Tillie's Punctured Romance

The comedy in "Tillie's Punctured Romance" is admittedly mediocre, but many who love classic cinema will still find this feature worth seeing once just for its cast. Besides Mabel Normand, it has Charlie Chaplin and Marie Dressler in some of their earliest film roles, plus Edgar Kennedy and Mack Swain in smaller roles, and of course the Keystone Cops. Most of these wonderful performers are not shown to their best advantage here, but it is still a rare chance to see them all together.

The film in itself is only fair. The story-line had possibilities, but Mack Sennett's disjointed, knockabout style just doesn't work very well in a full-length feature. Most of the material is quite predictable after a while, and except for the "Cops", who have a few funny moments, the cast members do not have roles that give them a chance to do what they do best. There are a handful of decent gags amongst the routine physical humor, and a film-within-a-film sequence that comes off all right, but in general there just was not enough worthwhile material to fill up a running time of this length. With this cast, though, it might have made a very good two- or three-reeler.

Tillie's Punctured Romance, produced and directed by Mack Sennett for his Keystone Studio in 1914, is a movie milestone. It's the first feature-length slapstick comedy (restored prints run 70 minutes or more), and boasts three top players in the lead roles: Charlie Chaplin, Marie Dressler, and Mabel Normand. Although it's remembered primarily as a Chaplin film he was still an up-and-coming young performer at the time, and made no contribution to the script or direction. This project was based on a stage success called "Tillie's Nightmare," which was known for Dressler's high-energy performance and her rendition of the mock tragic lament "Heaven Will Protect the Working Girl." Of course the hit song couldn't be used on the silent screen, but this adaptation offers lots of slapstick and a wild climax featuring a full scale chase, on land and sea, by the Keystone Cops. By Sennett standards this was obviously a major production, with scores of familiar players in supporting roles, extensive location shooting, and an elaborate set serving as Tillie's mansion for the grand finale.

Historic significance aside, however, Tillie's Punctured Romance is something of a letdown when viewed today. For starters, Marie Dressler was not entirely comfortable with the new medium, and simply repeated her stage performance for the cameras, gesticulating wildly, dancing drunkenly, and occasionally shouting her lines-- which, of course, we can't hear. (Her true movie stardom wouldn't come until the talkie era.) Dressler's bizarre antics are amusing to a point, but a little of this sort of thing goes a long way. Mabel Normand is cute in her stylish outfits, but her role gives her little comic business of her own to perform beyond reacting to the activities of her co-stars. And Chaplin, playing a cold-hearted villain who seduces, robs, and then abandons a homely farm girl, is about as far from the lovable Tramp as one could imagine. It's interesting to see Charlie in such an uncharacteristic guise, and it speaks well for his versatility, yet we wait in vain for those genuinely funny moments we find in his own films, even the early ones. He plays the scoundrel with relish, but the part could have been taken by any number of other comedians. Even so, in one late scene Chaplin managed to slip in a gag that suggests the Charlie we know: parading before servants in his new finery, he trips over a tiger rug, then 'punishes' the beast, lifting it by the tail and giving it a quick spank. That was practically the only laugh I found in Tillie's Punctured Romance. Otherwise, most of the humor comes from watching grotesquely-dressed people kick butts, fire pistols and fall off the pier into the ocean, all of which represents Sennett's taste in comedy, not Chaplin's.

'Tillie' is best appreciated by film scholars. It has its moments, but can't compare with Chaplin's own later features such as The Gold Rush and The Circus. Viewers who have never seen a classic silent comedy may get a distorted impression of what they were like from this one, in the same way that The Great Train Robbery of 1903 suggests that all silent drama was laughably primitive. Personally I find these very early movies fascinating, but they need to be seen in the larger context of their time; the silent cinema shouldn't be judged by its earliest products.

P.S. Autumn 2010: A newly restored version of Tillie's Punctured Romance has become available, one that is substantially longer than the various re-edited and truncated editions which have circulated for many years. Modern viewers can now get a better sense of what audiences of 1914 saw when the film was new. The restored 'Tillie' remains very much a vehicle for Marie Dressler, but it's gratifying to report that a fair amount of the "new" footage involves Mabel Normand. She has more to do during the party sequence at the end, disguised as a maid as she sips punch and spars with her employers and fellow servants. The flirtation sequence between Charlie and Marie at the beginning has been extended, and Dressler has more footage at the police station when she's jailed for drunkenness. The over all impact of 'Tillie' is essentially the same, but nevertheless it's good to see this historically significant film get the archival attention and respect it deserves.

This was the last film Chaplin was in that he neither directed nor wrote, made at the end of 1914, his first full year in America. There are a dearth of title cards in this one, and just about everything is projected via pantomime. And because it is a Mack Sennett film there is lots of pants kicking.

The plot is pretty simple. Chaplin plays a ne'er do well who convinces plain plus sized Tillie, who is physically abused by her father, to elope with him and to help herself to a big dowry. When they get to the city he steals her money and abandons her for his old girlfriend, Mabel Normand. As Tillie's fortunes wax and wane, so does Chaplin's interest in her.

Why was pants kicking and pie throwing considered such a big laugh getter in early silent film? According to a film historian on some silent Charlie Chase films I bought, it was push back at Victorian values of the day. When Victorian values fell away after WWI, this was no longer considered funny.

Things I noticed? That three million dollars in 1914 was considered a great fortune, worthy of newspaper headlines. Today it would be the cost of a home in the San Francisco Bay area that is nothing to write home about. Also, notice that men AND women are put in the same drunk tank. I have no idea if that is a dash of realism or just the Keystone Cops mismanaging a precinct as usual. When there is a big society party towards the end, the band is all dressed up like a bunch of Cossacks, but the servants are dressed like they are from the French Revolutionary period. I have no idea what was up with that.

At any rate, it is a real treat to see three great comics on the silent screen together. It's a shame sound had to come in for Marie Dressler to really get her due in comedy, a top box office draw the last few years of her life. Of course, Chaplin made the transition successfully, but pantomime was really always his forte. Poor Mabel Normand, a great silent comedienne, will not live long enough to compete in talking pictures. She died in 1930 of tuberculosis.

Mack Sennett, head of Keystone Studios, decided to take the plunge and produce a big budgeted feature film based on the Broadway comedy "Tillie's Nightmare." He was able to entice the play's star, Marie Dressler, for at that time one of her rare movie performances (she had previously appeared in two shorts). Augmenting her would be the studio's main stars, Mabel Normand and Charlie Chaplin. Sennett would spend a hefty $50,000 ($1.2 million in today's figures) for production, an enormous departure from his studio's trademark quickie, cheap movies.

Released in December 1914, "Tillie's Punctured Romance" became an instant hit with movie audiences. Chaplin discards his Tramp outfit to play a shyster intent on swindling the father of Dressler's life savings. Normand's role as Chaplin's girlfriend adds humor to the plot.

Critics were equally admirable in their reviews of "Tillie's," with one writing, "The film's final reel is a comedic crescendo, building from a brief pie fight to mayhem caused by Tillie firing a pistol indiscriminately, culminating with a farcical chase on a pier featuring the Keystone Cops on land and sea." "Tillie's" would be one of 500 movies nominated by American Film Institute for its Best 100 All-Time Film Comedies.

"Tillie's" was cinema's first feature film comedy. On a personal level, the movie would be Chaplin's last motion picture with Keystone as well as his final movie he neither wrote nor directed in his long film career. Sennett directed "Tillie's" and co-wrote the script.

Dressler would star in three more "Tillie" movies in the next three years, all produced by different studios. She returned to the stage and vaudeville after the last "Tillie," and wouldn't return to the screen until the late 1920's, making a successful transition to sound soon after. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1930 in "Min and Bill," and received a nomination in the same category two years later in "Emma."

Chaplin, seeing his star rising during his year at Keystone, wanted more money when his contract with the studio expired at the end of 1914. Sennett claimed he couldn't afford the comedian's salary demand of $1,000 per week. Essanay Film Manufacturing Company knocked on Chaplin's door and offered $1,250 per week with a $10,000 signing bonus, guaranteeing greater artistic freedom for the actor. He took the studio's offer. He headed for Chicago, the headquarters for Essanay, to begin working on his first film for the company. Yet, Chaplin later reflected emotionally he couldn't personally say farewell to his buddies he had developed friendships with at Keystone when it was time to depart. "It was a wrench leaving Keystone, for I had grown fond of Sennett and everyone there. I never said goodby, I couldn't."

What a treat that this 1914 feature-length comedy still exists. Historically important as the first feature comedy, it also boasts three great stars: Charlie Chaplin, Marie Dressler, and Mabel Normand. Directed by legendary Mack Sennett, this broad comedy was adapted from Dressler's stage hit. It's rough, with missing pieces, but enough exists to showcase the comedy talents of this trio of stars. The story is trite but Dressler and Chaplin are so funny, you forget the plot and laugh along with the mugging and pratfalls. So far as I know, Dressler and Chaplin never worked together again. What a shame. Dressler adapted to talkies (winning an Oscar for Min and Bill) so much better than Chaplin did. Normand died before the advent of talkies. Anyway, certainly worth a look. Co-stars Chester Conklin, Charles Murray, Minta Durfee, Edgar Kennedy, Charley Chase, Mack Swain, and possibly Milton Berle as the newsboy. Berle always said he played it. Edna Purviance may be the leading lady in the film Chaplin and Normand go to see. I love this film.