery. That was just exhibition’s way of saying Chaney put more on a customer’s plate than any other artist was serving. He may sometimes have been frightening, but no more so than what audiences often saw in neighbors, if not themselves. His characters were bearers of combined weight of all our insecurities. No matter how bad off you thought you were, his circumstances would surely be worse. Chaney was harder to step back from and observe because his performances were so immersive, even when the films were less so. The rage his legless criminal telegraphs in The Penalty erases buffers a modern viewer has from other silent actors whose gestures they ridicule from distances of eighty years. A well-chosen Chaney retrospective can still throw us back on our heels.




























































There’s more speculation and what ifs about Chaney than most any star I can think of. What if he’d played Dracula? Would a rediscovered London After Midnight disappoint us? (yes, say most). What of the nearly one hundred lost Chaney films? Some of those are (were) bound to be wonderful. A bare segment remains of The Miracle Man, one that established him as a major force. A Blind Bargain has horrific content that’s mouth-watering, but it’s gone too. Sometimes the losses seem so crushing as to make you want to give up. Just a few feet of something thought missing is reason enough to celebrate. A documentary by Kevin Brownlow had a snippet of Lon on a waltz floor and that resonated for being sole visual record of Chaney dancing. Fans devout enough want to observe him at all conceivable pursuits. That’s possibly because everything he does is totally unlike ways other people go about them. Old stills become collectible for someone recognizing a bearded background figure as Chaney. He must have stood before all the town’s still cameras at one time or another. When Blackhawk Films found Outside the Law back in the seventies, there was cause for jubilation over this early collaboration between Chaney and director Tod Browning. It had to be a gamble commissioning a new score, preparation of magnetic 8mm and optical 16mm prints, but being this was LC, a safe one for the Davenport distributor. Every scrap of him in the public domain seems to have been released on DVD. Film shows I’ve attended always have fullest houses when Chaney’s onscreen. TCM makes news when they premiere one of his MGM silents, such as was the case recently with The Black Bird. Any Chaney revival may be safely introduced with And Now For Something Completely Different …

2 Comments:

Anonymous Griff said...

John, your use of that title for this fine set of essays on Lon would surely have made FJA smile.

My late father always hoped that someone would excavate a print of LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT. He remembered it from his youth as the "real deal -- a genuine chiller."

12:21 PM  
Blogger Kevin K. said...

I loved "The Unknown" and wanted my wife to see it. Then she saw a clip of it on the TCM Chaney documentary and announced, "This is sick!" "That's the point," I answered, but she was already in the confines of the kitchen, refusing to watch the rest of the show. No taste, I tell you!

5:23 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home

grbrpix@aol.com
  • December 2005
  • January 2006
  • February 2006
  • March 2006
  • April 2006
  • May 2006
  • June 2006
  • July 2006
  • August 2006
  • September 2006
  • October 2006
  • November 2006
  • December 2006
  • January 2007
  • February 2007
  • March 2007
  • April 2007
  • May 2007
  • June 2007
  • July 2007
  • August 2007
  • September 2007
  • October 2007
  • November 2007
  • December 2007
  • January 2008
  • February 2008
  • March 2008
  • April 2008
  • May 2008
  • June 2008
  • July 2008
  • August 2008
  • September 2008
  • October 2008
  • November 2008
  • December 2008
  • January 2009
  • February 2009
  • March 2009
  • April 2009
  • May 2009
  • June 2009
  • July 2009
  • August 2009
  • September 2009
  • October 2009
  • November 2009
  • December 2009
  • January 2010
  • February 2010
  • March 2010
  • April 2010
  • May 2010
  • June 2010
  • July 2010
  • August 2010
  • September 2010
  • October 2010
  • November 2010
  • December 2010
  • January 2011
  • February 2011
  • March 2011
  • April 2011
  • May 2011
  • June 2011
  • July 2011
  • August 2011
  • September 2011
  • October 2011
  • November 2011
  • December 2011
  • January 2012
  • February 2012
  • March 2012
  • April 2012
  • May 2012
  • June 2012
  • July 2012
  • August 2012
  • September 2012
  • October 2012
  • November 2012
  • December 2012
  • January 2013
  • February 2013
  • March 2013
  • April 2013
  • May 2013
  • June 2013
  • July 2013
  • August 2013
  • September 2013
  • October 2013
  • November 2013
  • December 2013
  • January 2014
  • February 2014
  • March 2014
  • April 2014
  • May 2014
  • June 2014
  • July 2014
  • August 2014
  • September 2014
  • October 2014
  • November 2014
  • December 2014
  • January 2015
  • February 2015
  • March 2015
  • April 2015
  • May 2015
  • June 2015
  • July 2015
  • August 2015
  • September 2015
  • October 2015
  • November 2015
  • December 2015
  • January 2016
  • February 2016
  • March 2016
  • April 2016
  • May 2016
  • June 2016
  • July 2016
  • August 2016
  • September 2016
  • October 2016
  • November 2016
  • December 2016
  • January 2017
  • February 2017
  • March 2017
  • April 2017
  • May 2017
  • June 2017
  • July 2017
  • August 2017
  • September 2017
  • October 2017
  • November 2017
  • December 2017
  • January 2018
  • February 2018
  • March 2018
  • April 2018
  • May 2018
  • June 2018
  • July 2018
  • August 2018
  • September 2018
  • October 2018
  • November 2018
  • December 2018
  • January 2019
  • February 2019
  • March 2019
  • April 2019
  • May 2019
  • June 2019
  • July 2019
  • August 2019
  • September 2019
  • October 2019
  • November 2019
  • December 2019
  • January 2020
  • February 2020
  • March 2020
  • April 2020
  • May 2020
  • June 2020
  • July 2020
  • August 2020
  • September 2020
  • October 2020
  • November 2020
  • December 2020
  • January 2021
  • February 2021
  • March 2021
  • April 2021
  • May 2021
  • June 2021
  • July 2021
  • August 2021
  • September 2021
  • October 2021
  • November 2021
  • December 2021
  • January 2022
  • February 2022
  • March 2022
  • April 2022
  • May 2022
  • June 2022
  • July 2022
  • August 2022
  • September 2022
  • October 2022
  • November 2022
  • December 2022
  • January 2023
  • February 2023
  • March 2023
  • April 2023
  • May 2023
  • June 2023
  • July 2023
  • August 2023
  • September 2023
  • October 2023
  • November 2023
  • December 2023
  • January 2024
  • February 2024
  • March 2024