Fourth Of The Big Three in Two Shorts
Watched a pair of Harry Langdons from the Mack Sennett Blu-Ray, Saturday Afternoon and Fiddlesticks. It was impulse, not planned, so I came fresh to Langdon after a while of not thinking about him (since the terrific book by Michael Hayde and Chuck Harter). Hayde does audio on Saturday Afternoon, called it probably Langdon's best short. Blackhawk had several Langdons on 8 and 16mm, this about an only way to see them outside of glimpse in a Youngson parade. Every fan of sight comedy has an opinion on what made Langdon special. And even ones who didn't like him would have to admit Langdon was something special, or at least different. A 20's public thought so, and said so in bought tickets. He was a pet rock of clowns for a short time, kept working past that, and was guilty at most of being overexposed, not his fault, but that of once-employer Mack Sennett, who had held back shorts against calculation that Langdon was approaching a peak, so why not save bread to dip in richer gravy?
Others have estimated Langdon's impact on other comedians. He made them all slow down. Audiences found that refreshing. Chaplin, Keaton, and Lloyd had applied brakes to features they graduated to, common sense dictating you couldn't run pell-mell for an hour or more. What Langdon did was bring the concept to shorts, of which philosophy had always been faster is better, fastest is best. Harry would stand still or dither for precious minutes of a two-reeler and think nothing of it. Sennett had to be convinced of good sense in that. Eventually he was. Comics as result aped Langdon outright, and the rest incorporated at least bits of him into their act. Stan Laurel was reborn in Langdon's image. Had there been no Harry, there probably would have been no Laurel and Hardy, or at least not a Laurel-Hardy like one we know. Langdon takes getting used to ... he would have admitted as much, I'm sure ... but once aboard, you're fine. Are shorts a best place to start? Probably so, as in small quantity to develop taste for anything. To try Langdon is to experience something utterly new. There's not a comedian of a past century like him, unless I've missed a copy or inspiration somewhere. Did any rising star since Langdon's late-20's height call him a role model, or after the 30's, mention him at all? Saturday Afternoon has Harry and Vernon Dent trolling sun-kissed
Fiddlesticks has Langdon turned out of a family to which he already seems alien. They don't like him or his bull fiddle, but a junk man knows how to make most of Harry's least talent, gagging from there inventive and not so indulgent of stood-still Langdon as features would be. Most of current fans have waited lifetimes for lost comedians like Langdon and Charley Chase to be truly found and lionized like they deserve. That is, by a wider public. What's actually happened is that public continuing to overlook not only Langdon and Chase, but engaging forget mechanism to Our Gang, Laurel-Hardy, Bill Fields, the lot of those for whom we thought lamps were permanently lit. I'm just glad that (barely?) enough discs can be sold for most all of Langdon's extant silents (Chase's too). It's fan-base, of course, that made this possible. Labors for love, never for profit, as how much cash could there be in old comedies, wonderful as so many of them still are.
