Top Five Gags: Back Stage

September 7^th, 1919 – the day Back Stage was released. It’s been nearly a year since I last did a 100 Years of Buster Keaton post, and it was only recently that it occurred to me why: this would’ve been the stretch of time when Buster was serving in World War I. While Fatty Arbuckle continued to make shorts throughout 1919, this would have been the first he made after Buster returned home. A classic, and for good reason. Tons of great gags (and stunts!), but these are my favorites (spoilers.)

The Traveling Star

The stagehands are used to dealing with actors’ egos at the theatre. They have a single star attached to a pulley system that they use to hang it over each dressing room door in turn. That way, each arriving actor thinks they’re the star. Ha!

Unfortunate Sign Placement

Fatty has pasted up a wall ad for a new show, involving the famous actress Miss Gertrude McSkinny performing in The Little Laundress. However, the placement of the words on the ad, combined with its position right next to a sliding door, means that when the door is open, half the sign is covered and what remains are the words “Miss Skinny Will Undress Here at 2 P.M.” I love me a good sight gag.

Dancing Fails

This whole sequence is terrific. The stagehands are trying to imitate a dancer in the show. Fatty gets in on the action first, doing pretty well until he crosses his ankles and they get stuck that way, leaving him teetering. But Buster’s contribution is great, too. Attempting a complicated move, he winds up staggering around the backstage area in a precarious limbo position, unable to straighten back up. The cherry comes when Fatty winds up with a broom to knock him off his feet; as Buster sits up, he shakes Fatty’s hand in a matter-of-fact display of gratitude.

Wrestling with the Barbell

More awesome physical comedy from Fatty and Buster. After getting an electrical current to hit the barbell as the strongman is lifting it, they’ve knocked him out and are now struggling to get the barbell off him. Neither is up to the task, and Buster of course ends up trapped on the ground with the barbell lying across his neck. His gravity-defying attempts to free himself are a total Buster move, while Fatty’s efforts to help are well-meaning but wildly ineffective.

The King and Queen

You can’t talk about Back Stage without talking about this sequence. Everything about Fatty and Buster playing the king and queen in the show is a delight: their overly-dramatic posing, Fatty catching the leaping Buster in his arms, and the two of them lounging by their “throne” with Buster systematically yanking out Fatty’s leg hairs. There’s also Buster’s amazing series of no-handed cartwheels, which isn’t really a gag but still deserves mention just for being so damn cool.

Back Stage (1919)

Here’s a fun one.  My guess is that, creatively, it’s probably heavy on Buster’s influence.  Outside of the climax, it has a greater emphasis on tumbling than fighting, there are a number of Busterish mechanical gags, and it seems strongly influenced by Buster’s vaudeville origins.  Plus, it includes the earliest iteration of the falling-house gag that Buster ultimately perfected in Steamboat Bill Jr., and there’s not a whole lot that gets much more Buster than that moment!

Fatty and Buster (and Al St. John, but his part is pretty minor) are stage hands at a vaudeville house.  When they get into it with the strongman over his shabby treatment of his long-suffering assistant (Molly Malone, who plays the girl in the remaining Arbuckle-Keaton shorts,) the strongman convinces all the performers to quit.  Naturally, it then falls to Fatty and Buster to come up with their own show, which goes about as smoothly as you’d expect.

Tons of fun gags here.  I get a kick out of the running joke of the strongman’s super-strong assistant, I love that the playhouse only has one star that they hang over different dressing rooms to pacify all their performers’ egos, and there are some nice, amusing tangents that are just there for extra flavor.  Unsurprisingly, the short’s crowning achievement is the show put on by Fatty and Buster.  There’s a lot of theatrical humor in Buster’s work, but I think this might be the funniest onstage disaster in one of his films – even though I’d easily say The Playhouse is a stronger short, much of its comedy is found backstage between various acts, whereas everything Fatty and Buster get up to during their show is hilarious from end to end.  It has everything:  over-the-top acting, technical mishaps, Buster launching himself into a heckler’s box seat, and more.

Given the Bustery-ness of the proceedings, it’s a given that Buster is terrific here.  In general, he’s just such a great right-hand-man for Fatty, shining without overshadowing (and that’s coming from someone who watched these shorts specifically to see Buster.)  His attempts to help with the strongman situation are fantastic, and I don’t know if anyone has ever been pinned more humorously underneath a barbell.  I also love his contributions in the big climax, once again showing off his astounding athleticism and proving that he’s definitely someone you want on your side in a fight!

But let’s get to the really important part:  Buster in the show.  Before seeing these shorts, my most cursory peek into Fatty and Buster’s professional history together enthusiastically informed me of Buster performing in a long wig, an ancient-civilization-style dress, and slap shoes, and to be sure, Buster is a riot playing the queen.  He’s somehow scrupulously feminine and dismissively masculine at the same time, which make for a fun combination, and I’ve raved before about his stupendous no-handed cartwheels.  But that’s not even his only highlight here!  He also does a bang-up job in his and Fatty’s second skit; I think his “acting” when Fatty tells him he’s supposed to be shivering might be the biggest laugh of the short for me.  Really, it’s just wall-to-wall Buster goodness, and you can’t argue with that.

Warnings

Slapstick violence and some don’t-try-this-at-home with both barbells and electricity.