Grand Slam Opera (1936)

After a few not-so-great Buster Mondays, the Educational shorts finally get started on a very satisfying upswing with Grand Slam Opera.  I wouldn’t say this short is perfect, but it’s super-entertaining and wonderfully funny, probably one of the best indicators of the sound career Buster could have had if it hadn’t have been for MGM.

Buster travels across the country to New York, where he hopes to show off his mad skills on a radio show for amateur talent.  As he prepares his act, he gets hung up on a pretty waitress but doesn’t let anything deter him from his stardom dreams.  When the big day finally comes, he’s the only person in the studio who doesn’t get why a juggling act might not be the best fit for radio.  Still, he’s not going down without a fight.

Like I said, it’s not perfect – the love story is really undercooked and the short peters out at the very end – but that’s not the important thing.  What’s important here is the copious, almost decadent amount of physical comedy on display.  This short knows how to step back and just let Buster do his thing.  There are long sequences of him alone onscreen being a slapstick boss, letting those old vaudeville abilities shine through hard; the short’s climax, in fact, is a beautifully-timed adaptation of a Three Keatons routine from back in the day.

So great.  I like the old variety feel of it.  The assorted talent acts add to that sense, but really, Buster’s a walking talent show by himself.  Both juggling scenes – a rehearsal and the actual performance – are as well-done as they are entertaining, and that’s before you even add the radio gag.  It doesn’t stop there, though.  This short is also home to two simply awesome dance sequences that would feel right at home next to Buster’s Princess Rajah dance or his excellent comic dances in Fatty Arbuckle shorts like The Cook and Back Stage.

First, practicing in his room (apartment?  Hotel?  The short is kind of fuzzy on the details of how long Buster is in New York,) Buster decides to take a page from Fred Astaire’s and hoofs it all over the room in an exuberant but dubious tap routine.  Buster is terrific jumping onto various pieces of furniture, blissfully dancing his feet off.

The second, I think, might be even better.  I absolutely adore Buster’s wildly-evolving improvised dance in the waiting room at the studio, listening to another act inside performing an “international medley.”  As the band flits abruptly between numerous cultural genres, Buster barely misses a step, course-correcting to fit each change in melody – Spanish, Irish, Russian, and beyond.  It’s this fantastic scene of pure comedic know-how all about Buster being hilarious because that’s just what he does, and that makes me nothing but happy.

Warnings

Slapstick violence.