[102], Film critic Roger Ebert stated, "The greatest of the silent clowns is Buster Keaton, not only because of what he did, but because of how he did it. Imitators of our act don't last long, because they can't stand the treatment. Keaton's other 1924 film, The Navigator, was shot on an ocean liner and directed with Donald Crisp. The General, set during the American Civil War, combined physical comedy with Keaton's love of trains,[33] including an epic locomotive chase. Sometimes it's hard to keep up with the latest celebrity news, but don't worry we have you covered. Photograph: Ronald Grant. Harry N. Abrams, 2001, pg. Buster William Keaton Sr. from tree Keaton Family Tree. By the time he was five, Buster was formally added to the family act and instantly made "The Three Keatons" a success. 253 ratings60 reviews. ", In 1954, Keaton and Eleanor met film programmer Raymond Rohauer, with whom they developed a business partnership to re-release his films. The program always includes talks by Keaton expertsincluding family memberssocial events and film screenings. He appeared on screen simultaneously nine times. Anyone who thinks that the movie-within-a-movie is a recent conceit, the province of The Purple Rose of Cairo and Last Action Hero, should check out Sherlock Jr., a film in which Keaton dreams himself into another film: he strolls up the aisle of the theatre, hops into the action, and fights to keep up with the breakneck changes of scene. Ex-husband of Natalie Talmadge and Mae Elizabeth Keaton "[22], Keaton said he had so much fun that he sometimes began laughing as his father threw him across the stage. Yallop, David (1976). The next project confirmed Keaton's fears about studio interference. The series benefited from a company of veteran actors, including Marcia Mae Jones as the ingenue, Iris Adrian, Dick Wessel, Fuzzy Knight, Dub Taylor, Philip Van Zandt, and his silent-era contemporaries Harold Goodwin, Hank Mann, and stuntman Harvey Parry. The 21st Annual International Buster Keaton Convention will be held Oct 2-3, in Muskegon, MI, and The Humphrey Bogart Film Festival will be held October 21-25, in Key Largo, FL. Like Arbuckle before him, Keaton began directing films that he appeared in. The seemingly indestructible man married actress Natalie Talmadge in 1921, though wedded bliss did not last long. He supported them all. His final appearance on film was in The Scribe, a 1966 safety film produced in Toronto by the Construction Safety Associations of Ontario: he died shortly after completing it. At the end of the day, he asked to borrow one of the cameras to get a feel for how it worked. Buster Keaton and Marceline Day in The Cameraman, 1928. He first appeared on stage in 1899 in Wilmington, Delaware. Marriage: xxxx Ohio, USA: Record information. His mother nicknamed him Jimmy. [56] In December 1958, Keaton was a guest star in the episode "A Very Merry Christmas" of The Donna Reed Show on ABC. In Go West (1925), he is stared down by a herd of cattle. "Medicine Man" was completed but not aired. "[31] The more adventurous ideas called for dangerous stunts, performed by Keaton at great physical risk. Most of these parodies targeted acts with which Keaton had shared the bill. Keaton was the world's whipping boy and made the world love him for it. [105], Actor and stunt performer Johnny Knoxville cites Keaton as an inspiration when coming up with ideas for Jackass projects. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 966 Hollywood Loses Tavo Hedda Hopper, Lamar Green 217. Melissa Talmadge Cox wonderful talk about her grandpa, Buster Keaton and the Talmadge sisters and family. Comedy director Leo McCarey, recalling the freewheeling days of making slapstick comedies, said, "All of us tried to steal each other's gagmen. American comic actor, filmmaker, producer and writer, Born on October 04, 1895 Buster Keaton Remembered. Spouse: Thelma Ferne WOOD (1905-xxxx) 4454 People 0 Records 0 Sources: Buster William Keaton Sr. found in 22 trees View all. A 1905 ad for The Three Keatons read: "Maybe you think you were handled roughly as a kid watch the way they handle Buster!". His unit remained intact and was not broken up to provide replacements, as happened to some other late-arriving divisions. [7] The General is viewed as his masterpiece: Orson Welles considered it "the greatest comedy ever madeand perhaps the greatest film ever made". 'Camera Man' unspools the colorful life of silent film star Buster Keaton: By age 5, Keaton was a star in his family's vaudeville act; he went on to star in and direct silent films, performing jaw . By 1923, Keaton was making full-length features. Joseph Frank Keaton (1895 - 1966) Joseph Frank Keatonthe silent film star belovedly known as Busterwas born the same year, 1895, that the Lumire brothers unveiled the first moving pictures to an audience of stunned Parisians. . Peter Hogue wrote in Film Comment, "Keaton is astonishing not only for what he does as an actor within the frame, but also for what he does with frame in relation to the actor. The young Keaton goaded his father by disobeying him, and the elder Keaton responded by throwing him against the scenery, into the orchestra pit, or even into the audience. When a grant that funded the program ended in 2017, the festival moved to Kansas City for a year. It's true that Keaton was born in Piqua on October 4, 1895but it wasn't his home. [70], One of his most biting parodies is The Frozen North (1922), a satirical take on William S. Hart's Western melodramas, like Hell's Hinges (1916) and The Narrow Trail (1917). Because of Keaton's success, and a notorious scandal involving Arbuckle, Comique Films was renamed Buster Keaton Productions. Fairbanks recommended Keaton to take the role[citation needed] for the remake five years later, since the film was to have a comic slant. Buster Keaton. [46] Keaton had a free hand in staging the films, within the studio's budgetary limits and using its staff writers. "[20]:17 After this, Keaton's father began to use the nickname to refer to the youngster. After Keaton's successful work with Arbuckle, Schenck gave him his own production unit, Buster Keaton Productions. Keaton had little to say about the details of the MGM contract; he would no longer have any financial responsibility for his films, and even his salary had been pre-negotiated, without his own input. Keaton starred in five films for American International Pictures: Pajama Party (1964), Beach Blanket Bingo, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, and Sergeant Deadhead (all 1965), and War Italian Style (1966, co-starring the Italian comedy team of Franco and Ciccio). After returning to the U.S. in 1919, Keaton appeared in several more Arbuckle short films such as A Country Hero (1919). In the earliest days on stage, they traveled with a medicine show that included family friend . During the railroad water-tank scene in Sherlock Jr., Keaton broke his neck when a torrent of water fell on him from a water tower, but he did not realize it until years afterwards. The break brought new opportunities for Keaton. A great primer about the history of Buster Keaton b. By Kelly Braun. But we had no luck with Keaton because he thought up his best gags himself and we couldn't steal him! According to one biographer, Keaton was made to go to school while performing in New York, but only attended for part of one day. During his first meeting with Arbuckle, he was asked to jump in and start acting. The program also promoted the release of the biographical film The Buster Keaton Story with Donald O'Connor. [52], From 1950 through 1964, Keaton made around 70 guest appearances on television variety shows, including those of Ed Sullivan and Garry Moore. Born June 2, 1922, first born son of Natalie Talmadge and comedian Buster Keaton, nephew of silent screen actresses Norma and Constance Talmadge, Jim attended Blackfox Military . Adding to his mystique was a background on the vaudeville stage with all its tricks and sleight of hand. A suitcase handle was sewn into Keaton's clothing to aid with the constant tossing. Keaton's writers included Clyde Bruckman, Joseph Mitchell, and Jean Havez, but the most ingenious gags were generally conceived by Keaton himself. Vance, Jeffrey. They were married in Mexico on January 1, 1932, before his divorce was final; then again legally in 1933. It's a knack. [47], Keaton's personal life had stabilized with his 1940 marriage to MGM dancer Eleanor Norris, and now he was taking life a little easier, abandoning Columbia for the less strenuous field of feature films. Advertisement. Three Kids. An unnamed author of Keaton's obituary in Variety, wrote, "The secret to his lasting success as a master comedian was his universally recognized character - the unhappy, doleful fall guy to whom 'everything' happened. In today's dollars that would be the equivalent of more than $600,000making it the most . (The restored version of that film, released in 2013, contains a scene where Jimmy and Culpeper talk on the telephone. The International Buster Keaton Society was founded on October 4, 1992: Keaton's birthday. I do all that but I do a lot more with my three-year-old grandson. "[5] In 1999 the American Film Institute ranked him as the 21st-greatest male star of classic Hollywood cinema.[6]. On May 29, 1940, Keaton married Eleanor Norris, who was 23 years his junior. "[14], Keaton was born into a vaudeville family in Piqua, Kansas,[15] the small town where his mother, Myra Keaton (ne Cutler), was when she went into labor. Actor: The General. [80] The hats were often destroyed during Keaton's wild film antics; some were given away as gifts and some were snatched by souvenir hunters. His impassive features gave him the nickname "The Great Stone Face.". (Read Lillian Gish's 1929 Britannica essay on silent film.) The son of . Keaton was convinced to star in a short film with Arbuckle, called The Butcher Boy (1917). Keaton's widow, Eleanor, attended for a couple of years. [23], The act ran up against laws banning child performers in vaudeville. No Beer? 3, Thames Television, 1987, Perez Gilberto 'The Material GhostOn Keaton and Chaplin' 1998. The following year, United Artists hired Keaton; he made ten shorts in the next two years. Geni requires JavaScript! [22] Decades later, Keaton said that he was never hurt by his father and that the falls and physical comedy were a matter of proper technical execution. It was followed a month later by James Curtis' biography Buster Keaton: A Filmmaker's Life. When the Educational series lapsed in 1937, Keaton returned to MGM as a gag writer, supplying material for the final three Marx Brothers MGM films: At the Circus (1939), Go West (1940), and The Big Store (1941); these were not as artistically successful as the Marxes' previous MGM features. But the laughter died Tuesday when, Piqua, Woodson County, Kansas, United States, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States, Woodland Hills, California, United States, Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills), Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California, United States, Descendants of William Peck(1601-1694) Elizabeth(Davis)Peck (1608-1683), "Buster", "The Great Stone Face", "Malec", Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California, United States, Legendary motion picture comic actor, writer, producer, and director, Actor. Buster Keaton, original name Joseph Frank Keaton IV, (born October 4, 1895, Piqua, Kansas, U.S.died February 1, 1966, Woodland Hills, California), American film comedian and director, the "Great Stone Face" of the silent screen, known for his deadpan expression and his imaginative and often elaborate visual comedy. Plus two cats, a dog, and a St. Bernard. Buster Keaton in a still from the 1927 film The General. With The Frozen North and The Playhouse. 8 'A Woman of Paris'. Service.[73]. His mother, sister and brother (and his family) all lived with him. Keaton played every role in the movie, which was set in a theater. Image via United Artists. Keaton was born into a vaudeville family. Most of these 16 films are simple visual comedies, with many of the gags supplied by Keaton himself, often recycling ideas from his family vaudeville act and his earlier films. [71] He wears a small version of Hart's campaign hat from the SpanishAmerican War and a six-shooter on each thigh, and during the scene in which he shoots the neighbor and her husband, he reacts with thick glycerin tears, a trademark of Hart's. In 1933, he married his nurse Mae Scriven during an alcoholic binge about which he afterwards claimed to remember nothing. [74][75] Critic and film historian Imogen Sara Smith stated about Keaton's style: "the coolness and subtlety of his style [is] very cinematic in terms of recognising that the camera can pick up very, very small effects".[74]. Keaton supported himself throughout the 1940s by appearing on stage in Europe and the United States, and writing gags for MGM and 20th Century-Fox. 1. [58] In 1960, he returned to MGM for the final time, playing a lion tamer in a 1960 adaptation of Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. "[40], When the studio began making talking films, Keaton was enthused about the new technology and wanted to make his next film, Spite Marriage, with sound. Keatan balanced his work in front and behind the camera very well. This channel is dedicated to the genius of Buster Keaton and family. Keaton's character emerged unscathed, due to a single open window. By this time, Keaton had further developed his distinct signature style that consisted of lucidity and precision along with acrobatics of ballistic precision and kineticism. [92] The marriage lasted until his death. He would return often. Aerial stuntmen and daredevils from around 1920s - 1940s. Username and password are case sensitive. He made me believe in make-believe." He was eventually billed as "The Little Boy Who Can't Be Damaged", and the overall act as "The Roughest Act That Was Ever in the History of the Stage". [51] Keaton had prints of the features Three Ages, Sherlock Jr., Steamboat Bill, Jr., and College (missing one reel), and the shorts "The Boat" and "My Wife's Relations", which Keaton and Rohauer then transferred to Cellulose acetate film from deteriorating nitrate film stock. As usual, Keaton performed all of his own stunts. By Dana Stevens. One of the best of this era was Grand Slam Opera. Neibaur, James L. and Terri Niemi (2013). Much more thoroughly than Chaplin, he managed a near-perfect, and highly expressive, harmony between the roles of performer and filmmaker." The actors would phonetically memorize the foreign-language scripts a few lines at a time and shoot immediately after. Please enable JavaScript in your browser's settings to use this part of Geni. Keaton, however, did not own any part of the company. So that's how he did itit hurtbut you had to care enough not to care. He had his sound debut in The Hollywood Revue of 1929, then made eight more films under his Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer contract. Whenever a TV show wanted to simulate silent-movie comedy, Keaton answered the call and guested in such successful series as The Ken Murray Show, You Asked for It, and The Garry Moore Show, and The Ed Sullivan Show. Keaton endured this treatment for two more feature films, and then exchanged his independent setup for employment at Hollywood's biggest studio, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Keaton's periodic television appearances during the 1950s and 1960s helped to revive interest in his silent films. MGM had been featuring comical musician Cliff Edwards in Keaton's films. Maltin, Leonard, The Great Movie Comedians, Bell Publishing, 1978, Buster Keaton: A Hard Act to Follow, Chap. Buster Keaton With Family Rare Candid 8x10 Photo. Throughout the story, a simple good-guys-versus-bad-guys schema is applied to the Civil War, with the Confederates being the good guys, and Johnnie's hometown of Marietta depicted as a sort of bland, folksy utopia. I just stood there, and everybody is hassling. Buster Keaton Remembered. Sgt. On May 31, 1921, Keaton was married time to Natalie Talmadge. A scene from "Our Hospitality," the feature film at the 2013 Buster Keaton Convention in Muskegon. It was too dramatic for some filmgoers expecting a lightweight comedy, and reviewers questioned Keaton's judgment in making a comedic film about the Civil War, even while noting it had a "few laughs. They are the work of a man who, after decades of obscurity, found a way to perpetuate his comic images by embracing a new medium." In 2018 filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich released The Great Buster: A Celebration, a documentary about Keaton's life, career, and legacy. In 1965, Keaton appeared in a short film written and shot by French existentialist playwright Samuel Beckett entitled simply Film. However, Thalberg did allow Keaton to stage the gags, including long stretches of pantomime, and agreed to send a crew to Keaton's own mansion for exterior shots. The studio replaced Edwards, who had substance-abuse problems, with nightclub comedian Jimmy Durante. Category: Arts & Entertainment from The Berkeley Daily Planet Friday November10,2006", "The Biggest Mistake Buster Keaton Ever Made", "Lucille The Life of Lucille Ball Kathleen Brady", "The House Next Door: 5 for the Day: James Mason", "Where's Buster? By James Curtis. Kinescopes were made for distribution of the programs to other parts of the country, since there was no transcontinental coaxial cable until September 1951. Late in his career, Keaton made cameos in Wilder's Sunset Boulevard, Chaplin's Limelight, Samuel Beckett's Film and the Twilight Zone episode "Once Upon a Time". Buster that the judge thought my mother was the bride! Buster Keaton was born in Piqua, Kansas, the small town where his mother, Myra Edith Cutler, happened to go into labor. Prikryl, Jana (July 9, 2011), "The Genius of Buster". On February 14, 2007, James Talmadge (born Joseph Talmadge Keaton) passed away peacefully with his wife of 63 years, the love of his life, Barbara Talmadge, by his side. This was witnessed by the magician Harry Houdini (or, some say, actor George Pardey), who christened the hearty boy Buster. In 1964, he told an interviewer that in making "this particular pork pie", he "started with a good Stetson and cut it down", stiffening the brim with sugar water. Employing picturesque locations, the film's storyline reenacted an actual wartime incident. Battling Butler (1926), a boxing movie, was a commercial success. Genealogy for Joseph Frank Keaton, VI (1895 - 1966) family tree on Geni, with over 240 million profiles of ancestors and living relatives. "[12] In 2018, Peter Bogdanovich released The Great Buster: A Celebration, a tribute to Keaton featuring Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, Werner Herzog and Quentin Tarantino, among others. Pioneer in Film Industry. Why did Buster Keaton stop making movies? He was a student at Blackfox Military Academy and a graduate of Santa Monica High School. [107], In 2012, Kino Lorber released The Ultimate Buster Keaton Collection, a 14-disc Blu-ray box set of Keaton's work, including 11 of his feature films.[108]. His greatest works from . He and Natalie Talmadge divorced on bitter terms in 1932. While the movie had an impressive tornado sequence and an interesting topic (a Mississippi riverboat race) which pleased critics, Steamboat Bill Jr. was not a commercial success. [49], Keaton accepted various character roles in both "A" and "B" features. With the exception of Seeing Stars, a minor publicity film produced in 1922, Limelight was the only time in which the two would ever appear together on film. His third wife was a dancer named Eleanor Ruth Norris. He was named Joseph to continue a tradition on his father's side (he was sixth in a line bearing the name Joseph Keaton)[1] and Frank for his maternal grandfather, who disapproved of his parents' union. He appeared on shows such as Playhouse 90, Route 66, and The Twilight Zone. He was born Joseph Frank Keaton on October 4, 1895, in Piqua, Kansas, the eldest of three children, including a younger brother and sister, born to two vaudevillians, Joseph Hallie Keaton and Myra Cutler. He was born in Piqua, Kansas on 1895-10-04. Best known for his silent film work, Keaton was ranked as the 21st-greatest male star of classic Hollywood cinema by the American Film Institute in 1999. In 1950, he played himself in Sunset Boulevard. Husband of Eleanor Ruth Keaton In 1994, caricaturist Al Hirschfeld penned a series of silent film stars for the United States Post Office, including Rudolph Valentino and Keaton. [93] Despite being diagnosed with cancer in January 1966, he was never told he was terminally ill. Keaton thought that he was recovering from a severe case of bronchitis. Born on October 4, 1895, in Piqua, Kansas, as Joseph Francis Keaton. In The Playhouse (1921), he parodied his contemporary Thomas H. Ince, Hart's producer, who indulged in over-crediting himself in his film productions. Go Outside. ), Keaton was so demoralized during the production of 1933's What! Jimmy assists Spencer Tracy's character, Captain C. G. Culpepper, by readying Culpepper's ultimately-unused boat for his abortive escape. By the time he was 9, his reputation as a performer had reached both coasts of the US, which Stevens' details alongside evolving child abuse and labor law reform in . Meanwhile, the eldest scion of "fun's funniest family" traveled on to New York and Ehrich House, where he arrived, according to his datebook, on January 18, 1917. . Keaton's last commercial film appearance was in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1966), which was filmed in Spain in SeptemberNovember 1965. I Image: Wikimedia Commons. You had to requisition a toothpick in triplicate. [2] He is best known for his silent film work, in which his trademark was physical comedy accompanied by a stoic, deadpan expression that earned him the nickname "The Great Stone Face". Kansas, and was the firstborn of Joseph Keaton and Myra Cutler. Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Buster Keaton With Dog Rare Candid 8x10 Photo at the best online prices at eBay! In the earliest days on stage, they traveled with a medicine show that included family friend, illusionist Harry Houdini. Joe and Myra were Vaudevillian comedians with a popular, ever-changing variety act, giving Keaton an eclectic and interesting upbringing. Alone in New York City, Buster was walking down the street when he encountered Lou Anger, an old family friend from their days on the road. ] Keaton had a free hand in staging the films, within the studio replaced,. Friend, illusionist Harry Houdini mystique was a background on the vaudeville stage with all its tricks and of... 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