Born Today January 11: Chester Conklin

1886-1971

Born Chester Cooper Conklin in Okaloosa, Iowa; he got his first taste of live vaudeville in St. Louis, Missouri seeing the team of Joe Weber and Lew Fields.  It's not clear what age he was, because he had run away from an extremely violent household sometime after the age of eight, when his father probably murdered his mother in a horrific manner.  He vowed never to return, which he didn't; finding work instead in various mid-western cities, before landing in St. Louis.  He developed th comedic character that he would be associated with for the rest of his life at this time and it was based on his current boss:  a man with a pronounced foreign accent and a huge unruly mustache.  With the character he was able to break into vaudeville.  He traveled with minstrel shows and even did stints as clowns in traveling circuses.  This character development made it's way into his early roles in film fromt he start.  This was by way of him viewing a Mack Sennett film (creator of the Keystone Cops)  and actually going to Keystone Studios and applying for a job.  He was hired at a reputed payment of $3 a day.  The first film that he appeared in was Hubby's Job in 1913--directed by Sennett--a bit part that he was not credited for--it starred one the recognized greats of the silent cinema Mabel Norman.  The next year, Conklin was a bit player in Making A Living, the film debut of one Charles Chaplin (he would appear in possibly the studio's most famous Chaplin short as the Singing Waiter/Mr. Whoozis in Tillie's Punctured Romance).  Also during 1914, Conklin appeared in a number of Mabel Normand films for the Keystone Studio; and he appeared in films by the company with Harold Lloyd.  By 1915, Conklin had become a money making comedic star for Sennett and Co. in his own right; teaming up with Mack Swain, the two formed the movie duo of Ambrose and Mr. Walrus, with Conklin in the role of Walrus; one of their first films featuring the act was Love, Speed and Thrills (1915).  The duo made close to thirty films together as both those characters and others before Conklin left in 1920.  Before this, he had made a few films for Famous Players-Lasky (one of which was the J. Searle Dawley directed feature Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1918), and his star was bankable enough that he had offers from other studios--one of them Fox. During the year of 1919, he was the star of a series of films produced by Mack Sennett Comedies in which he played bubbling characters in different lines of work such as a blacksmith, police chief, school teacher, etc.  Conklin rightly figured that he deserved a raise as a condition to renewing his contract with Sennett's company, when Sennett refused (and reportedly spoke of him in disparaging way), Conklin left for Fox.  The first film that he made with them was Chicken à la Cabaret in 1920.  He continued to be the star of shorts at Fox, though he did take second billing to Australian comic actor Clyde Cook in the feature length (and partially animated) Skirts in 1921. Conklin made a rare appearance in a drama in the 1923 Thomas Ince production Anna Christie, and by 1924, he was appearing in more features than shorts (the market for comedy shorts had grown thin by that time).  He appeared in 4 features in 1924 before taking on the role he is most "known" for in the history books of cinema and outside of the world of slapstick fandom: 'Popper' Sieppe in Erich von Stroheim's bloated production that was Greed (his part was cut from film and thought to have been part of the film that was burned for the silver nitrate).  He immediately returned to comedy with Battling Bunyan (1924), a poverty row affair produced on the cheap by Encore.  Conklin continued to be a major player in films, most of them comedies, throughout the rest of 1920's.  Most films were lesser known and not by major studios, though a few, like Where Was I? were made by "majors" like Universal.  One Conklin film from 1927, produced at Paramount that is now lost, is of historical import to fans of comedy the world over due to it's being the film debut of Ed Wynn; that film Rubber Heels also featured Thelma Todd.  In 1928, Conklin appeared in two films that have titles instantly recognizable today, one was a remake of a famous silent, the other the first version of a film famously remade in in the 1950's.  The first is Tillie's Punctured Romance (1928) starring the immutable W. C. Fields and bears little resemblance to the film from 1914 in which he also appeared; the second is Gentlemen Prefer Blonde (1928) which was famously remade with Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell in 1953. Both of the films from 1928 are now lost.  His first film with sound comedy horror House of Horror, which had two versions: a silent version and a Vitagraph all sound version.  Conklin appeared in one additional all silent film after this; Stairs of Sand (1929) was a western romance based on a Zane Grey novel--Wallace Beer took top billing.  After this, all the rest of his film appearances in 1929 were in sound films, with his appearance in the extravaganza The Show Of Shows rounding out the decade.  For someone so acutely associated with silent slapstick, Conklin's transition to talkies was as seamless as they come (of course, he had been a vaudevillian).  His first film of the new decade was Swing Time, which featured a number of older former silent actors: Ben Turpin, Stepin' Fetchit and Robert Edeson.  In 1931, he appeared with several "old timers" from the Sennett days in Stout Hearts and Willing Hands, a short comedy that amongst the "original Keystone Cop" players, also included all three of the Moore brothers as lookalike bartenders.  Given his background in comedic film shorts, it is hardly surprising that he wound up in Three Stooges shorts.  As time went on, however, his roles became smaller and smaller, often going uncredited; this did not stop him from working steadily all the way up through the 1950's.  In 1947 he had a very small role in the Pearl White biopic The Perils of Pauline; White, of course, being a silent star herself.  Conklin, it seemed, would have been a shoe-in for television, yet that was not to be (and, in fact, he wound up taking job like department store Santa to make ends meet in the 1950's, instead of being hired for broadcast--a real lose!).  He did appear on television but not often.  In fact, the first series that he appeared on was Ed Wynn's show in 1950 as himself.  Additionally, he appeared on the Make Room For Daddy and Doc Corkle and General Electric Theater.  He also made a small appearance the Roger Corman production The Beast With A Million Eyes in 1955.  This was the same year that his acting visibly slowed, after decades of appearing in films his acting career was coming to an end.  He appeared in three films after this: one in 1958, one in 1962 and one in 1966, which was the last acting job of his life (the film was A Big Hand For The Little Lady the Henry Fonda western). Conklin died on the 11th of October in 1971 at the age of 85.  He was cremated and his ashes were eventually scattered in the Pacific Ocean.

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Born Today September 1: John W. Boyle

1891-1959

Cinematographer John W. Boyle was born on this day in Memphis, Tennessee.  By the end of his career, he had shot over 150 films, but he got his start solidly in the silent era.  His first film was Greater Love Hath No Man in 1915.  He was in fact, the cinematographer on a film starring Arthur Shirley (II), who was written up yesterday on this blog; the film was The Fall Of A Nation (1916).  By 1917,  he was working for Fox and photographed a great many of their late 1910's iconic films (most of them sadly lost)--including a great many of the Theda Bara/J. Gordon Edwards films.  Even after Edwards was through directing Bara, he kept Boyle on as his cinematographer.   He, for example, shot the now lost Edwards' directed The Queen Of Sheba (1921), which features Betty Blythe who also had a birthday on the 1st of September. From 1922 on, he was working at various studios, including: Metro, Warner Bros.,  and Goldwyn.  He was given top jobs at some the earliest merged studios as well.  1928 brought his first brush with early talking pictures; he was director of photography on The Good-By Kiss a partial sound film directed by the great Mack Sennett, for whom he worked in the late silent era.  He next worked on a short film of Sennett's that had an experimental two-color technicolor sequence: The Campus Carmen (1928).  Sennett's next comedic short The Lion's Roar (1928) was a full sound affair that Boyle also photographed.  Also by 1928, he gained the attention of up and coming directors working under Sennett's umbrella at Sennett Comedies--one of them was Frank Capra.  These aquntiances would serve him well later in his career.  The over-whelming bulk of the films that he shot in the late 1920's and early 1930's were shorts around 20 minutes long.  In 1928 and 1929, he also served as president of the American Society of Cinematographers.  Boyle worked right up until the time of his death, having made his television debut in shooting seven episodes of Big Town in the early 1950's.  The last film that he shot was Courage of Black Beauty in 1957.  Boyle passed away in Hollywood on the 28 of September 1959, almost one month to the day after his 68th birthday.  He is interred at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.  In 1965, some of his archive footage of Abbott and Costello was used in The World Of Abbott and Costello.  

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Born Today November 9: Marie Dressler

1868-1934

Born Leila Marie Koerber in Cobourg, Ontario to a musical family, her father was both a church organist and a music teacher, she started acting at the age of five in church plays.  The family eventually relocated to the United States, where young Leila continued to seek out roles in local theatrical productions.  She left home at the age of 14 to seek out acting jobs professionally, and found work with the Nevada Stock Company, where she lied about her age, telling them that she was 18.  Her parents had become disapproving of her choice of career and her father began to object to the use of the Koerber last name; so she changed it to Dressler (there are conflicting accounts as to how she came by the name).  Dressler stayed with the company for three years, after which she joined the Robert Grau Opera Company.  She eventually ended up in Philadelphia, where she then joined the Starr Opera Company, though she later quit and returned home to her parents living in Saginaw, Michigan.  She joined the church choir, and while yet another opera company, Bennett and Moulton, came to town, she gained their attention and was asked to join them--she stayed with them a further 3 years. In 1891 she quit and moved to Chicago.  She starred in a couple of productions there, after which she moved to New York City.  She made her Broadway debut in 1892. She was persuaded to accept comedic roles by Maurice Barrymore.  It was at this time that her long association with that large acting family began.  By 1900, she had started her own touring theater group, which saw them working up and down the northeastern city circuit.  In 1907, she moved to London with fellow actor Jim Walton. While there, they sunk an enormous amount of money into what became a huge theatrical flop; destitute, they returned to New York and declared bankruptcy.  She returned to Broadway for a time and wound up doing vaudeville in the summer at Atlantic City.  She also began to record for Edison Records in 1909 and 1910.  At this tim, she began rehearsals for a new play Tillie's Nightmare.  The play was a success, and toured extensively, ending up staged on Broadway.  During the first World War, Dressler was very active in selling Liberty Bonds and entertaining American Expeditionary Forces.  As she owned the rights to the play of Tillie's Nightmare, any production of it of any sort, had to gain her approval first.  Having made the acquaintance of Mack Sennett in 1902, she was the obvious choice to star in a filmed production of the play which famously became known as Tillie's Punctured Romance in 1914, in which she acted opposite Charlie Chaplin (the film also featured Mabel Normand and Chester Conklin, amongst others). The film made history as being the very first full feature length motion picture comedy (the film would also be remade in 1928 with W.C. Fields).  She starred in two more "Tillie" films before moving on to other comedic shorts through 1918; all the while, continuing to star on Broadway and in vaudeville.  She then quit acting in motion picture altogether until 1927, when she reentered the business in the comedic drama The Callahans and the Murphys (sadly a lost film).  Her first sound speaking role came in the comedy short Dangerous Females in 1929.  She continued to act both on the stage and in front of the camera until a little less than a year before her death.  In late in 1933, she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. She succumbed to the illness on July 28 in 1934 at the age of 65.  She is interred in the crypt in Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, Ca. Her interment plaque records the year of her birth as 1871, though she was 3 years older in actual age.

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Born Today September 19: Ben Turpin

1869-1940

Bernard Turpin was born today in New Orleans, LA the child of a candy store owner.  Having been born long before the invention of the moving picture, he obviously got his start on the stage; which in  his case came in the form of various traveling shows.  He possessed a body type and face that lent itself to comedic work, with one of his eyes permanently crossed (later in his life, he famously--and comically--took out an insurance policy with Lloyd's of London in case his eyes straightened out), and an oversized handle bar mustache.  In the early days of his career, he found work in circuses, vaudeville and burlesque.  He developed an exaggerated form of physical comedy that laid the ground work for what we now call "slapstick;" and was this talent that eventually got him into the motion picture business.  He made his film debut in 1907 in a comedic short that he was specifically cast for:  An Awful Skate, or, The Hobo On Roller Skates.  From this point onward, he starred in a series of slapstick comedy shorts, making him a huge star of the silent cinema, even playing roles such a "The Tramp" long before one Charlie Chaplin would take up that comedic identity. In fact, the company that introduced Turpin to the moving image was Essanay, who would later employ Chaplin, who became their biggest star until his departure bankrupted the studio.  This is when things began to deteriorate between Turpin and Essanay.  As soon has they hired Chaplin, they made Turpin his comedic side-kick, setting up his characters as mere foils for which Chaplin could play off of.  Turpin was naturally insulted by this.   In 1917 he went to work for the king of comedy Mack Sennett. Turpin signed a very lucrative contract the the Mack Sennett Studios.   Much to Turpin's delight, he quickly became one of their biggest stars; so much so, that he began to introduce himself as "I'm Ben Turpin, I make $3000 a week!"  He worked steadily up through the invention of talkies, at which time--owed to good investments--he chose to retire from the industry, rather than attempt to make the transition to talking cinema.  Still, he was sought out for cameo comedy appearances in films regularly.  In 1935 he, and other stars from the silent comedy era (including Chester Conklin and Ford Sterling), starred in Keystone Hotel; it was his only starring role in the sound era.  The last film that he appeared in, very briefly, was Laurel and Hardy's Saps At Sea (1940).  He was set to make a cameo appearance in Charlie Chaplin's The Great Dictator (1940), but Turpin died of a sudden heart attack at the age of 70 on the first of July before filming started.  He is interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, CA.  

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Born Today September 5: Darryl F. Zanuck

Darryl F. Zanuck:  1902-1979

Yet another giant in the entertainment world (two in a role here), this time from deep inside the industry, pretty much the opposite of Artaud.  Zanuck became one of the faces of the studio era, but unlike others of his generation, he bounced from studio or production company to studio/production company during the duration of his career.  And, unlike many other studio bosses, he got his start from the bottom up and has as many credits for writing as he does for producer (even 3 ghost director credits--one in the silent era--and a novel as well), the list here today will be long, with some very famous silents on it! He was also somewhat unique in the use of at least three aliases for his writing for film.  Not that the moving around in the oil slick was was the golden age of Hollywood, meant that he wielded any less power--in it's hey-day he was considered one of the kingpins of system.   He was one of the first studio directors to build up a "stable" of stars, including Shirley Temple.  This is the beginning of a system that came to benefit the big wigs and harm the actors.  His life after success was certainly not without controversy.  Zanuck was born Wahoo, Nebraska,  There are a couple of different versions of his early life; one stating that by the age of 13 he was abandoned by both parents, and at 15 he lied about his age in 1917 and joined the army.  Another that he moved to LA with his mother when he was six, and actually got his first job film as an extra when he was 8 (no credit or information available on the production--seems a bit questionable), but that he was recalled back to Nebraska by his father and escaped by lying about his age at 16 in 1918 (seems to me this might be cleared up in military records--they are better kept than people think);  He served in both the World Wars.  I will concern myself here with just the silent era of his career.  He spent his first years in Hollywood working with the likes of Syd Chaplin and Carl Laemmle, but most of his early work was done with Mack Sennett, creator of The Keystone Cops, where Zanuck was a sort of jack of all trades for Sennett's Keystone Co.  His earliest great break through, and first "actor" discovery (and he does, in my humble opinion, deserve credit for this, though many disagree) was not even a person:  Rin Tin Tin.  His role in the late silent era was much more in the camp of ushering in the talking era and less about advances in artistic expresses found in many late silents.  His writing credits alone are so numerous that it is head spin, so this clearly is not high art--to the extent it could be called "dime store stuff."  Vitaphone was his and his 1920's bosses thing--they certainly won the day, and added "pulp" to the film industry that quickly frustrated such greats as James Whale.   In 1925 comes his first producer (uncredited) credit, the rest, as they say, is history.  Zanuck died of cancer on 22 December 1979 at the age of 77.  His descendants continued to (and still do) make big marks on Hollywood.  He is the father of Richard D. Zanuck and grandfather of Harrison Zanuck and Dean Zanuck.  For more about his very long and varied career, see his Wikipedia page.  He is buried at Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles. 

Acting:

Find Your Man (1924) (Rin Tin Tin, his only known silent acting credit)

Writing Credits

Round Two (1922) (partially lost)

The Storm (1922)

Fighting Blood (1923)

The Knight in Gale (1923) (Series Short)

The Knight That Failed (1923) (Series Short)

Six Second Smith (1923) (Series Short)

Two Stones with One Bird (1923) (Series Short)

Some Punches and Judy (1923) (Series Short)

Gall of the Wild (1923) (Series Short)

The End of a Perfect Fray (1923) (Series Short)

When Gale and Hurricane Meet (1923) (Series Short)

Judy Punch (1923) (Series Short)

Julius Sees Her (1924) (Short)

When Knighthood Was in Tower (1924) (Short)

Money to Burns (1924) (Short)

King Leary (1924) (Short)

William Tells (1924) (Short)

Sherlock Home (1924) (Short)

For The Love of Mike (1924 (Short)

Find Your Man (1924)

The Millionaire Cowboy (1924)

A Lighthouse by the Sea (1924) (Rin Tin Tin feature)

On Thin Ice (1925)

A Broadway Butterfly (1925)

Eve's Lover (1925) (lost film)

The Limited Mail (1925)

Red Hot Tires (1925)

Seven Sinners (1925)

Hogan's Alley (1925)

Three Weeks in Paris (1925) (lost film)

The Caveman (1926)

The Little Irish Girl (1926)

A What A Nurse (1926)

The Social Highwayman (1926)

Footloose Windows (1926)

Across The Pacific (1926) (lost film)

The Better 'Ole (1926)

Wolf's Clothing (1927)

Tracked By The Police (1927) (Rin Tin Tin film)

The Missing Link (1927)

Irish Hearts (1927)

Simple Sis (1927)

The Black Diamond Express (1927)

The First Auto (1927) (Partial silent, Vitaphone sound)

The Desired Woman (1927) (directed by Michael Curtiz)

Slightly Used (1927)

Jaws Of Steel (1927)

Good Time Charley (1927) (lost film)

Ham And Eggs At The Front (1927) (this was a film that Zanuck had personal guilt about later in life and produced a number of well known films to counter stereotypes)

Tenderloin (1928) (partial silent, small speaking parts sound by Vitaphone, lost film, also has a production credit.)

Pay As You Enter (1928) (Vitaphone sound effects and music)

State Street Sadie (1928) (partial talkie, talking sequences by Vitaphone, lost film)

The Midnight Taxi (1928)

My Man (1928) (talking sequences by Vitaphone)

Harboiled Rose (1929) (partial silent, Vitaphone sequences)

Madonna Of Avenue A (1929) (early talkie, full sound by Vitaphone)

Say It With Songs (1929) (early talkie musical, Al Jolson film, full sound by Vitaphone)

Production Credits:

Lady Windermere's Fan (1925)

So This Is Paris (1926)

Old San Francisco (1927) (writer credit here, two version of film, one silent, one sound, with soundtrack and recorded sound effects.)

The First Auto (1927)

The Desired Woman (1927)

The Jazz Singer (1927) (he is uncredited here, several now documented production credits were first uncredited, but because this is such a giant in the silent world, I am making a note of it.)

Tenderloin 1928

The Terror (1928) (partial talkie, and partially lost, unfortunately, because it's a horror film--and features an early depiction of a serial killer--as such a horror fan, I'd love to hear that complete footage had been found!)

Noah's Ark (1928) (he also has an uncredited Director role in this film--his earliest, he also has a writing credit here )

On With The Show (1929) (early talkie, Vitaphone with a Western Electric Apparatus)

The Show Of Shows (1929) (early talkie with the same sound as above, John Barrymore film)

Production Manager:

Lights Of New York (1928) (extremely early talkie, often credited with being the first full sound film with full syncopation)

All Night Long (1924)

More violent and hilarious slapstick, this time from Mack Sennett and comedic "fubble bum" Harry Langdon--with soldiers and criminals to boot!

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