Favorite Characters: Rollo Treadway (The Navigator)

Figured I might as well do the other side of this coin.  Rollo is just fabulous.  I know that, in comparing him to fellow Buster dandy Alfred Butler, I’ve said that I’d rather try to survive on a crewless ocean liner than voluntarily get into a boxing ring to be repeatedly punched in the face, and I stand by that, but Rollo’s transformation over the course of this movie is nothing to scoff at.

Let’s not forget, this is a guy who, at the film’s outset, gets chauffeured across the street.  Tough and capable?  Not so much.  While Betsy is looking for her father, who’s been snatched by bad guys, when she’s set adrift on the Navigator, Rollo’s reason isn’t nearly as commendable – nope, he just gets on the wrong boat.  Not to mention, he’s only at the pier that night because the boat he’s supposed to get on is leaving at 10 the following morning, and he “[doesn’t] get up that early.”  How’s he doing so far?  Instilling any confidence?

Yeah, I didn’t think so.  Still, this is Buster we’re talking about, so even from the start, Rollo is a highly-entertaining hapless dandy.  He may not be all that resourceful from the get-go, but he does demonstrate a bit of the ole Buster tenacity early on.  When he first discovers that he’s alone on the Navigator (seemingly – he hasn’t come across Betsy yet) and is wandering around the deck, it just kills me that every time the wind blows his hat off, he simply grabs another one from his room.  No muss, no fuss – it’s just take two/three/etc…  And to be fair, he only loses a few hats before he starts using the end of his cane to keep the next one pressed onto his head.  Not mind-blowing or anything – it’s certainly not Johnnie Gray chasing after a stolen train in a handcar – but it’s a start.  And I love that, when he finally finds Betsy (with a pretty epic tumble,) the first thing is does is propose to her again.

So, right.  Rollo isn’t yet a huge thinker, doer, or hero, but he also isn’t a quitter, and he’s learning.  He and Betsy quickly start figuring out the ways of the ship.  Since it’s less than a day before their first man-overboard situation, the learning curve doesn’t mess around, and even though Rollo in particular is still kind of hopeless and disaster-prone, he manages to get the job done when it counts.  Nobody drowns on his watch, and later that night, when they’re variously beset by a major creep-out factor, a box of Roman candles, and pouring rain, he persists from one dubious solution to the next until they finally found somewhere relatively safe and dry to sleep.

Buster’s characters are all about their journeys from zero to hero, and Rollo probably makes the biggest change of them all.  Here’s what Mr. Can’t-Successfully-Transfer-a-Single-Soft-Boiled-Egg-from-Pot-to-Plate is capable of after just a few weeks on the Navigator.  With Betsy’s help, he a) comes up with a plethora of handy labor-saving device to dandy-proof the kitchen, b) uses a diving suit, c) fixes the ship underwater, d) fights a swordfish and an octopus, and e) defends the ship against a cannibal attack (unfortunately, preventing old-timey racial tropes isn’t one of Rollo’s newfound talents.)  Like the best of Buster’s heroic transformation, Rollo remains himself throughout, even as he finds his inner awesomeness.  I mean, sure, he saves the day, but he also accidentally gets himself tangled up in a rope attached to a tiny, loaded cannon – pretty sure that’s one of those “only Buster” sort of problems, and I love it.