Synopsis
From 1913 to 1916, Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle rose from the ranks of bit player to writer, director and star of comedies for Mack Sennett's Keystone Film Company. Because of Sennett's belief that actors were interchangeable, he lost Arbuckle to producer Joseph M. Schenck, who not only paid the comedian handsomely, but also permitted him complete creative control. To help in the new venture, Arbuckle recruited Buster Keaton, popular star of a knockabout vaudeville act; Keaton took a large pay cut to act in motion pictures, and Arbuckle welcomed his ideas and taught him all he knew about making movies. This volume of the DVD collection presents films that Arbuckle and Keaton made for Schenck between 1917 and 1918; they are presented chronologically so we can watch Buster grow from Arbuckle's bit player to his full partner. Following the 1921 scandal that was inflamed by a publicity-seeking prosecutor and the tabloid press, Arbuckle's films were withdrawn from circulation in America, and the negatives were not preserved. The films in this collection were gathered from international archives and private collections. The English intertitles are new, and except for Coney Island , derived from non-English sources. All the films are digitally mastered from 35mm, sometimes directly from the nitrate originals. VOLUME ONE INCLUDES: The Butcher Boy (Apr. 1917) with Josephine Stephens The Rough House (Jun. 1917) with Alice Lake His Wedding Night (Aug. 1917) with Alice Mann Oh, Doctor! (Sept. 1917) with Alice Mann and music by Brian Benison Coney Island (Oct. 1917) with Alice Mann and music by Eric Beheim Out West (Feb. 1918) with Alice Lake and music from vintage recordings in the Columbia Photoplay Series The Bell Boy (Mar. 1918) with Alice Lake, Charles Dudley Moonshine (Fragment, May 1918) with Alice Lake, Joe Keaton, Charles Dudley Year: 1917-1918 Length: 163 Writer/Director: Roscoe Arbuckle Starring: Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle and Buster Keaton with Al St. John, Josephine Stephens, Alice Lake, Alice Mann Composer: Neil Brand Format: NTSC Produced for DVD by Serge Bromberg, Eric Lange, and David Shepard From the Blackhawk Films Collection Presented by Flicker Alley