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00:00:00In 1900, when these films were made along New York's 5th Avenue, two newly born inventions
00:00:20were just beginning to shape and expand our lives, the automobile and the motion picture.
00:00:33We are traveling up turn-of-the-century Broadway, a street already world-famous for its swank
00:00:38restaurants, legitimate theaters, and electric lights.
00:00:43The first movie houses were not to be found here, but on the side streets.
00:00:47The lowly Nickelodeon catered to the common man, and from the beginning, comedy was king.
00:00:54As one showman pointed out, you can get an onion to make you cry, but nobody has discovered
00:01:00a vegetable to make you laugh.
00:01:02Films had to be hand-cranked by the weary projectionist.
00:01:07In this early French comedy, someone steals into the Paris Conservatory and makes the
00:01:11great master clock run fast, which speeds up time everywhere in the city.
00:03:11What a difference two decades made.
00:03:25This is 5th Avenue in the 1920s.
00:03:27The automobile had driven the horse from the streets to the racetrack.
00:03:32And this is Broadway in evolution through the roaring 20s, as it might have been viewed
00:03:37if we were riding H.G. Wells' time machine.
00:03:41This is 1920.
00:03:42Marion Davies is playing at the Globe.
00:03:45Stage attractions still dominate the Great White Way, like Cinderella on Broadway at
00:03:50the Winter Garden.
00:03:511921, midnight photo plays and Chalmers underwear.
00:03:571923, the cast of the Ziegfeld Follies includes Fanny Bryce, Burt Wheeler, and Paul Whiteman.
00:04:05In 1924, Broadway offers on stage the Marx Brothers, Fred Astaire, and Will Rogers.
00:04:121925, on screen, Lon Chaney is in The Phantom of the Opera.
00:04:18In 1926, Mae West makes headlines when her show is closed and she is sentenced to jail.
00:04:25The moving sign above the Capitol Theater in the distance proclaims Eric Von Stroheim's
00:04:30production, The Merry Widow, starring Mae Murray and John Gilbert.
00:04:36At the Astor, the big parade is in its second year.
00:04:42As 1926 ends, Beauget, starring Ronald Coleman, is at the Criterion.
00:04:48In 1927, the Criterion features Old Ironsides with Wallace Beery and Charles Farrell.
00:04:55Also in 1927, signs for the Student Prince and for Cecil B. DeMille's King of Kings light
00:05:01up the Broadway sky.
00:05:041928, white shadows in the South Seas, Lost in the Arctic, and a contest to find new kids
00:05:14for Our Gang comedies.
00:05:171929, silent films and the prosperous 20s bow out together.
00:05:22The lights of Broadway take on a special glow before the Depression dims them and World
00:05:26War II blacks them out.
00:05:29The sign for the part-talkie Noah's Ark combines electric bulbs and clouds of steam in a display
00:05:34stretching almost a block.
00:05:40Movie theaters had progressed from shabby Nickelodeon to shining palace.
00:05:45The old hand-cranked projectionist was only a memory.
00:05:50Through these early movie years, Oliver Hardy, first of our four clowns, played a part in
00:05:56the growth of silent comedy from rough beginnings to what many today consider a lost art.
00:06:02Here he supports Billy West, whose impersonation of Charlie Chaplin was so exact, it was uncanny.
00:06:10The girl is Leatrice Joy.
00:06:15Enter a sissy.
00:06:17He's Billy Quirk, the film comedy pioneer, once leading man to Mary Pickford.
00:06:47Oliver falls for Leatrice and invites her to the barber's ball, where trouble develops
00:07:16at once, and Billy West proves that when his body's in action, it's almost impossible
00:07:21to tell him apart from Charlie Chaplin's little tramp.
00:07:32The police arrive.
00:07:34They're looking for a Bay Rum addict with a mustache.
00:07:54In the hobo, Charlie, I mean Billy, has just collected a big reward.
00:08:15It looks like he's also won the girl from young Oliver Hardy, here minus mustache.
00:08:37As every moviegoer of 1917 expected, the romantic tables are turned so that Billy can give us
00:08:43a typical Charlie Chaplin pathos ending.
00:09:07Ten years later in No Man's Law, an offbeat Hal Roach western of 1927, Oliver Hardy plays
00:09:13the grubby villain Sharky Nye.
00:09:16The girl he's nearing at is lovely Barbara Kent.
00:09:20The other prong of this triangle is the girl's guardian stallion, Rex the Wonder Horse.
00:09:28Running through the woods, Barbara Kent will remind some moviegoers of Hedy Lamarr in Ecstasy,
00:09:34made a decade after this.
00:09:36But don't be concerned, Barbara's wearing a flesh-colored bathing suit.
00:09:41This is still a family picture.
00:10:06Barbara orders Rex to let Hardy alone.
00:10:31She shouldn't have.
00:10:34After a few kicks for good measure, the sensitive stallion retires to the upper ridges, leaving
00:10:39unprotected our Waif of the Wastelands.
00:11:42Hardy wants to play house.
00:11:54Rex is determined there'll be no house left to play in.
00:11:58This kind of thing could be hard on a villain's nerves.
00:12:28Hardy retreats.
00:12:34Rex forecloses the mortgage.
00:12:59The second of our four clowns is Stan Laurel.
00:13:07Before teaming with Oliver Hardy and perfecting the character of Oliver's beloved dim-witted
00:13:11friend, Stan often played brash go-getters, like this patent medicine salesman and bird
00:13:48On a corner nearby, Happy Harry, yesterday's playboy in need of refreshment.
00:14:16Watch those elevator shoes.
00:14:22Harry is beset by a government agent in this bygone age of prohibition.
00:14:46The warden discovers he has visitors in the carpet.
00:15:10It's worse than mice or moths.
00:15:12It's tunneling convict Oliver Hardy and his burrowing cellmate, Stan Laurel.
00:15:22This cow-roach comedy, The Second Hundred Years, was the first official Laurel and Hardy
00:15:27piece.
00:15:55To masterful Oliver Hardy, signs mean nothing.
00:15:59He demonstrates that to be a successful Christmas tree salesman in sunny California, you have
00:16:04to be both persistent and hard-headed.
00:16:32Often for visiting royalty, Laurel and Hardy register in style.
00:16:37Actually, Stanley and Oliver, who were always starting new jobs, are reporting as doormen
00:16:42from the bottom of the labor barrel.
00:17:35Quickly reduced to their proper station, Stan and Ollie become involved in a monetary crisis.
00:17:57Oliver Hardy versus the law.
00:18:23Oliver has a terrible time getting skittish Scotch nephew Stanley fitted for a pair of
00:20:11Oliver vows he'll get those measurements no matter what the consequences.
00:21:39Two tars on shore leave and shipwreck.
00:22:00The gum machine won't work.
00:22:02Neither will Thelma and Ruby.
00:22:04Demure damsels in distress always bring out the devil-may-care romantic side of Stanley and
00:22:10Oliver.
00:23:35Pick them up, says Stanley.
00:23:36Put them in here.
00:23:51Enter shopkeeper Charlie Hall, Laurel and Hardy's eternal opponent.
00:24:05Just cleaning things up, explains Oliver.
00:24:26Thelma commands, go help your shipmate.
00:25:56Their purple moment was dedicated to husbands who hold out part of their pay envelope on their wives
00:26:02and live to tell about it.
00:26:08Stanley hides his loot in a portrait of Uncle Sneed,
00:26:11a natural place to store money.
00:26:13Because he couldn't take it with him, Uncle Sneed wouldn't go.
00:26:17Guests arrive, friend Oliver and Mrs. Hardy.
00:26:37Mrs. Laurel replaces Stan's money with cigar coupons, the trading stamps of their day.
00:27:08Hardy's wife is a bloodhound.
00:27:11The most money he gets to keep is five cents car fare and he has to show the transfer.
00:27:16But Laurel explains he's a weasel with a hiding place even a wife couldn't find.
00:27:26Oliver, the financial advisor, has one-way pockets marked out.
00:27:32Naturally, he knows just the way to spend Stanley's savings.
00:27:38The town gossip.
00:27:48Fine day for mischief, observes Mrs. Fisheye.
00:27:52Let's go, says Oliver.
00:28:02So
00:28:19two guys who couldn't pay the bill are expelled from Eden, the cafe Eden, that is.
00:28:25They're followed by the girlfriends they left with a check, Kay DeLeese and Anita Garvin,
00:28:30a pair of roving debutantes.
00:29:01Oliver solves it all.
00:29:04They'll assume responsibility.
00:29:06The age of chivalry lives on, down to the last dollar Stanley thinks he has.
00:30:00So
00:30:30do
00:30:35cigar coupons.
00:30:48So
00:30:57put it on the check, says Stanley.
00:31:12A taxi driver joins the party.
00:31:15The girls, who believe in instant transportation, left him outside with a clock running.
00:31:21In 1928, there wasn't a man living who could lift the stuff you could buy with
00:31:26the amount on that meter. Sit down, have a steak, says good time Oliver.
00:31:45So
00:31:57do
00:32:12Oliver suggests a fast exit, the tippy-toe route.
00:32:27So
00:32:58do
00:33:07wait till this number's over, requests Hardy.
00:33:28So
00:33:40from a nightmare to grim reality, from a skirmish to Armageddon, here come the wise.
00:33:50So
00:33:57the head waiter, played by Tiny Sanford, is back.
00:34:00This time he'll either see green or red.
00:34:49So
00:34:58at this moment of crisis, Oliver announces he has an idea.
00:35:11Tell them your idea, Ollie, says Stanley.
00:35:14So
00:35:18we were heading for the bowling alley, explains Oliver, when Stanley dragged me to this den of
00:35:23vice. No one has replaced Laurel and Hardy, just as no one has replaced Chaplin or Keaton or Fields.
00:35:33Good comedians have many imitators. The great clowns stand alone.
00:35:44So
00:36:14so
00:36:44so
00:36:51so
00:37:11our third clown is Charlie Chase, the original good time Charlie whose elk's tooth had a cavity.
00:37:18Lindbergh had just flown the Atlantic. Lucky Lindy referred to himself and his plane as we,
00:37:24and the term became a household word. So Charlie made a comedy called
00:37:29Us, in which he tried to get up courage to take his first flight.
00:37:47Says the little old lady, it's great. Tomorrow I'll try wing walking.
00:38:17Says mother, flying soothes her better than a cradle.
00:38:48So
00:39:01says granddad, it sure beats goat land.
00:39:11Charlie cries, nothing can stop me this time. Made in 1927, this film is a memento of a time
00:39:18not so long ago when dusty cow pastures were transformed into airports.
00:39:23Planes were made of piano wire, canvas and plywood,
00:39:27and a five minute flight was one of life's great adventures.
00:39:41No refunds, yells the one man ground crew. Get in there and fly.
00:39:51We've got customers waiting for that coat.
00:40:11So
00:40:20so
00:40:34Another daring rescue ruined by lack of danger.
00:40:43The girl he thought he saved is an aviatrix, and Charlie's going up at last.
00:42:14So
00:42:22Charlie Chase's life was one long embarrassing moment.
00:42:43So
00:42:55In What Price Goofy, take off on the title of the then current stage hit,
00:43:00What Price Glory, Charlie has been asked to put up a certain Professor Boggs as house guest.
00:43:06He has no idea Professor Boggs is a beautiful woman with May Murray type beast on lips.
00:43:13Another visitor, Noah Young, a burglar so busy as crowbars suffering from mental fatigue.
00:43:21Butler Lucian Littlefield announces the professors in the guest room upstairs.
00:43:26Unsuspecting Charlie, who thinks all professors are old fogies,
00:43:30decides it's time to dress for dinner. En route home, Charlie's wife.
00:43:43So
00:44:13So
00:44:43Uh
00:45:13So
00:45:19Mrs. Chase arrives. Her sunny disposition resembles that of a hyena with a sore nose.
00:45:29Charlie admits the little woman while she's accusing him of stepping out. Noah's stepping in.
00:45:39So
00:45:42Chase calls the professor to dinner. In his Cal Roach comedies,
00:45:46poor Charlie was always innocent, but he got caught anyway.
00:45:53Buddy the Terrier is such a bad watchdog, he won't even watch.
00:45:57Hungry for culture, Noah stole a cap and gown before tackling the silverware.
00:46:03The professor misinterprets Charlie's pleading for silence
00:46:07as some kind of attack.
00:46:09Help!
00:46:12Help!
00:46:25Help!
00:46:35Who, me? I'm just taking out the laundry.
00:46:49So
00:46:54In Fluttering Hearts, Charlie Chase makes a clothes store dummy come alive.
00:46:59Oliver Hardy is the tipsy victim who couldn't and shouldn't believe his eyes.
00:47:19So
00:47:49So
00:48:19So
00:48:49The bugs are bad this year, observes Oliver.
00:49:04On movie night, Charlie's daughter, played by Edith Fellows,
00:49:08comes down with a hiccups. Old medicine man Charlie attempts to scare them away.
00:49:19Boo!
00:49:24Boo!
00:49:49Boo!
00:50:05Darn hiccups, that means no movie tonight. The cure is instantaneous.
00:50:19So
00:50:34More hiccups. Charlie, the good Samaritan,
00:50:37decides he'll use the same scare technique to cure the cashier too.
00:50:49So
00:50:56In Family Group, Charlie, wife, and baby pose for a portrait.
00:51:01Charlie's pea-shooting son is on the window seat. The photographer is Edgar Kennedy.
00:51:19So
00:51:30Without a balloon in the picture, Edgar's camera won't work.
00:51:49So
00:51:58Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
00:52:05oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
00:52:10oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
00:52:15oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
00:52:19oh, oh, oh.
00:52:31Nothing could stop Charlie Chase and his everlasting journey from bad to worse.
00:52:35He buys all the balloons just in time for a California windstorm.
00:52:40What's holding him up, wonders Gertrude Astor, as Charlie's wife.
00:53:09Goodness, moans Mrs. Chase, this never would have happened if he'd eaten a heavy breakfast.
00:53:39Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no
00:54:09Viola Richard's car runs wild in Limousine Love, a Charlie Chase misadventure in depth.
00:54:26Viola's unhurt, but her flaming youth got all damp.
00:54:30She spots an empty limousine.
00:54:33Cars of the 20s with shades and cut glass vases made perfect dressing room.
00:54:39In today's models, you'd have a hard time dressing a midget.
00:54:44Meanwhile, Charlie, the limousine's owner, discovers gas trucks don't sell retail.
00:54:53There's adventure minus dressing ahead for Charlie, a bridegroom-to-be already late for
00:54:59his wedding.
00:55:23Charlie discovers he had gasoline all the time.
00:55:27Remember when cars carried spare gas on their running boards?
00:55:31Remember when cars had running boards?
00:55:47There go Viola's clothes, every stitch.
00:56:03Viola through the speaker, quick, catch my clothing, out the window.
00:56:07I'll explain later.
00:56:37That's all there is, there isn't anymore.
00:56:51A bride at the church, a naked woman in the car, and along hobbles Edgar Kennedy, the
00:56:57most persistent hitchhiker west of Upper Sandusky.
00:57:01You can have a lift, says Charlie, but not in the backseat.
00:57:05Charlie explains about his cargo in the rear, and Edgar smiles knowingly.
00:57:11He belongs to that great fraternity of men who have been around a bit themselves.
00:57:19Up roars a cop looking for contraband booze, flooding the land in these days of prohibition.
00:57:28Charlie has the guilty look of someone hauling bathtub gin.
00:57:33Pull over, orders the policeman.
00:57:35The presence of an arm of authority quickly transforms experienced Edgar from passenger
00:57:41to innocent bystander.
00:57:45Okay, brother, let's see what's inside, commands the law.
00:57:49No, no, pleads poor Charlie.
00:57:53Yes, yes, says the cop.
00:57:59No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
00:58:09no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
00:58:19no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
00:58:27no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
00:58:32It's all right, chum.
00:58:33I'm only looking for rum runners.
00:58:51leggers they were everywhere Edgar suggests they circle his hotel and he'll
00:59:01pick up some clothing but wouldn't you know it
00:59:03Edgar's hotel is just the place they're holding Charlie's wedding
00:59:23I can't stop the car yells Charlie it's the pickup the best man volunteers I'll
00:59:32stop it Charlie has to share his secret the males of the 20s were not as yet
00:59:38fully domesticated they stuck together we can't stop there's something wrong
00:59:44with her body her motors racing she needs to be greased
01:00:03the case is hopeless it's the naked truth that's enough of that says the
01:00:09father of the bride I'll stop it now Charlie has to tell all the dear old
01:00:23dad it happens to the best of us says father you should have seen what used to
01:00:28go on in my Stanley steamer there's no stopping her now she stripped when at 30
01:00:42something's gumming up her wedding never underestimate the power of a woman
01:00:47the determined-to-be bride kills the switch my my says Charlie now why didn't
01:01:05we think of that
01:01:57what's going on here asked the bride oh this is our large ceremony explains
01:03:07my goodness cries mother don't tell me you'd marry that leaping bedsheet
01:03:37off to his wedding goes Charlie chase man of the roaring
01:04:0720s a simpler happier and long-vanished moment of time our fourth clown is
01:04:15Buster Keaton he and friend J. Roy Barnes learned from lawyer snits Edwards
01:04:20that Buster is to inherit seven million dollars providing he is married by 7 p.m.
01:04:27on his 21st birthday and when is his 21st birthday that very day the long
01:04:35arm of coincidence often stretched out of its socket in this era of movie
01:04:39making when fun was more important than logic he's off to propose to Genevieve
01:04:48his sweetheart since childhood
01:05:18Oh
01:05:48Buster's girl Genevieve is thrilled at first but then he let slip that business
01:06:04about 7 o'clock and 7 million dollars and the climate changes she's afraid he
01:06:10wants to marry her for his money
01:06:40rejected by the girl he loves poor Buster decides it doesn't matter whom he
01:06:55marries he'll marry anyone who'll have him even a golf bet as long as it's
01:07:00before seven o'clock
01:07:30by friend and lawyer Buster proposes on
01:08:30by mother
01:08:59Buster's girl writes him a note translated from female into English it
01:09:04reads yes
01:09:13Mary doesn't trust the phone anyway in those days proper girls didn't call boy
01:09:19it wasn't ladylike so she sends her message by Pony Express
01:09:24J. Roy Barnes has an idea I'll get a bride he says meet me at the Broad Street
01:10:05an acceptance of life is this movie over
01:10:29early
01:10:35even if you play grown-up in my makeup and coat says mother you're still only
01:10:4012
01:10:59a proposal wheel-to-wheel
01:11:02big idea give the story to the newspaper
01:13:02there says Barnes I've done it that should flush out a bride or two
01:13:32this comedy seven chances was made in 1925 almost a half century later
01:13:59Niagara Falls and Reno still signify the ins and outs of Mary
01:17:29the minister speaks
01:17:58ladies may I please have your attention
01:18:03you're evidently the victims of some practical joker I must ask you to leave
01:18:07the church as quickly and as quietly as possible
01:18:58Buster gets the message Genevieve is his nothing stands between our hero and
01:19:20happiness but time space and an unmarried mom
01:19:28loses his watch with that seven o'clock deadline looming ever nearer he has to
01:19:50know the time
01:20:20upstairs the life of somebody's party awakens to the morning after
01:20:5045 minutes left
01:22:20directions on the run bring the minister to Genevieve's house I'll get
01:22:49there before seven if I can this film was directed apparently a full gallop
01:22:54by Buster Keaton himself
01:29:49follow me directs the lead Amazon I know a shortcut we'll head him off at the
01:34:11married in the nick of time eternal happiness love well no worries except
01:34:39keeping out of the way of a few thousand disappointed bride
01:35:09did you pick out eighteen-year-old Jean Harlow she was the woman who lost her
01:35:36dress and Lauren Hardy's double will be she continued to play small roles in
01:35:41short features for two more years before Howard Hughes cast her in Hell's Angels
01:35:45and finally who was this guy Charlie Chase well he was a very talented fellow
01:35:51from Baltimore Maryland he starred in produce wrote or directed an amazing
01:35:55hundred and fifty-five films for how wrote studios most of which were shorts
01:36:00and he also appeared with many of the top comedy stars of the day including
01:36:04Charlie Chaplin and Lauren Hardy of course in the late thirties he directed
01:36:09some of the early Three Stooges pictures but success didn't make Charlie Chase
01:36:13very happy he was always a very heavy drinker and he had an unhappy marriage
01:36:18that made a lot worse he was just forty-six years old when he died of a
01:36:22heart attack I come from Baltimore and he was one of our very big stars we're
01:36:27very proud of him he was a very talented man and his name is remembered by movie
01:36:31buffs around the world now watch this