Back Stage

Egos collide in the wings of a weekly variety show, leading the talent to walk out en-masse and two stagehands (Fatty Arbuckle and Buster Keaton) to perform in their stead. Both comedians owe their careers to the live circuit, where they learnt the ropes with a traveling vaudeville act or two, and that gives the behind-curtains stuff a sense of validity. These guys know which corners to prod, which props to rig for spectacular failure, where and how to poke the pompous stars to push them over the edge.

On-stage, too, they exploit every last opportunity for misadventure, from heckling audience members to collapsing scenery (including an early example of Keaton's famed "falling edifice" gag, best-known from 1928's Steamboat Bill Jr.), with the usual amount of reckless tumbles and messy melees thrown in for good measure. More balanced than some of the duo's earlier pictures, with a number of fresh new bits, but it's missing a certain spark. Maybe their rigorous filming schedule (a dozen comedies together in the preceding two years) was beginning to take a toll.

One of the later Arbuckle-Keaton collaborations, showing the marked influence of Keaton in the construction of gags, "Back Stage" was made the year before they went their separate ways: Arbuckle into features and Keaton into his own series of shorts. Arbuckle's nephew, Al St. John, by this time is relegated to a rather minor role. Jackie Coogan's father, who was an eccentric dancer in vaudeville, appears here in that role (he later heckles from a stage box, but he is not the man in the balcony with a mustache). Coogan was a friend of Arbuckle's and appeared in a few of his two-reel films before Jackie became a star in Chaplin's remarkable feature, "The Kid," two years later (the elder Coogan also appeared in that film in three different minor roles, most notably as Satan in a rather odd dream sequence).

Like Keaton's later short, "The Play-House" (1921), this two-reel comedy gives viewers a distinct feel for the era of vaudeville--though from the perspective of the stagehands rather than the audience. It includes many fine gags built around various back-stage activities and the bumbling attempts of two stagehands, Arbuckle and Keaton, to act as performers.

The most interesting gag historically involves a scenery flat falling toward Arbuckle, with an upstairs window passing around him. Keaton later used an actual falling house front in the same manner twice in his own films: the 1920 short "One Week" (his first release as a solo artist) and, more dramatically, in the 1928 feature "Steamboat Bill Jr.," which was his last independent release (it does not appear in "Sherlock Jr." as stated elsewhere). The latter instance was an extremely dangerous stunt, which easily would have killed Keaton if he did not hit his mark precisely.

"Back Stage" is not their best film together, but it remains a very good Arbuckle-Keaton effort well worth viewing.

Back Stage (1919)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Later day two-reeler has Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle and Buster Keaton playing stage hands who run off The Strong Man after insulting him. When everyone walks out the duo must go on stage and try to make the paying crowd happy.

BACK STAGE isn't the greatest collaboration between Arbuckle and Keaton but if you're a fan of the two legends then this here is certainly worth watching, although you can't help but wish it was better. The biggest problem is that the story itself just doesn't give our two leads much to do. The first portion of the film contains a few laughs and especially the scenes with Arbuckle and the kid that is annoying him. The second portion has Keaton in drag but this here just never gets a big laugh. Again, if you're a fan this is worth watching but the duo certainly made a lot better.

This is one of the very best of the Arbuckle/Keaton short features, and there are a lot of good reasons to watch it. Most of the comedy material works very well, and it has some very creative gag ideas, along with some excellent stunt work added in.

The setting, with Fatty and Buster working "Back Stage" for a vaudeville show, lends itself well to humor and variety, and this setting is quite interesting in its own right. If you watch closely, you'll also notice a number of gags used here that Keaton later refined and used to even greater effect later in some of his own short features.

There are several good sequences, and they provide a good showcase for both Arbuckle and Keaton to display their considerable array of comic talents. Al St. John and the rest of the supporting cast also get a couple of good moments. It's great comedy, and a lot of fun to watch.

Perhaps nothing reveals the edge in Roscoe Arbuckle's comedy more than when Buster Keaton's character is tipping over backwards, and rather than catching him, Arbuckle first dusts off the floor with a broom, and then whacks the back of his legs, causing Buster to fall hard. Another such moment is when he and Buster rig up a barbell to try to electrocute a menacing strongman (Charles A. Post). This was after Keaton had tried to incapacitate the man by hitting him with an axe a few different ways.

The darkness in the comedy is ironic, because by bosom buddy Buster Keaton's account, in real life "Arbuckle was that rarity, a true jolly fat man. He had no meanness, malice, or jealousy in him. Everything seemed to amuse and delight him. He was free with his advice and too free in spending and lending money. I could not have found a better-natured man to teach me the movie business, or a more knowledgeable one. We never had an argument."

Fresh off being away for nearly a year in the army, Keaton stayed loyal to Arbuckle despite offers for significantly more money elsewhere. Change was in the wind for Arbuckle, however, as he had changed studios and lost many of the other people in his ensemble, including Alice Lake and (very soon) even nephew Al St. John, who barely appears here. Arbuckle was ill during production, delaying it, and perhaps all of these things led to a rather average film. This was a year before he would sign a mega-contract with Paramount, and two years before the Virginia Rappe scandal would unfairly ruin him.

There are some of the old Arbuckle standbys, including him and Keaton dressing up in drag and dancing, not much of which is very inspired. The limber (and likely coded gay) dancer John Coogan (Jackie's father) does the splits and various maneuvers both Arbuckle and Keaton try to follow, which was amusing. One of the funnier bits was an early version of a sign changing message when a portion of it is concealed, when a posting goes from "Gertrude McSkinny famous star who will play the little laundress first time here tomorrow at 2 pm" to the decidedly more ribald "Miss Skinny will undress here at 2pm."

The best, however, was the bit with the wall of a stage set falling down and just missing Arbuckle, who happens to be standing where one of the window cutouts is. Keaton of course would use this to much more dramatic effect in Steamboat Bill, Jr nine years later, and it was pretty cool to see this early version. Between this and the early version of Chaplin's bread roll dance in The Rough House (1917), you can really see the influence Arbuckle had on these giants of comedy, and his own place alongside them.