Neal Burns Bids For Laughs in Call The Wagon (1923)
Dapper comic Neal Burns looks normal enough to
spoof courtship ritual in this Al Christie comedy released through Educational
Pictures. We can only be part guided as to career progression of minor clowns
like Burns for so little of their work surviving, Call The Wagon another
rescued by private collectors. The popularity of Harold Lloyd's go-getter paved
way for others as resourceful, if not so (wildly) successful asLloyd. Burns disposes of romance rivals in ways similar to Harold. Audiences liked
comedians to be fleet of foot and nerve. It took Harry Langdon to slow tempo
and change styles, but he was just starting in movies, so for a meantime, Lloyd
would serve as role model. Call The Wagon's girl interest turns tables on Neal
by pretending to have false teeth, hair extensions, and a glass eye. That first
seems less a joke in an era where many (most?) came round to store teeth
eventually, even otherwise pretty flappers. Might this gag have been off-putting
to patron multitudes making night deposit of upper/lowers into a glass? The old
situation of boy letting girl think he's insane comes to fore ("His
only way out --- to imitate a cuckoo clock"); "normal" comics
like Burns and Charley Chase could use this device foreclosed to freakier faces
that everyone figured for nuts to start with.
A few of Burns' Christie Comedies would pop up in 16mm prints time to time. I was always fond of DANDY LIONS and COURT PLASTER although I'm not sure if NB's actual personality added much to the proceedings.
Donald Benson considers aspects unique to silent comedy:
Found myself thinking of "His Wooden Wedding", where Charley Chase is told his bride-to-be has a wooden leg. He has a nightmare vision of a wooden-legged family, including a wooden-legged dog. He isn't fully dissuaded until the end of the film, when she's wearing a swimsuit. It must have been a singularly formal courtship for him to entertain doubts at all. Was this plausible in the 20s, or just something audiences accepted to make the jokes work.
A lot of stuff in old comedies makes one wonder if they were referencing something very common and/or accepted, or just an accepted comic wheeze: -- False teeth and toupees escaping their owners -- Social-climbing mothers eagerly seizing any nobleman, real or not, as a son-in-law -- Extraction as the cure to any dental complaint -- Defective bungalows -- Shotgun weddings with actual shotguns, and elopements involving ladders -- Arranged marriages among upper-class families (often with bride and groom meeting accidentally, not knowing they're scheduled to be wed) -- Adhesive mustard plasters attached to the chest -- Mechanically complicated murphy beds
Richard M. Roberts supplies some interesting background on Neal Burns and offers data on writer Edgar Wallace as well:
John,
Nice to see Neal Burns getting some coverage on Greenbriar today, but forgive one correction, Harold Lloyd didn’t pave the way for Burns to be playing the go-getter, because Burns was playing it by late 1915, when Harold Lloyd was just figuring out how to do a variation on Chaplin’s moustache with Lonesome Luke. Burns and Director-soon-Producer Al Christie were blazing the trail for that form of situation comedy at Nestor/Universal from 1915-onward (we ran a nice 1916 example of their work at Slapsticon last year called ACROSS THE HALL), and the series of one-reelers Burns did with Betty Compson in 1916-17 are delightful. He continued to be a main-stay with Christie until the end of the Silent Era, and Christie never gets any credit for really creating much of what would become situation comedy style, way before Hal Roach added slapstick to the mix and laid his own claim to the form. Christie is so forgotten today as a major comedy producer, he really was mentioned in the same breath with both Sennett and Roach at the time and the scattered nature of his surviving films today is one of the reasons he is more obscure than the other two today. We hope to rectify some of this neglect in Volume Two of my magnum opus.
And answering the smart-aleck who wondered if there were any good Edgar Wallace thriller movies, yes, a goodly number, especially in England in the late 30’s: THE FROG (1937), THE SQUEAKER (aka MURDER ON DIAMOND ROW) (1937), THE TERROR (1938) and THE GAUNT STRANGER (1938) immediately leap to mind, and yes, that late 50’s-early 60’s series of Wallace films are also a lot of fun. Wallace may have been a bit if a cheat in the plotting department, but his books still are a lot of fun to read today.
4 Comments:
A few of Burns' Christie Comedies would pop up in 16mm prints time to time. I was always fond of DANDY LIONS and COURT PLASTER although I'm not sure if NB's actual personality added much to the proceedings.
Donald Benson considers aspects unique to silent comedy:
Found myself thinking of "His Wooden Wedding", where Charley Chase is told his bride-to-be has a wooden leg. He has a nightmare vision of a wooden-legged family, including a wooden-legged dog. He isn't fully dissuaded until the end of the film, when she's wearing a swimsuit. It must have been a singularly formal courtship for him to entertain doubts at all. Was this plausible in the 20s, or just something audiences accepted to make the jokes work.
A lot of stuff in old comedies makes one wonder if they were referencing something very common and/or accepted, or just an accepted comic wheeze:
-- False teeth and toupees escaping their owners
-- Social-climbing mothers eagerly seizing any nobleman, real or not, as a son-in-law
-- Extraction as the cure to any dental complaint
-- Defective bungalows
-- Shotgun weddings with actual shotguns, and elopements involving ladders
-- Arranged marriages among upper-class families (often with bride and groom meeting accidentally, not knowing they're scheduled to be wed)
-- Adhesive mustard plasters attached to the chest
-- Mechanically complicated murphy beds
Richard M. Roberts supplies some interesting background on Neal Burns and offers data on writer Edgar Wallace as well:
John,
Nice to see Neal Burns getting some coverage on Greenbriar today, but forgive
one correction, Harold Lloyd didn’t pave the way for Burns to be playing the
go-getter, because Burns was playing it by late 1915, when Harold Lloyd was just
figuring out how to do a variation on Chaplin’s moustache with Lonesome Luke.
Burns and Director-soon-Producer Al Christie were blazing the trail for that
form of situation comedy at Nestor/Universal from 1915-onward (we ran a nice
1916 example of their work at Slapsticon last year called ACROSS THE HALL), and
the series of one-reelers Burns did with Betty Compson in 1916-17 are
delightful. He continued to be a main-stay with Christie until the end of the
Silent Era, and Christie never gets any credit for really creating much of what
would become situation comedy style, way before Hal Roach added slapstick to the
mix and laid his own claim to the form. Christie is so forgotten today as a
major comedy producer, he really was mentioned in the same breath with both
Sennett and Roach at the time and the scattered nature of his surviving films
today is one of the reasons he is more obscure than the other two today. We hope
to rectify some of this neglect in Volume Two of my magnum opus.
And answering the smart-aleck who wondered if there were any good Edgar Wallace
thriller movies, yes, a goodly number, especially in England in the late 30’s:
THE FROG (1937), THE SQUEAKER (aka MURDER ON DIAMOND ROW) (1937), THE TERROR
(1938) and THE GAUNT STRANGER (1938) immediately leap to mind, and yes, that
late 50’s-early 60’s series of Wallace films are also a lot of fun. Wallace may
have been a bit if a cheat in the plotting department, but his books still are a
lot of fun to read today.
Best,
RICHARD
I saw The Squeaker, I think, at one of the festivals, probably Richard's print. It may have risen to "not bad"...
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