Snowy Fields, and Sennett Adrift

The Fatal Glass Of Beer (1933) Leaves Showmen Cold

The most oft-repeated pan of this W.C. Fields short came from a North Carolina exhibitor, J.J. Medford, whose 430 seat Orpheum Theatre was/is located in Oxford, a small berg northeast of Durham. Medford lent prolific and unsparing voice to Motion Picture Herald's "What The Picture Did For Me" column. He didn't mind chopping tall timber from major companies, thus putdown in plain words of Metro's Laughing Boy, WB's Mystery Of The Wax Museum, many others. Medford spoke for showmen at the low end who had to live with patron disdain over dog movies. He'd fling red ink back at Paramount and Mack Sennett for rottenness that was The Fatal Glass Of Beer: "This is the worst comedy we have played from any company this season. No story, no acting, and as a whole has nothing." Medford's indictment would forever-after speak for 1933 response to The Fatal Glass Of Beer, it having been quoted in every Fields bio I've seen and certainly any discussion of a short called a stinker by most everyone recovering from initial view. So how do we account for maverick few who'd call The Fatal Glass Of Beer an enduring masterpiece of comedy?

Bill Presents Old Boss Sennett With a Special Academy Award

The story was Bill's. He'd put it on for the Earl Carroll Vanities and introduce what became a spread-among-schoolboys catch-phrase: It Ain't A Fit Night Out For Man Nor Beast. Fields beat that like a rug in the short, and many called him monotonous for it, but as Bill told producer Sennett, the idea was to put what he considered funny on the screen, and worry less about the audience. That naturally left Mack skittish, a condition made more so when the Fatal Glass was poured. Had Fields blown a fuse? His last, The Dentist, laid them in aisles, but this would bark like the bulldog of Sennett credits, long missing from Beer prints, but happily restored to element used for The Mack Sennett Blu-Ray Collection. The Fatal Glass Of Beer was to Fields' mind a put-on, a mockery of Yukon melodrama faked out with stage convention dating to the 19th century, but maybe that was too far back for 1933 auds not born when Bill noted foolishness of old styles. To those younger, it was just old as in not funny.

Variety gave Fatal Glass the frost, but Film Daily understood: "Clever process work and many amusing gags are part of the riot of laughter," said the trade's 6/3/33 review. Did it need sophistication and years' exposure to 10-20-30 stagecraft to "get" Bill's humor here? Clearly yes, but even Fields had to admit, to himself if not others, that comedy aimed for a mass public must be more accessible. He'd not go so far out again till 40's haywiring of Never Give A Sucker An Even Break. Modern viewers are of course even less familiar with conventions Fields was spoofing, so The Fatal Glass Of Beer still has its hill to climb. I can but imagine how the thing played to college crowds during Fields-maniacal days of the 60/70's, where it had much circulation thanks to prints easily rented (generally at $10 per day) or bought (Blackhawk sold Beer at relative bargains in 8 or 16mm). I admit to liking The Fatal Glass Of Beer more with each visit. It is Fields walking the wire and maybe falling, but for some of his admirers, this is right up there with his most accomplished work.

Greenbriar highly recommends The Mack Sennett Collection from Flicker Alley, a Blu-Ray set of fifty comedies which includes The Fatal Glass Of Beer. Most all of comic luminaries from the silent and early sound era are here. It's just about the best assemblage of clowning so-far offered to home viewing, truly a one-stop for slapstick.